Date: Tue, 08 Oct 1996 23:45:33 -0400 Subject: Majordomo Joins the BenefitsLink Army A new software program has been configured to send the BenefitsLink Newsletter to all subscribers on a more timely and reliable basis. The software, called "Majordomo," is used by thousands of Internet mailing lists around the world. By sending a single copy of the BenefitsLink Newsletter to Majordomo, the publisher will be able to have the newsletter promptly and automatically emailed to each of the 2,200 BenefitsLink Newsletter subscribers. For prospective subscribers, Majordomo automates the process of subscribing to the BenefitsLink Newsletter. It is no longer necessary to fill in a special online form while browsing the BenefitsLink Web site. All that's needed is an email message (see details below). Any interested person with an Internet-accessible email address (including AOL, CompuServe and Prodigy) is invited to subscribe. (Majordomo already knows you are a current subscriber if this newsletter is addressed to your email address, so you will NOT need to use Majordomo to resubscribe.) If you're familiar with Majordomo, you probably know that such a mailing list program usually is configured to permit subscribers to add their own messages, which then are rebroadcast automatically to each of the mailing list subscribers. The BenefitsLink Newsletter is a "one-way" configuration, however; any comments or questions you submit to newsletter@benefitslink.com (by using your email program's "reply" command now, for example) will be read by the BenefitsLink Newsletter's editor--and are invited--but will not be echoed. Such online discussions of current employee benefits issues are taking place NOW in the new, free "message boards" that appear on the BenefitsLink Web site at http://www.benefitslink.com. They are proving extremely popular and easy to use! A message board is like a two-way mailing list because you have the ability to post a message for others to read (e.g., a benefits question), but your message is posted to a Web page rather than via email-- so it stays online longer and is more likely to attract an answer. Check out the BenefitsLink message boards at http://www.benefitslink.com, including the new "Coffeehouse" message board for mingling. (We've attracted some fine actuary joke contributions, but I'm afraid the attorney jokes have not even begun.) --Dave Baker, Editor