Dear Listers,
I was thinking that perhaps I should explain why I have a Fund Raiser and
also take the opportunity to express why I think the List Services here
provide a far better experience than the commercial equivalents.
I use the List Fund Raiser each year to offset the costs involved with
running a high performance email list site such as this one. With the
annual support from the List members through the PBS-like Fund Raiser, I
have found I can run the entire site without having to inflect any of the
members with those annoying banner ads flashing up all the time trying to
sell Toner Cartridge Refills or other garbage nobody wants or needs. From
the comments I've received over the years regarding the Lists, the great
majority of the members really appreciate the non-commercialism of my List
systems and don't mind my 'go-team-go' banter once a year to encourage
members to support the Lists.
I believe that the Lists services that I provide here offer a great many
benefits over the commercial equivalents in a number of ways. The first
feature I believe to be particularly significant is that you *cannot*
receive a computer v*rus from any of my Lists directly. I've been on a few
other List servers and have been unfortunate enough to download infected
files people have innocently or not-so-innocently included with their
posts. This just can't happen with my Lists; each incoming message is
filtered and attachments stripped off prior to posting. I provide a Photo
and File Share feature that allows members to share files and bitmaps with
other members and everyone can be assured that these files will be
prescanned for any sort of v*rus before they are posted. Safe and
simple. Also, with this photo and file sharing technique, the Archives
don't get loaded up with a huge amounts of bitmap "data" that slows the
Archive Search times.
Another feature of this system is the extensive List Archives that are
available for download, browsing, and searching. The Archives go all the
way back to the very beginning of each List and with the super fast Search
Engine, the huge size of the Archives is a non-issue in quickly finding the
data you're looking for. Another feature of the Archives, in my opinion,
is that they have been primarily stripped of all the useless email header
data and all the other header garbage that seems to build up in a typical
email thread.
I have received an extremely positive response from Listers regarding the
List Browse feature and the consensus is that the format and ease of use is
outstanding. Members report that having the previous 7 days worth of
messages on line for easy browsing and sorting is hugely beneficial. And
again, as with the real time distribution of List email, the messages are
stripped of all the unnecessary email headers and potentially dangerous
v*ruses.
I've been running email Lists and services under the matronics.com domain
since about 1989 starting with RV-List and 30 guys who I knew and who where
also building RVs. It has grown into over 40 different aviation-related
Email Lists and an associated web site that receives over 10,000,000 hits
each year!! Additionally, the List email system forwards well over
90,000,000 (yes, that 90 MILLION) email messages to subscribers each
year! With all the dot.bombs these days, I think there's a lot of value in
supporting a service that has gone the long haul and is still providing and
improving a high quality service at a price that's nearly free.
I have to admit running these Lists is a labor of love and I hope it shows
in the quality of the experience that you receive when you get a List Email
Message, Search the Archives, or use the List Browser. The Lists will be
here for a long time to come. If you just want to lurk a while for free,
that's great and I encourage you to do so. If you use, appreciate, and
receive value from these Lists, then please support them during the Annual
List Fund Raiser!
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The SSL Secure Web Site:
http://www.matronics.com/contribution
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Thank you,
Matt Dralle
Email List Administrator
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