Message greatly truncated to save reading time, etc.
>> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I can only presume that
>> Mr. Bonomi (the author of the note before this last one)
>> places _me_ and this Digest in the same category as the
>> 'Verification Center' above since _these_ are the sort of
>> things which AOL would require to pay their own way. PAT]
> Ah, but the real question is: *WHO*decides* whether you
> are, or are >not, in the same category? And what the
> 'definition' of that category >is. > >I'm quite sure that
> if that 'verification center' was making the
> determinations, that they *would* put themselves in the
> "wouldn't >have to pay" class, while it is unpredictable
> how they would classify >Telecom Digest.
And this is where my questions/comments begin:
> It is also an undeniable fact that some of the mailings originating
> from the Digest moderator are *indistinguishable* from what the 'evil
> spammers' send out. If AOL, for example, looked at one or more of
> those instances where the esteemed moderator decided to 'share the
> wealth' of his incoming spam, by sending it on to *all* the Digest
> subscriber mailboxes, it _would_ be very reasonable to classify the
> sender as a 'spammer'. *NOBODY* signed up to the Digest with the
> expectation that the moderator would _deliberately_
> _and_intentionally_ send them 'lotto', 'Nigeria 419', bank/ebay
> 'phishing', and other scam messages -- but he =does=.
Anything resembling SPAM which is sent out from here is sent out only
as illustration; I have never sent any 'stand alone on its own merits'
spam for no other reason except to spam people.
If you are receiving any lotto, Nigeria, bank/ebay, phishing' etc as a
stand alone piece of email, regardless of who it says it is from, it
is NOT from me. Is this the kind of spam you claim I am sending?
Any illustrative spam sent under my name (and really is me) will come
under the subject headers 'last laugh!' 'what a loser' or similar and
will be intended to mock and castigate the true sender, whoever it is.
There will be social commentary in the form of Editor's Notes will all
of it. Is this the kind of spam you claim I am sending, or is it the
first kind, stand alone, sent by someone who decided to pick up the
indicia from a bonafide Digest and use it?
> Note, given that neither the original line-item ("E-mail,
> should the sender pay?"), nor our esteemed moderator's
> impassionedly affirmative 'answer' to that question made any
> reference to AOL or its policies -- *nor* did my query
> regarding his answer -- it is hard to imagine how any
> rational person would/ could conclude that I was using AOL's
> categorization rules as the basis for my query.
Because a rational person, _taking in context_ the original message a
couple days earlier where AOL stated their intentions for handling
mail and the replies which had followed it the next day (but still
before your Epistle showed up would have probably concluded that the
discussion was based on AOL's plans.
> BTW, I *DO* have issues with the concept of "sender pays the
> receiving ISP to bypass all spam-filtering, regardless of
> the user's wishes". Some are of a practical nature, some
> are philosophical.
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The answer to your question
> is that the the present-day 'authorities' (who intend to
> make the decision on pay to send mail or not) are the AOL
> people;
Which means it affects *only* AOL's customers. The TLA BFD applies.
And also, people who send email to AOL customers.
And the nice thing about it is it works _both_ways_.
If AOL starts mucking with mail that AOL's customers _want_,
and that mail gets delayed -- or even worse misrouted to a
spam folder or deleted -- AOL's customers have the option of
going to another provider.
Certainly they do, but what I am hearing (only me) is that the vast
majority of AOL customers are quite pleased with the blessed relief
given them in recent months since AOL started pushing so hard on the
spam/scam.
And it doesn't take much to make that happen.
I consulted at a shop that did a paid-subscription electronic
newsletter. "Something" about that newsletter, on occasion,
caused AOL's mail-handling system to do strange things with
it. Not every mailing, just 'once in a while'. Of course,
_we_ got the calls, when the newsletter showed up
'unreadable'. The only answer we had, was "it's a problem in
AOL's system, to eliminate it, we recommend you get an account
at a different provider." Since the price of (and thus the
'value', to the subscriber) the newsletter was several times
greater than the cost of the AOL subscription, this advice was
usually taken.
That is a big difference between what you were sending to AOL and what
I send to AOL. The price/value of TELECOM Digest is practically zilch
particularly when someone does not recieve it and writes me asking to
please re-issue a certain copy to them; I just remail the missing copy.
I'm pretty sure it wasn't 'spam filters' that were causing the
problem, the mailings were going to a maximum of about 2 dozen
AOL addresses at any time.
> they have said that when __taken in context_ over a long
> period of time (_NOT_ message by message but the entire
> contents of a Digest -- several individual >'messages') this
> Digest and other established Usenet-style publications do
> not qualify as and will not be counted as 'spam'. Context is
> the all-important factor; not any one single message out of
> the thousands which go out. If YOU honestly believe that
> taken in context over the quarter-century this Digest has
> been published that it amounts to 'spam'
No, _I_ don't believe that the Digest, "taken as a whole" is
spam, however, it is also a fact that the single largest
source of advance-fee scams, make-money-fast scams, outright
money-begging scams, etc. that _reaches_me_ is
"telecom-digest.org", accounting for more than 40% of the
total volume of such pollution that I encounter.
Then I will suggest that my name 'telecom-digest.org' is being forged
by spammers/scammers; that is, assuming you are discussing stand-alone
spams/scams and _not_ commentaries by myself using illustrative spam
examples. And oh, yes, I know there are tons of that going around,
even viruses being sent under the name telecom-digest.org. What do you
really expect _me_ to do about it?
If the esteemed moderator of the Digest just exercised a
little more restraint, on behalf of those who _trust_ him, my
spam load would decrease nearly in half. And thousands of
other people would see a reduction -- although probably not to
the same degree -- as well.
Considering that maybe once every two weeks or so I see some
individual item of spam/scam which is so ridiculous, so outrageous I
feel compelled to comment on it -- and that is the ONLY spam/scam I
will take any credit for at all -- what I have defined as
'illustrative spam/scam' then you must indeed have a very low volume
of it if what I editorially send you amounts to 'nearly half' of what
you recieve. (And YOU said that statistic earlier!)
> set publishing schedule, etc, then God Bless You. I guess I
> will qualify as spam in your estimation. Yes, there could be
> a change in the authorities; yes, the new authorities could
> take a different approach to what is what; we will have to
> deal with it when that time comes, if it ever
> does. Furthermore, you read this Digest in one of two ways
> only: Either you subscribe and ask to read it (and I can
> document your 'asking' to receive it if you are a subscriber)
And just _where_ was it explained that this subscription
included anatomy enlargement/enhancement solicitions requests
for assistance in smuggling large amounts of money across
international borders, phony international order-processing
and money-laundering schemes, etc.?
You see, right from this assertion of yours I can safely say that you
are getting a lot of crap sent by whoever _using telecom-digest.org_
as the sender. Now you are subscribed to a social commentary
newsletter in which some of those topics get discussed _very rarely_
and when they are used as _ilustrations_ of what comes through the
phone numbers and email addresses are time and again 'exxed out' and
made illegible. Or, occassionally toll free numbers are left intact
for readers to 'play with'. I _NEVER_ print messages like this on
their own merits. Never! Someone else must be sending them.
You hate them when they show up in your inbox coming from strangers.
Have you ever thought about peoples reaction when that cr*p shows up
_from_somebody_they_trust_??
I assume that when penis enlargements, bank frauds, job scams, etc
show up from someone I trust that the person I trust is not expecting
me to place an order for same; that what they are really doing is
trying to demonstrate what a _hell-hole_ internet has become in recent
years, particularly now that the Enablers have essentially turned
their back on the tactics used by these nefarious residents of our net.
The Digest subscribers trusted you to select _legitimate_
message traffic, and what do you do, when your frustration
level runs over? You cr*p in the mailboxes of people who
trusted you. It seems that you have as little respect for
_their_ mailboxes, as spammers have for yours.
Oh, I hardly think that would be the case. When is the last time YOU
received a TELECOM Digest with 150-200 spams/scams on a stand alone
basis in an issue. I mean, I do not need an excuse, if that is what
you are claiming.
> 'asking' to receive it if you are a subscriber) or you read
> it via a public mailbox (Usenet) in the same way. You do
> _not_ recieve this Digest in some sort of shady way, where it
> just shows up in your mailbox each day with no documentation.
Absolutely correct. People, myself included, *TRUSTED*YOU* to
"do the right thing" and send _what_you_said_you_would_.
I send a social commentary newsletter dealing in large part with tele-
communications matters. And that is what you get _from me_, a small
part of which deals some days with the loads of crap send through by
people I have never heard of, never wish to meet, and even wish they
did not exist.
When a 'trusted neighbor' cr*ps in your yard it is more
offensive than finding a turd left by a stranger.
This is true, but did your 'trusted neighbor' crap in your yard or
did he merely point out the mounds of shit left by persons unknown
and in effect point his finger at the Enablers in town who helped to
make it possible?
The 'betrayal of trust' is a bigger problem, and has far
more-long-lasting consequences.
Again, WHO did the crap versus WHO occassionally pointed out the crap
in the hopes of maybe shaming the Enablers into helping to clean up
the mess?
> That (documentation of your desire to receive it) and/or the overall
> context of the publication demonstrates it is not spam/scam. For
> everyone that is, except very possibly you,
For people who have the time to do the 'research', that is.
For someone who doesn't have the luxury of time, and has to
make what amounts to a 'snap judgement',based on an
'unfortunate' and small sample of our esteemed moderator's
selections -- they *can* draw an adverse conclusion. And, if
you look at *only* what they had to work with, their decision
is not indefensible. Given the 'right' sub-set of data, the
hypothetical 'reasonable person' *could* come to that
conclusion.
Do I think they "should" do so? H*ll, no.
Do I think such a conclusion is justified, or appropriate?
H*ll, no.
Do I think such a result is 'within the realm of possibility'?
H*ll yes.
Do I think the esteemed moderator could eliminate that
possibility, by exercising a little more moderation? H*ll,
yes!
You have not yet begun to see the huge, horrenendous piles of garbage
which accumulate here each day. In the thirty minutes or so I have
spent considering and composing this reply to you, I can tell you
another 40-50 items have accumulated. With luck, they all fell into
the spam bucket, but in real practice they fell partially into the
real messages area, scattered far and wide, with subject titles so
tricky many of them will have to receieve at least a cursory glance
before being _manually_ eliminated. Are you suggesting that _I_ should
have time to work on all that even though you do not?
So, its a lack of moderation you want to see, is it? I have noticed
a few things in common about Enablers: so many of you fuss and quarrel
among yourselves as the 'correct' approach to take. Each of you feel
that _your way_ is best; that the others know nothing or very little,
and certainly simple-minded lay people like myself know absolutely
nothing at all. None of these problems we face will ever get solved
by one single solution. Many solutions and approaches will be needed.
Most Enablers have a very high-and-mighty approach, and because most
Enablers are relatively intelligent people -- but selfish -- they
think of a variety of approaches which will mostly work for themselves
and a few others, while leaving the majority of netters out in the
cold entirely. Some Enablers go so far as to threaten punishment --
not for the insects they should be abateing, but for other netters
who do not 'go along with them'. I have become convinced in recent
months that it is not the fault of the spammers/scammers; they are
just insects out to suck blood and get their food. The fault really
lies with the Enablers who could make some changes on the net if they
would only get off their high horses and work with others.
Let's twist things around a bit just as you have attempted to do with
me, your Esteemed Moderator. I could say if some of you Enablers
gave a Good God Damn one way or the other about your Esteemed
Moderator(s) -- I am sure there is more than just one -- then you
would be working your asses off make our jobs at least a wee bit
easier. And I don't think you do give a shit -- or an iota of a shit
for that matter what happens to the people who try to organize the
messages and maintain some semblance of order in these newsgroups.
Because, to give a shit, it would behoove you to work along on
other's suggestions on eliminating spam/scam. That would require
getting off your high horse and listening and working with others.
If you were talking about stand alone, stand on its own merits (or
lack thereof) spam/scam then the answer would be to rebuild the
net for the essence of un-spoofable (or mostly so) 'caller ID'.
In any event, do not blame that on me.
If you were talking about my commentaries on same, and the fact that
you sometimes wind up getting your nose rubbed in a mess not of your
own making, when it begins to happen less and less, I will talk about
it less and less, and if one message every two weeks or so causes your
spam count to go up 40 percent, then you really do have some virgin
eyes.
PAT
TELECOM Digest Editor (ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu)