3.18. How do I hide the fact that I'm using a mailing list management system?

See also I want to do extensive customization of outgoing messages -- can Mailman do this? and I want to completely customize the look and feel of Mailman -- how do I do that?.

Question: I want to change the configuration of the mailing list so that all messages are addressed directly to the recipient, and the mailing list name does not appear anywhere in the headers. I also want all e-mail to appear to come from Customer.Service@mycompany.example.com, since most users will probably reply to the sender address if they have any questions. How do I set this up?

Answer: If you simply want to mail to appear as if it's from the author to each recipient individually (such as a "holiday card" email), then set the personalize option to Full Personalization in the "Non-digest Options" section of the Admin page for the list. Optionally set the reply goes to list option in "General Options" to Explicit Address, and the accompanying reply to address option to the appropriate address. You can also use the Anonymous list setting in "General Options" to "hide" a whole department behind the list address.

If you need more than that (eg, one departmental From address for several lists), the features you're asking for seem more appropriate to a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, and not a mailing list management system (such as Mailman). Any attempt to abuse a mailing list management system to function more like a CRM system is likely to be both painful and unsuccessful.

Many ISPs use a simple "POP Bulletin" system to achieve these goals, with the messages appearing to come from Customer Service and all replies being sent back to them. No mailing list management system involved at all – indeed no MTAs involved, and no extra copies of this message stored anywhere on the server, and no "deliveries" of this message to individual private mailboxes. You can achieve the same sorts of things with a shared IMAP folder system, and subscribing all users to the appropriate shared folder(s).

If you're not an ISP and you can't use "POP Bulletin" or IMAP shared folder solutions, then you'd be left with traditional CRM systems which do actually send out real e-mail messages.

Try going to www.google.com and search for "Customer Relationship Management system" to see what solutions are available that are likely to be more appropriate to your needs.

On the other hand, if you'd like to add these kinds of features to Mailman, we encourage you to join the mailman-developers mailing list and work with us to add this kind of functionality. To quote Richard Barrett on a related subject:

 MM is free, Open Software; so go for it. I am sure a well implemented enhancement
 will find other grateful users.

Converted from the Mailman FAQ Wizard

This is one of many Frequently Asked Questions.