BBCode?

[J.B. Nicholson-Owens]

rolf wrote:
> Just guessing here, but appears that you are trying to view the BBCode
> markup in a non-BBCode enabled app - such as email perhaps?  The code
> snippet in question is the BBCode markup for quoting.

What open standard can I read to learn about this BBCode markup?

As is, it looks like someone's gateway or client software is broken and 
spilling non-standard markup to a mailing list.