More McHenry County Blog

Here was the reply from the Federal government:
Your command:

SUBSCRIBE NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 Anonymous

has been received. You must now reply to this message (as explained
below) to complete your subscription. The purpose of this confirmation
procedure is to make sure that you have indeed requested to be added to
the list.

To confirm, you must reply to the present message and type "ok" (without
the quotes) as the text of your message. Just the word "ok" - do not
retype the command. This procedure will work with any mail program that
fully conforms to the Internet standards for electronic mail. If you
receive an error message, try sending a new message to
LISTSERV@LS1.HOUSE.GOV (without using the "reply" function - this is very
important) and type "ok 4E3A96C1" as the text of your message.

Finally, your command will be cancelled automatically if LISTSERV does
not receive your confirmation within 48. After that time, you must start
over and resend the command to get a new confirmation code. If you change
your mind and decide that you do NOT want to confirm the command, simply
discard the present message and let the request expire on its own.

------------------------- Original mail header --------------------------
Received: from norma.house.gov (norma.house.gov [143.228.150.136])
by ls1.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/0.00.00) with ESMTP id jBUH5sPa013557
for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:54 -0500 (EST)
Received: from heoc-www6.house.gov (heoc-www6.house.gov [143.228.144.189])
by norma.house.gov with ESMTP id jBUH5rHF021808
for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 –0500
Received: from heoc-www6.house.gov (localhost [127.0.0.1])
by heoc-www6.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/0.00.00) with ESMTP id jBUH5r3l011631
for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
Received: (from webforms@localhost)
by heoc-www6.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/8.12.2/Submit) id jBUH5rrm011630
for listserv@ls1.house.gov; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
Message-Id: <200512301705.jBUH5rrm011630@heoc-www6.house.gov>
To: listserv@ls1.house.gov
Subject: Kirk Newsletter Subscription confirmation
From: calskinner@comcast.net
So, I typed “ok” in the message portion and left it out of the title line.

Here’s how Google handles search requests. I got this immediately on my screen:

Google Alert Created
Your Google Alert request [ Mark Kirk ] has been created and a verification email has been sent to calskinner@comcast.net.
You will not receive Google Alerts on this topic until you click the link in the verification email and confirm your request.


Return to the Google Alerts home page to create more alerts.

Then, I received this email:

Google received a request to start sending Alerts for the search
[ Mark Kirk ] to calskinner@comcast.net.

Verify this Google Alert request:
http://www.google.com/alerts/verify?s=96813f29cb80978b&f=1

Cancel this Google Alert request:
http://www.google.com/alerts/remove?s=96813f29cb80978b

Thanks,
The Google Alerts Team
http://www.google.com/alerts

One click and the daily alerts start coming. The instructions are even in little boxes to make it easy.

And, here’s the message the second time I tried to follow the federal government’s sign-up directions:
ok
Unfortunately, the confirmation code could not be extracted from the headers
generated by your mail program. You will have to retype this code manually,
as explained in the confirmation request you were sent. If you have lost it,
just send the command again to get a new confirmation code.
So, I sent it a third time. Maybe I’ll get it right this time.

Nope, here’s the reply I got:
Your message is being returned to you unprocessed because no command was found
in the message body. LISTSERV expects commands in the body of the message
rather than in the message subject because some users have no control over the
contents of the "Subject:" field on outgoing messages.

Of course, that’s what I sent the second time. I’ll send it in caps this fourth time.

Didn’t work then either. Here’s my next instruction:
OK
Unfortunately, the confirmation code could not be extracted from the headers
generated by your mail program. You will have to retype this code manually,
as explained in the confirmation request you were sent. If you have lost it,
just send the command again to get a new confirmation code.

So, I read through the original garbage again and see they want a “confirmation code,” which I find and type in next to “ok.”

You can conclude that I cannot read or that I do not have the patience to de-code instructions that are written in the style of those of a cheap toy produced in China with “some assembly required.”

This is the United States. Why doesn’t the government try English?

IT WORKED!

Now, the Feds want me to save the email message, so I will. Right here:
Fri, 30 Dec 2005 13:17:45

Your subscription to the NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 list (Hero Newsletter 2004)
has been accepted.

Please save this message for future reference, especially if this is the
first time you are subscribing to an electronic mailing list. If you ever
need to leave the list, you will find the necessary instructions below.
Perhaps more importantly, saving a copy of this message (and of all
future subscription notices from other mailing lists) in a special mail
folder will give you instant access to the list of mailing lists that you
are subscribed to. This may prove very useful the next time you go on
vacation and need to leave the lists temporarily so as not to fill up
your mailbox while you are away! You should also save the "welcome
messages" from the list owners that you will occasionally receive after
subscribing to a new list.

You may leave the list at any time by sending a "SIGNOFF
NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10" command to LISTSERV@LS1.HOUSE.GOV. You can also
tell LISTSERV how you want it to confirm the receipt of messages you send
to the list. If you do not trust the system, send a "SET
NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 REPRO" command and LISTSERV will send you a copy of
your own messages, so that you can see that the message was distributed
and did not get damaged on the way. After a while you may find that this
is getting annoying, especially if your mail program does not tell you
that the message is from you when it informs you that new mail has
arrived from NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10. If you send a "SET
NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 ACK NOREPRO" command, LISTSERV will mail you a short
acknowledgement instead, which will look different in your mailbox
directory. With most mail programs you will know immediately that this is
an acknowledgement you can read later. Finally, you can turn off
acknowledgements completely with "SET NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 NOACK
NOREPRO".

Following instructions from the list owner, your subscription options
have been set to "REPRO ACK CONCEAL MIME" rather than the usual LISTSERV
defaults. For more information about subscription options, send a "QUERY
NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10" command to LISTSERV@LS1.HOUSE.GOV.

More information on LISTSERV commands can be found in the LISTSERV
reference card, which you can retrieve by sending an "INFO REFCARD"
command to LISTSERV@LS1.HOUSE.GOV.
And, here’s still another confirmation email:
LS1.HOUSE.GOV LISTSERV Server (14.4) wrote:
Unknown command - "LS1.HOUSE.GOV". Try HELP.

>>Your command:
>>
>> SUBSCRIBE NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 Anonymous
>>
>>has been received. You must now reply to this message (as explained
>>below) to complete your subscription. The purpose of this confirmation
>>procedure is to make sure that you have indeed requested to be added to
>>the list.
>>
>>To confirm, you must reply to the present message and type "ok" (without
>>the quotes) as the text of your message. Just the word "ok" - do not
>>retype the command. This procedure will work with any mail program that
>>fully conforms to the Internet standards for electronic mail. If you
>>receive an error message, try sending a new message to
>>LISTSERV@LS1.HOUSE.GOV (without using the "reply" function - this is very
>>important) and type "ok 4E3A96C1" as the text of your message.
>>
>>Finally, your command will be cancelled automatically if LISTSERV does
>>not receive your confirmation within 48. After that time, you must start
>>over and resend the command to get a new confirmation code. If you change
>>your mind and decide that you do NOT want to confirm the command, simply
>>discard the present message and let the request expire on its own.
>>
>>------------------------- Original mail header --------------------------
>>Received: from norma.house.gov (norma.house.gov [143.228.150.136])
>> by ls1.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/0.00.00) with ESMTP id jBUH5sPa013557
>> for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:54 -0500 (EST)
>>Received: from heoc-www6.house.gov (heoc-www6.house.gov [143.228.144.189])
>> by norma.house.gov with ESMTP id jBUH5rHF021808
>> for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500
>>Received: from heoc-www6.house.gov (localhost [127.0.0.1])
>> by heoc-www6.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/0.00.00) with ESMTP id jBUH5r3l011631
>> for ; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
>>Received: (from webforms@localhost)
>> by heoc-www6.house.gov (8.12.10+Sun/8.12.2/Submit) id jBUH5rrm011630
>> for listserv@ls1.house.gov; Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
>>Date: Fri, 30 Dec 2005 12:05:53 -0500 (EST)
>>Message-Id: <200512301705.jBUH5rrm011630@heoc-www6.house.gov>
>>To: listserv@ls1.house.gov
>>Subject: Kirk Newsletter Subscription confirmation
>>From: calskinner@comcast.net
>>
>>
>>

> ok 4E3A96C1
Confirming:
> SUBSCRIBE NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 Anonymous
You have been added to the NEWSLETTER-HERO-IL10 list. Your subscription has
been made anonymous; only the list owner will be able to see that you have
joined the list. Please note however that posting to the list could reveal
your name and e-mail address. In other words, you can only remain anonymous
as long as you do not say anything on the list.

# posted by Cal Skinner : 8:26 AM