Obviously biased towards English speaking network users, but here's my breakdown of common (more than one organization using) role-based e-mail contact addresses. I've grouped them based on my observations how sites seem to use them. Operations action noc root routing security trouble Protocol ftp gopher hostmaster mbone news ntp postmaster usenet webmaster Administrative admin abuse billing info moreinfo nic sales service support And one I wish existed Informational fyi - no action or response needed, but you might want to know about it. Or the "We know its broken, don't bother calling" address. If people agree on a common practice for naming role-based accounts, great. But since many sites still have trouble handling "postmaster" I won't hold my breath. An up-to-date "real" name, e-mail address, and telephone number somewhere for a network is still a necessity, even if just a last resort. I know we've messed up and dropped trouble tickets into a black hole. Its really tough to tell people their e-mail system isn't working when the only contact information you have is an e-mail address. When no one updates the role-base alias when the person leaves, if given the old contact's name the telephone receptionist can often tell callers the name of the new person in the position. Asking for the Postmaster may get you transferred to the shipping department instead of the computer department. Asking for the MBONE person might get you reported to the police as an obscene caller. While we're trying to agree on a common practice, may I suggest each NANO take a few minutes and do a little spring cleaning. Check at least the WHOIS contact information for your own Autonomous System Number(s) for people who no longer work there, out of date phone numbers or addresses. If you use role-based accounts, could you consider listing a person as an alternate contact. Maybe make this a twice a year event, change your clocks, change your smoke detector batteries and update your WHOIS information. -- Sean Donelan, Data Research Associates, Inc, St. Louis, MO Affiliation given for identification not representation