# Posting via email best practices

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100>\
**Category:** Community Building\
**Created:** [2017年十一月15日 13:07 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100 "2017-11-15T13:07:42Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Fsantiago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Fsantiago](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Fsantiago)\
**Post date:** [2017年十一月15日 13:07 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100/1 "2017-11-15T13:07:42Z")

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Hello discourse community. On my discourse site, in the category about topics, I advertise the posting email address for that category and mention it’s for trusted users above a certain level. I post the address as a png image rather than text to try to avoid spammers skimming it off my site with automated bots.

As I look around other discourse forums, I see no one else advertising post via email addresses. Is this feature typically used only by staff and not advertised?

Am I doing right? Best? Any opinions out there that can be offered to me? Thanks everyone.

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**Author:** ![pfaffman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/pfaffman/32/120154_2.png) [@pfaffman](https://meta.discourse.org/u/pfaffman)\
**Post date:** [2017年十一月15日 13:13 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100/2 "2017-11-15T13:13:06Z")

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It’s sort of a fringe use. I suspect it’s most often used in communities where people were already accustomed to posting by sending an email to a certain address.

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**Author:** ![Fsantiago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Fsantiago](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Fsantiago)\
**Post date:** [2017年十一月15日 13:16 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100/3 "2017-11-15T13:16:24Z")

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Ok so for example using discourse to replace a mailman style mailing list? I also run one of those too…

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**Author:** ![pfaffman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/pfaffman/32/120154_2.png) [@pfaffman](https://meta.discourse.org/u/pfaffman)\
**Post date:** [2017年十一月15日 13:19 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100/4 "2017-11-15T13:19:46Z")

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Right. I think that’s probably the biggest use for email-to-a-category. Import the list to the category & point the mail to it.

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**Author:** ![jomaxro](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/jomaxro/32/126216_2.png) [@jomaxro](https://meta.discourse.org/u/jomaxro)\
**Post date:** [2017年十一月15日 14:01 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/posting-via-email-best-practices/74100/5 "2017-11-15T14:01:51Z")

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I know a number of sites don’t advertise it, but use it in another system for automated reports. For example, users can “generate a bug report” from a game which is then emailed into Discourse using the email-in feature. This way the email is never revealed to anyone.