> We have learned that AOL has a policy of SILENTLY discarding
> selected mail messages as part of their ongoing efforts to fight
> spam. Unfortunately they will not tell us what rules are used to
> determine if a particular message will be discarded. They have only
> told us that the rules change daily and...
I've been following the search engine technology wars, and
something similar is happening there. The search engines (altavista
etc.) are retuning their search engines daily, trying to outsmart
folks who are constantly trying to make their sites show up at the
top of the list. They no longer publish the rules. And there are
companies who spend full time submitting things different ways to
see how to take advantage of the rules this month, and selling the
info.
This is not at all how we like to think of the net. We like to
think of an index as a tool of the user, but the overly-commercial
interests look at it as a kind of predatory coloration. Same thing
with SPAM only more so. If AOL told us the rules, or just didn't
change them constantly, the SPAMmers would take advantage of that
too. Sick, sick, sick... Now I understand the role of Marshal
Dillon and the Texas Rangers in the Old West, vs. the rogue cattle
barons and the hoss thieves.
