?

Win,

> I’ve just joined here, thanks for the link Shal.

You're welcome. You're posterid #566,976 at Groups.io.

An unimportant number, I think, but it does indicate how much Groups.io
has grown recently. Not that long ago new subscribers had numbers in the
100,000 range.

> 1... I want to “vet” pending members before I approve their
> membership. From looking in the archives, it seems that I can’t have a
> message sent automatically and I would have to do it by emailing them
> personally myself... is this correct?

Nope.

Go to your Group's Settings page, Member Notices tab, and if there isn't
already a notice of type "Pending Subscription" click on the blue "New
Notice" button (at the bottom of the list) and create one with "Pending
Subscription as its Notice Type.

Be sure to check the "Active Message" box so that this message will be
sent automatically when someone applies to join your group. When you
finish composing the message body, click the blue "Add Notice" button at
the bottom to save it.

> Is there any way to take off the “conversation” mode and have each
> message just displayed in the list, not lumped together like this?

"Topics" is the default view, but the leftmost blue button above the
list of messages is a view selector. Other choices are "Messages" (the
view you're looking for, I think), "Expanded", and "Polls".

Shal