Re: [PHP] Multiple Addresses Mailer

[Manuel Lemos]

Hello,

On 10/31/2002 10:09 AM, -<>- wrote:

You are contradicting yourself. Most mailing list programs put all recipients in Bcc: and queue only on message, so it is the same thing that you are recommending against and for it.

But most listservers generate a new message for each receiver. Most

You are confusing queuing with sending. Most list servers queue a single message with all recipients in Bcc and the mail server delivers separate messages obviously because the destination SMTP server is different.

mailservers, my own included, do not accept more than 5 recipients in the
bcc field...50 total for to and cc combined (some allow more).

That is usually a limit that exists for relaying (via SMTP) .

The limit's there to prevent spam. Also it would be abuse of the intent to

The limit exists to prevent unwarned clients from abusing from their ISP servers overloading it with messages to many recipients that make the mail server hog the machine for a long time. You may even be sending solicited newsletter messages which are not SPAM, but for your ISP the load that it inflicts to the server is inacceptable.

You may still use the server for sending SPAM, either many messages at once or one at a time. Either way, you should not be doing that unless your ISP authorizes you to do so.

use bcc for the entire list of receivers. Also you cannot have a bcc
without a to field anyway ...

Spam filters that discard messages which the recipients are in Bcc: are wrong, just like everybody that filters messages with general criteria like that. Anyway, it is their problem if they discard messages arbitrarily.

If the bcc field is the only field with a receiver, then the message is
malformed and should be rejected. The To:, Subject:, and Date: fields are
required to fullfill RFC 822. If you only get Bcc: and no To:, then the
message should be bounced, that's how alot of spam used to be addressed,
and some still is.

Let me tell you a secret, for the SMTP protocol, whatever you put in the headers is irrelevant. Message headers are actually part of the message body for the SMTP protocol. So, you can put a fake To: header in there but the message is actually not delivered to it.

What I mean is that SMTP servers do not parse headers. SPAM filters may do so and reject the message if you lack a wellformed To: header though.

So, to please everybody, you can just put an arbitrary To: header and put all the real recipients in Bcc:.

You need to check with the ISP if sending to many recipients respects the acceptable use policy. If they don't accept bulk mailing, it doesn't matter the method you use.

I've never met an ISP that would refuse bulk mailing, as long as you can
proove that you've got concent from the receivers for the messages. My
mail server handles all the concent things itself, and sofar my ISPs have
not complained about the up to 3 digit amounts of message that go out each
day, with up to 4 digits coming in...

So, there you have it, some ISP may allow a number of messages upto a limit but you need to ask them to know what the limit is.

--

Regards,
Manuel Lemos


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