New in March (2007)

If you send a "special announcement" email to the group it shows info @ meetup email address

in the From: address, yes. But the Reply-to: address has your email address, otherwise the recipient couldn't reply to your special announcement by email, only via the website.

Timothy

I was doing a test run on the email list as a regular message to those who subscribed. I had one remember reply and I went ahead and approved it this morning to test it. The message didn't come out till late late tonight. I'm using this email list in case anybody wants to make last minute plans for days we don't have events scheduled. But if the turn-a-round for the emails to be sent are over 10 hours long then there's no point in my group having it. Also it'd probably be pretty confusing.

Is anybody else having this problem or just me?

Jennn --

When the X group ran its test the time delays were in the run of the five to ten minute range. Which wasn't too bad, except that Shay and I were so enthusiastic in our e-mails back and forth that we kept crossing each other and replying to stuff that were 2-3 e-mails in the past.

Hmm

It's an inherent problem with email, a system invented on the internet back in *mumble* when I was a mere lad. Email can perfectly happily take up to 7 days to be delivered and be considered successful. (failure to do so (for what appears to be a genuine email address) within 7 days will result in a bounce)

That's one of the many things that message boards on websites were designed to alleviate. Along with threading, being able to put important threads in a prominent place, providing some level of privacy, and preventing overloaded inboxes...

[

Every Meetup group is assigned a unique email address. For example, pug.meetup.com/45 would get pug-45@meetup.com.

A group member sends a message to the group email address.

The message is emailed to everyone on the mailing list.

The message is archived in the Messages section of your group's site.


WHAT ABOUT THE RECIPIENTS!

I AM AN ORGANIZER AND ALSO A PARTICIPANT IN NUMEROUS MEETUP GROUPS. I SET UP MY EMAIL WITH A RULE THAT EVERYTHING FROM MEETUP GOES INTO A NICE TIDY MEETUP FOLDER. I GET TOO MANY PER DAY TO LOOK AT EACH AND EVERY ONE.

THIS WAS A VERY POORLY THOUGHT OUT IDEA. AM I TO SET UP A RULE FOR EVERY GROUP, ORGANIZER AND ASSISTANT?

I ALSO HATE EMAIL CONVERSATION CHAIN MAILS. I DON'T WANT MORE DISTRACTING EMAILS WHILE I WORK.

IT WAS WORKING FINE. I WAS HAPPY WITH IT THE WAY IT WAS.

FACEBOOK HERE I COME!

One of the features that I liked about Meetup was that it was participant opt in/opt out. Participants chose which groups they wanted to be in and whether they wanted email. Simple. Effective.

What's all the huff about?

If you don't like the mailing lists, don't use them. Just use your message board as you always have. Simple as that. You organizers are acting pretty unprofessional by bitching over a new OPTION.

The option as you say becomes forced once you turn it on, because there's no way to turn it off!!

So if you turned it on to test it and check it out like most did, then you're screwed.

Kimberly

Okay... I've found some stuff that I like about this change so long as I don't enable the mailing list function.

I like being able to e-mail my group with an announcement, even if I'm not signed in.

I am thawing to the mailing list archive tab. A repository of past e-mail announcements from the organizational team could prove a useful record.

I really like having the same edit toolbar available for email as is available on the message boards. It's nice to be able to send HTML formatted e-mails to my group for announcements, like this one.

Having the red and bold to highlight certain aspects of the message made this one a bit more readable.

I have taken to writing my announcements on the message boards first, and then copying them to e-mail. The advantage of this is that I can then provide a link in the e-mail to the corresponding post on the message board for further discussion.

(I still miss that little button I used to be able to click to post these messages on the board directly, however.)

Hmm

Hi Hilary,

Okay... I've found some stuff that I like about this change so long as I don't enable the mailing list function.

I like being able to e-mail my group with an announcement, even if I'm not signed in.

...

Does this mean ANYONE can use the e-mail system without logging in? For example, could I e-mail all the members of your scifiwriting group by using the standard mailto format?

-- Todd

What's all the huff about?

If you don't like the mailing lists, don't use them. Just use your message board as you always have. Simple as that. You organizers are acting pretty unprofessional by bitching over a new OPTION.

The Meetup members here who are up in arms against these changes are not "bitching" because they enjoy being negative. No. It is because the new features seem to change the way we manage our groups and therefore add to our workload, and they don't seem like they are optional.

Many of us here organize large groups (400+ members), and again many organize more than one group, of all sizes. Many are professionals in the world of work and/or have very responsible jobs (including the very important, time consuming and responsible job of raising children while managing the home); and in their respective worlds most I imagine would speak out and ask questions when something is going to signifcantly affect their time, and affect their ability to meet the responsibilities they've take on.

Many of us organize groups because we first want to, but later also because we feel an obligation to keep our growing/evolving groups going - even if it means communicating in the wee hours of the morning just to keep up. As Meetup Organizers we rely on the Meetup.com system/ interface to assist us in doing our respective good works in a timely and organized manner, while being vigilant to the rights and privacy of our members... and doing all of this voluntarily. We do benefit from the process of organizing: from the satisfaction of creating great events and maintaining stimulating forums for our members. Many of us take our contributions to our respective communities pretty seriously.

Don't misunderstand. We're not here to be a thorn for Meetup, although some of us are losing respect with each rollout when it's apparent there is an undue lack of testing procedures and best practices.

But we're also the folks who are the most vocal when things are going well... If Meetup takes away unnecessary steps to perform our good works and we're thankful for providing the means to do things more efficiently, most of us here strive to relay our appreciation via kudos and positive feedback to Meetup via personal notes, and in this forum.

In systems rolling out to large communities, planning, communication, testing, and adoption are huge challenges not easily overcome.

I'd like to suggest this heated debate is a result of confusion (i.e., lack of communication). Perhaps it has been borne from a variety of reactions from hard-working organizers around what this all means. So, what does it all mean? In seemingly simple changes to workflow, group management, the way we as organizers communicate with our members, and how groups communicate within themselves, we should be able to figure this out and work with it even if it means a huge learning curve, fear of more work to our already busy plates, etc. Each possible change to workflow, group management, and the way we communicate could be considered "simple" to some and signficant to others... All tolled, our complaints mount and we react.

What shouldn't fuel the fire is Meetup's response. We should be told the communication that was attempted, a clear description of the the consultation process which resulted in these changes, and perhaps more significantly, tangible evidence that what has been provided (and taken away) is an improvement over what was there before (or best practices, or quantitative industry evidence)...

Anyway, IMVHO, it is not possible to tune out and simply "not use" the new features. The changes affect the everyday practice of managing our groups, and it is obvious the new features are woven through the fabric of this build of the Meetup system/interface.

Again, it is not possible to simply "not use" the new features... specifically, here are some changes I've observed with the new features "turned off". I may be wrong, but it all points to an eventual adoption of Mailing Lists by all:

• Whether we want it or not, the Mailing List Archive is located on the Messages page - at a minimum, dividing "announcements" on the Archive from "discussions" on the Message Board. What seems short sighted with this division is that organizers often use the announcement posted to the Message Board strategically, i.e.:
  
  
  
  • To invite discussion about things like carpooling and things to bring, future events of the same kind (of course, we can create a new discussion thread on the Message Board but this now forces an extra step in our workflow);
    
  • In my experience, it is most helpful to post the announcement to the message board when it is announced because instead of the organizer of a large group receiving yet another query from a member via email, if someone posts a question to this thread someone else will undoubtedly help and answer the question for the organizer, thus taking away pressure from the organizer;
    
  • By posting the announcement to the message board, the organizer is aware of the extra advertising to the group as it will spawn a What's New item on the Welcome page (further announcing the event to those who scan the Welcome page)
  
  
• The concept of mailing lists is now apparent in new messages sent to the group (or part of the group), and are not optional to the organizer:
  
  
  
  • The "subject" line now shows the originating group - while this is somewhat helpful as an identifier, it infers a "mailing list", something many of us are not interested in using (especially those with large groups) unless we "want" to use it
    
  • The format of the new messages out via the "mailing list" is new and we don't have control over it as other sites might alow - it is now sent out with a mix of fonts. This is a change from the text-only messages as before. While it's fine the problem comes in when the email is tossed around: If sent off to another and received again, the resulting mix of fonts and colors (specified by the mailer's client and not necessarily indicative of what the senders want to be sending, adding yet another layer of complexity to the situation)
    
  • The change is the organizer/sender not being able to specify to keep their email address private; we cannot turn this off, or ignore it if it's important to us! It's built into the system.
    
  
  
• Then there's the Membership and Communications tab on the Account page:
  
  
  
  • With Mailing Lists turned off, the whole communication management section shows what is available and what is not available for the group.
    
  • Here, the options "I would like to receive messages from mailing lists? " provides the options for using the various levels of features of the Mailing List, even if it has not been turned on
    
    
  • By showing that the "Organizer has not turned on Mailing Lists for this group", infers to members that for some reason the organizer has chosen not to enable some potentially useful features for the group. Some members will think they know better than the orgainzer and insist on the use of mailing lists within the group -- causing divisiveness
    
  • Eventually, the ensuing discussions and arguments within the groups from members who want to use mailing lists (whether or not it is actually good or better for the group), force the group - and all groups (with forcefull/vocal members and/or with cross membership) to use the Mailing list feature.
    

Trish