Tom,
I have not looked into gopher-type systems because HP does not
allow direct Internet access except from certain isolated machines.
For now, email seems to be the lowest common denominator that allows
people on FIDOnet, BITnet, compuserve,... etc. to participate in
the list.
The listserver does allow access to archive files by email. The
only disadvantage is that you cannot have a real-time interaction
with the database here. For things like the Hybrid decoder program,
the source code and database are easily sent by mail.
Gopher-type systems are needed when the databases are so large that
it is impractical to just send everybody their own local copy of
the data.
However, if you'd like to give it a try, you are welcome to use
any information from the listserv archive that you find useful.
Let me know if I can help...
-- Rick