Spam Control Considered Harmful

Wed Oct 29 22:23:01 UTC 1997

On October 29, 1997 at 20:29 matt at planet.net.uk (Matt Ryan) wrote:
 > > 
 > > This sounds nice and principled but who is going to pay the bill for
 > > the spam? It's non-trivial.
 > > 
 > 
 > The spammers pay by hooking up with an ISP. How do your customers pay the
 > recipients of their messages for them downloading them? Have you not noticed
 > that email delivery is a cooperative process?

You're talking about social justice or some such basis for judging,
parity or something, I'm talking about simple business.

If the spammers don't pay their way such that it's in the interest of
my customers and myself (&c for other ISPs) to receive their messages
then they will not be effective: They will be hounded, they will be
blocked, their business format will be vilified and "spammer" will
remain synonymous with "crook" as is the case now. No decent business
will deal with them. They can keep trying to make money off of scams
and con-artists and other sewer-rats I suppose...

Very simple, really. There's absolutely no reason to bring "fair play"
into the picture when one is dealing with a band of howling jackals,
and that's all spammers are; the graffitti spray-painters of the net.

If they can present a business proposition which makes sense, then
it's merely an advertising business. As it is now they're just crooks,
kind of what shoplifters are to retail establishments, a type of
destructive parasite.

 > 
 > 
 > Matt.
 > 
 > --
 > Matt Ryan - Network Engineer                    matt at planet.net.uk
 > Planet OnLine Ltd, The White House,             Tel: +44 113 2345566
 > Melbourne Street, Leeds, LS2 7PS, UK            Fax: +44 113 2240003
 > 
 > 

-- 
        -Barry Shein

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