On Wed, 03 Sep 2008 23:53:28 -0700, Paul G. Allen
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
MattyJ wrote:
This kind of thing won't really work unless everyone with an E-mail
address does it and I just don't see it. It'll get through, just like
regular junk mail. And we'll just learn to throw it away when it gets
here rather than call 15 advertisers every month to ask them to stop.
There's the problem. It won't work unless everyone does it, so I won't
do it. Everyone thinks that, no one does it, so nothing ever gets done
(or fixed, or whatever). Same with voting, fighting Big Brother, not
releasing buggy software, dealing with spam, etc., etc.
To me the excuse of "I can't make a difference doing it when so many
other people are not doing the same." is somewhat less than a bad excuse.
If I gave in to every cause du jour that came my way I wouldn't have
enough time to go to work or eat. I find it hard to believe spam is a
cause on par with voting or privacy rights. Forgive me for caring more
about healthcare, the economy, the homeless, education, animal rights, the
war, violent crime and a hundred other things that are way more important
than spam.
Do you think my mom cares or even understands spam? She's fascinated that
wifi works, how can I explain to her that this suspicious looking E-mail
with a link is okay to press, and you're fighting such and such a "cause",
but when you get something suspicious from E-bay, that's what you don't
want to click...?
And by the way, mom, it doesn't matter how many people do this, it still
won't work because of other reasons already outlined on this list (and I'm
sure more are coming.) Forgive me for saying so, but spammers are smarter
than we are and will find a way in.
The way I see it this is just one more avenue for spammers to persue a
path into my mailbox, where my spam filter that has an over 99% success
rate works just fine. My mom and I are okay with emptying our spam folders
now and again.
Perhaps instead of these band-aids and un-unified tactics at combating
spam we should take the same tact that seems to have worked with
unsolicited phonecalls and faxes in the past.
-Matt
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