Lyndon, For better or worse, I find those tags immensely helpful in making quick decisions about how to group messages I read (e.g., all of the traffic for one WG before looking at another). Could I search on List-ID? I guess so, but but just doing a little scanning of subject lines is, for me, faster. And "maybe" because I'm using because I'm using a very old MUA that still has features (such as IMAP disconnected mode -- not just offline or online modes) that seem to be very rare in other MUAs that support other important-to-me features and run on the platform I use. I just looked and could set up searches/ filters, but, again, it is easier and more efficient to group mail from IETF lists and then scan subject lines visually for what I want to read and in what order. My guess is you are going to find lots of different experiences and preferences about this rather than the single clear-cut situation you seem to be describing. And, yes, I wish long strings that do me no good and that, IMO, MUAs ought to be filtering out of outbound messages -- "]EXTERNAL]" is a great example -- annoying but don't want to see the baby disappear with the bathwater. best, john --On Friday, August 1, 2025 10:14 -0700 "Lyndon Nerenberg (VE7TFX/VE6BBM)" <lyndon@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > We have had the List-ID header for 24 years now. Any MUA or MDA > that can filter on "[xxx]" in the subject header can filter on > "<xxx>" in the List-ID header. The need for the [xxx] Subject > prefix tags expired long ago. > > The tags are quite annoying, in that they push the actual Subject > header text off the screen. This is especially true for lists with > long names, and is compounded when a message from > [this-is-a-verbosely-named-list] is forwarded to [this-is-another- > list-with-a-chatty-name]; pretty soon the Subject text is rendered > invisible. > > It's time the IETF retired those prefix tags from all of its > mailing lists. > > --lyndon >
