What is a Mailing List or Listserv?
Internet mailing lists are discussion groups in which participants share information with a large community of people with similar interests. Participants send one message to the list and it is automatically transmitted to all list members. Lists are usually made up of people discussing their favorite topics by e-mail. For example, middle school teachers can join the free public list, Middle-L, to meet other middle school teachers from all over the world and talk about middle school issues via e-mail. The mailing list format lends itself to calm, thoughtful, literate, mature discussion, where relationships between the list members actually grow and deepen over an extended period of time. Most Internet experts feel that the mailing list format is the most civilized type of online community.
