mailing list

Mailing lists are the second principle, along with newsgroups, by which discussion forums are organized on the Internet.

Mailing lists are based on the principle of distribution lists. Anyone with Internet access and e-mail can participate. The variety of interest groups and the number of active participants is correspondingly large.

The technology used to organize mailing list-based interest groups is very simple. Each interest group has a distribution list maintained centrally on a list server, which contains the e-mail addresses of all participants. Each contribution in the context of the respective discussion group is first sent by mailing to the address of the corresponding mailing list, from where it is forwarded to the entire distribution list.