How to best send email to a low volume list?

[chris]

I need to maintain a list of subscribers to an email list for a
"newsletter" that will be sent via a web form probably once a month.
I anticipate low numbers--tens to maybe one hundred subscribers at the
most. Just curious what the best way to code this is. Should I just
loop through the addresses and send one-off emails to each, or is it
better to somehow send to every recipient in one shot? One thing I
would like to avoid in the latter scenario is each recipient being
able to see the entire list of recipients. Also don't want to trigger
any kind of spam thing on my web host by sending out too many emails.

Anyway, any tips appreciated.

Thanks,
Chris

 

[Adam Lanier]

I need to maintain a list of subscribers to an email list for a
"newsletter" that will be sent via a web form probably once a month.
I anticipate low numbers--tens to maybe one hundred subscribers at the
most. Just curious what the best way to code this is. Should I just
loop through the addresses and send one-off emails to each, or is it
better to somehow send to every recipient in one shot? One thing I
would like to avoid in the latter scenario is each recipient being
able to see the entire list of recipients. Also don't want to trigger
any kind of spam thing on my web host by sending out too many emails.

Anyway, any tips appreciated.

Thanks,
Chris

Before you reinvent the wheel, you should look into using a mailing list
manager, Mailman for example:

http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/index.html

Regardless, confirmed double-opt-in should be a requirement as should a
mechanism for subscribers to unsubscribe themselves.

Using a 'list address' as the from address and using bcc addressing will
prevent your recipients from being able to see all the other recipient
addresses.

 

[Shane Geiger]

A mailing list manager is really overkill for what he is trying to do
*IF* he is not maintaining a discussion list. A "newsletter" list
doesn't sound like a discussion list, especially since he wants to hide
the email addresses of the other people.

If you want to manage your mailing list in a mail client like Mozilla
Thunderbird, you can export them in CSV format. You could put some
string in a certain field that would denote that someone is on the
mailing list, and you could compile the email addresses rather easily
and send out a message via the mailto: protocol (which I will use via
the 'open' command available in MacOSX).

import os

subject = '' # note: you will have problems if you insert certain
characters.
body = '' # You are better off simply writing the message subject
and body once your mail client starts up.

to = ''
cc = ''
bcc=','.join("""(e-mail address removed)
(e-mail address removed)
(e-mail address removed)
(e-mail address removed)
(e-mail address removed)""".splitlines())
addresses = ''

headers = 'TO=' + to + '&CC=' + cc + '&BCC=' + bcc
url = 'mailto:' + addresses + '?subject=' + subject + '&' + headers +
'&body=' + body
os.system('open ' + url)


Contact me off list if you would like a little code to help you even
more. I suspect there is a little bug in this code, but the idea is there.

Before you reinvent the wheel, you should look into using a mailing list
manager, Mailman for example:

http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/index.html

Regardless, confirmed double-opt-in should be a requirement as should a
mechanism for subscribers to unsubscribe themselves.

Using a 'list address' as the from address and using bcc addressing will
prevent your recipients from being able to see all the other recipient
addresses.

--
Shane Geiger
IT Director
National Council on Economic Education
(e-mail address removed) | 402-438-8958 | http://www.ncee.net

Leading the Campaign for Economic and Financial Literacy

 

[Steven D'Aprano]

A mailing list manager is really overkill for what he is trying to do
*IF* he is not maintaining a discussion list.

It's not overkill at all. Mailman is easy to install (at least on a Red
Hat based Linux system, your mileage may vary elsewhere) and easy to use
*and* for bonus marks it's written in Python.

A "newsletter" list
doesn't sound like a discussion list, especially since he wants to hide
the email addresses of the other people.

There's more to running a mailing list than just sending emails. How do
you handle archives, the invariable complaints of missing newsletters,
requests for subscriptions, unsubscriptions, and temporary "I'll be on
holiday for a month, don't email me until I return" requests? And even if
it is not a discussion list, people expect to be able to write back to
the author/editor of the newsletter.

 

[Benjamin M. A'Lee]

It's not overkill at all. Mailman is easy to install (at least on a Red
Hat based Linux system, your mileage may vary elsewhere) and easy to use
*and* for bonus marks it's written in Python.

There's very little that Mailman is not overkill for. Running as a
daemon and managing its own queue is completely unneccessary; that's
what the MTA is for.

Enemies of Carlotta is also written in Python, except it's written sanely.

http://liw.iki.fi/liw/eoc/ or 'enemies-of-carlotta' in Debian.

Alternatively, SmartList is written as a set of procmail filters;
available from http://procmail.org/ or 'smartlist' in Debian.

There's more to running a mailing list than just sending emails. How do
you handle archives, the invariable complaints of missing newsletters,
requests for subscriptions, unsubscriptions, and temporary "I'll be on
holiday for a month, don't email me until I return" requests? And even if
it is not a discussion list, people expect to be able to write back to
the author/editor of the newsletter.

Being able to reply to the author/editor is something that has been
possible via email for 25+ years. You don't need a mailing list
manager for it.

--
Benjamin A'Lee :: (e-mail address removed)
http://subvert.org.uk/~bma/
"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill
in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." - Voltaire

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