
Hitchhikers Guide to the Internet (RFC 1118) (1989) - DanBC
https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1118
======
DanBC

        The way most people keep up to date on network news is through
        subscription to a number of mail reflectors (also known as mail
        exploders).  Mail reflectors are special electronic mailboxes which,
        when they receive a message, resend it to a list of other mailboxes.
        This in effect creates a discussion group on a particular topic.
        Each subscriber sees all the mail forwarded by the reflector, and if
        one wants to put his "two cents" in sends a message with the comments
        to the reflector.
    

I wish they were still called mail exploders.

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DrScump
" _When the Internet was designed it was to have about 50 connected networks.
With the explosion of networking, the number is now approaching 1000._ "

Yikes!

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iraphael
Is there a mailing list for discussions of currently-proposed RFCs? I couldn't
find it on ietf's website.

e: I may have found it: [https://www.rfc-editor.org/mailman/listinfo/rfc-
interest](https://www.rfc-editor.org/mailman/listinfo/rfc-interest)

~~~
marcosdumay
Oh, God.

"You may enter a privacy password below. This provides only mild security, but
should prevent others from messing with your subscription. Do not use a
valuable password as it will occasionally be emailed back to you in
cleartext."

"If you choose not to enter a password, one will be automatically generated
for you, and it will be sent to you once you've confirmed your subscription.
You can always request a mail-back of your password when you edit your
personal options. Once a month, your password will be emailed to you as a
reminder."

~~~
TeMPOraL
A nice relic of times when we trusted each other more and didn't feel the need
to crypto-secure everything, including your cat's social media profiles :).

~~~
DanBC
... except it's an active mail list, with current discussion. Interestingly
the submitted article ends with this para:

    
    
        Security Considerations
    
        Security and privacy protection is a serious matter and too often
        nothing is done about it.  There are some known security bugs
        (especially in access control) in BSD Unix and in some
        implementations of network services.  The hitchhikers guide does not
        discuss these issues (too bad).

~~~
TeMPOraL
I meant the GNU Mailman being a huge relic :).

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satyajeet23
A good read!

