OT: question re. the Volume of unwanted email (fwd)

Wed Jun 18 18:03:37 UTC 2003

jbates at brightok.net (Jack Bates) writes:

> While there is a cost to ISPs reguarding spam, the highest cost is still 
> on the recipient. End User's who are outraged by their children getting 
> pornography in email, or having trouble finding their legitimate emails 
> due to the sheer volume of spam that fills their inbox.

yes.

lartomatic=# select date(entered),count(*)
             from spam
             where date(entered)>now()-'20 days'::interval
             group by date(entered)
             order by date(entered) desc;
    date    | count 
------------+-------
 2003-06-18 |   505
 2003-06-17 |   873
 2003-06-16 |   644
 2003-06-15 |   621
 2003-06-14 |   667
 2003-06-13 |   396
 2003-06-12 |   696
 2003-06-11 |   517
 2003-06-10 |   673
 2003-06-09 |   616
 2003-06-08 |   421
 2003-06-07 |   398
 2003-06-06 |   558
 2003-06-05 |   534
 2003-06-04 |   616
 2003-06-03 |   464
 2003-06-02 |   555
 2003-06-01 |   677
 2003-05-31 |   378
 2003-05-30 |   642
(20 rows)

that's actually not too bad.  the trend is flattening after the Q1'03 surge.

> In this day and age, time is often more valuable than money and the
> assigned value is dependant on the individual. Unfortunately, end user's
> cannot just highlight and hit delete on spam. They must look at almost
> every email to verify that it is spam and not a business or personal
> email.  The misleading subject lines and forgeries are making this even
> more necessary.

let's not lose site of the privacy and property issues, though.  even if
all spam were accurately marked with "SPAM:" (or "ADV:") in its subject
line and there were no false positives, there is no implied right to send
it since it still shifts costs toward the recipient(s).  all communication
should be by mutual consent, and one way or another, some day it will be.
-- 
Paul Vixie