On 23/01/2008, Wiebe van der Worp wiebe@vrijschrift.org wrote:
With a list with a lot of members you don't want to approve membership manually. Besides, based on his name only it is hard to distrust spammer williamromsay at gmail.com (btw he is still on this list...). On the other hand manual membership approval may be the only solution for now because a look at the membership list shows several accounts I wouldn't trust. Tough decision to make.
On wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org all new members are set to moderated until their first message is approved. This is a massive pain in the backside and no-one ever clears the list quickly enough for the aggrieved new subscribers. I advise against it on nuisance grounds unless and until problematic posters (spammers and trolls - it was address-changing trolls we had to do it to fight) make it the only feasible option.
- d.