Re: DMARC: perspectives from a listadmin of large open-source lists

[Dave Crocker <[e-mail]>]

On 4/8/2014 2:13 AM, Sabahattin Gucukoglu wrote:
> On 8 Apr 2014, at 06:16, Robin H. Johnson <[e-mail]> wrote:
>> And don't start on suggesting Reply-To instead, RFC 2822 already
>> noted that it should be set by the author, not the list software [1].
>
> Not that I disagree, but be sure to read the note in RFC 5598 s5.3.


Section 5.3 has no "note". I assume you mean the portion on mailing lists:

      5.3. Mailing Lists
      ...
       RFC5322.Reply-To:  Set by - Mediator or original Author

          Although problematic, it is common for a Mailing List to assign
          its own addresses to the Reply-To: header field of messages
          that it posts.  This assignment is intended to ensure that
          replies go to all list members, rather than to only the
          original Author.  As a User Actor, a Mailing List is the Author
          of the new message and can legitimately set the Reply-To:
          value.  As a Mediator attempting to represent the message on
          behalf of its original Author, creating or modifying a
          Reply-To: field can be viewed as violating that Author's
          intent.  When the Reply-To is modified in this way, a reply
          that is meant only for the original Author will instead go to
          the entire list.  When the Mailing List does not set the field,
          a reply meant for the entire list can instead go only to the
          original Author.  At best, either choice is a matter of group
          culture for the particular list.


To the extent anyone wants to claim that this is in conflict with RFC 
5322, it's helpful to remember that a mailing list is a 'mediator' and 
not an MTA.

So it took delivery of a message and is posting a /new/ one.  In formal 
terms, the "author" of the new message is the mailing list; hence it 
gets to set Reply-To...

Consequently, the ending clause in "it should be set by the author, not 
the list software" is not correct.


d/

-- 
Dave Crocker
Brandenburg InternetWorking
bbiw.net