The IDM List
In November 1991, the phrase "intelligent techno" appeared on Usenet in reference to Coil's The Snow EP.[18] Off the Internet, the same phrase appeared in both the U.S. and U.K. music press in late 1992, in reference to Jam & Spoon's Tales from a Danceographic Ocean and the music of The Future Sound of London.[19][20] Another instance of the phrase appeared on Usenet in April 1993 in reference to The Black Dog's album Bytes.[21] And in July 1993, in his review of an ethno-dance compilation for NME, Ben Willmott replaced techno with dance music, writing "...current 'intelligent' dance music owes much more to Eastern mantra-like repetition and neo-ambient instrumentation than the disco era which preceded the advent of acid and techno."[22]
Wider public use of such terms on the Internet came in August 1993, when Alan Parry announced the existence of a new electronic mailing list for discussion of "intelligent" dance music: the "Intelligent Dance Music list", or "IDM List" for short.[23][24]
The first message, sent on 1 August 1993, was entitled "Can Dumb People Enjoy IDM, Too?".[25] A reply from the list server's system administrator, Brian Behlendorf, revealed that Parry originally wanted to create a list devoted to discussion of the music on the Rephlex label, but they decided together to expand its charter to include music similar to what was on Rephlex or that was in different genres but which had been made with similar approaches. They picked the word "intelligent" because it had already appeared on Artificial Intelligence and because it connoted being something beyond just music for dancing, while still being open to interpretation.[26]
Artists that appeared in the first discussions on the list included Autechre, Atom Heart, LFO and Rephlex Records artists such as Aphex Twin, µ-ziq and Luke Vibert; plus artists such as The Orb, Richard H. Kirk and The Future Sound of London, and even artists like System 7, William Orbit, Sabres of Paradise, Orbital, Plastikman and Björk. By the end of 1996, Boards of Canada and the Schematic Records label were among the usual topics of discussion, alongside perennial favorites like Aphex Twin and the Warp repertoire.
As of 2015, the mailing list is still active.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_dance_music#The_IDM_List