RPD Mailing List Setup and Guidelines

Details

Name of Proposal	RPD mailing list setup and guidelines	Status:	Under Discussion
ID:	AFPUB-2026-GEN-004-DRAFT01	Date Submitted:	17/10/2026
Author(s):	Benson Muite benson_muite[at]emailplus.org	Version:	1.0
Obsoletes:	None	Amends:	New sections
Sections of Policy Manual affected:	3.4	Related Policies:	None

1. Summary of the problem being addressed by this proposal

Discussion for new policies occurs on a mailing list. Many people use threads to enable efficient reading of the mailing list. For mailing lists with high activity, people often subscribe to digests. When people reply to digests, the metadata associated with a thread can be lost, making it time consuming to follow a related discussion.

Should AFRINIC decide on alternative means of electronic discussion of policy proposals other than mailing lists, then these new sections of the CPM would also need to be updated.

2. Summary of how this proposal addresses the problem

The proposal asks that AFRINIC disables digest mode on email lists that receive less than 20 submissions per day on average over a 2 month period. It also asks that AFRINIC display on its website mailing list software used, and add a guide to participating in the RPD mailing list.

Proposal

The proposal adds the following new sections to section 3.4 of the AFRINIC CPM:

3.4.1.1 AFRINIC should maintain a webpage with a description explaining how to engage on the RPD mailing list. The description should explain that only plain text emails should be used, how to start a new discussion topic and ho2 to reply to an email on a particular discussion topic and any email filtering or bounce rules that the mailing list software has. The mailing list software used and its version should also be displayed on the webpage.

3.4.1.2 The RPD mailing list must not allow subscription using digest mode unless over the preceeding two month period, more than 20 emails are sent to the list on average on each day. Should this threshold be exceeded, digest mode subscriptions may be turned on and kept on, unless over any next two month period, the threshold is not exceeded.

3.4.1.3 If subscribing to the RPD mailing list using digest mode is enabled, replies to a digest should be discarded and an automated message sent to the person sending a discarded message letting them know how they can reply to a specific message, preserving appropriate metadata or how to start a new discussion topic.

References

1. https://www.snort.org/faq/what-is-the-mailing-list-etiquette
2. https://man.sr.ht/lists.sr.ht/etiquette.md
3. http://linux.sgms-centre.com/misc/netiquette.php
4. https://www.ietf.org/participate/lists/