Michael S. Lorrey [retroman@together.net] wrote:
>I have found that the spam content on usenet is more a matter of the time of
>day, and how well administrators/moderators control their group's content.
The vast number of groups (probably 99.9%) have no moderator, and most of those groups contain far more posts from idiots than spam. Since those posts from idiots waste my time, being mis-labeled to make me think that they may actually have something to say, I'm going to be charging each idiot $500 per message in future. It's the only way to get the idiots off Usenet before they destroy it.
>Since
>bulk emailers tend to mail late at night or early in the morning, they usually
>mail at least 10-16 hours before the typical casual admin logs on and cleans
>house.
Which has no effect on Usenet because of propagation delays; a message sent through a mail-to-news gateway early in the morning may not get to you until that evening. In any case, someone somewhere is reading Usenet at any time of day, so the spams can be spotted and cancelled.
>That is a load of crap. There is a big difference between mandating that
>From
>and Reply-To addresses are real addresses from which the mail actually
>originated (even if the mailer is an anonymous one), and using fraudulent
>header information, which is the typical spammer tactic
And the difference is? I don't see any difference at all, so I think you're going to have to explain it to me. And as with Netsurfer you're going to have to explain how you can retain anonymous remailers if they're going to be hit with thousand dollar fines every time they allow a spam through. Answer: you can't. You and your friends will kill anonymity on the Net. Thanks.
>to avoid
>retribution.
Note: "retribution". Is that how you see yourself Mike? The wrath of God descending from heaven to smite the evil spammers? With no concern about a few collateral casualties? This kind of nonsense is what's destroying any pretence at civilization today.
>More crap. Nobody is more pro-freedom than I.
So why are you pushing to destroy anonymity and privacy on the Net? How can you have "retribution" against spammers if they're anonymous?
>Freedom cannot exist for long without personal integrity.
Indeed. When people rush out at the slightest provocation calling for Big Mummy to save them from the evil XYZ (XYZ == spammers, terrorists, drug dealers, whatever the evil-of-the-day may be) freedom cannot last.
>If you've read my posts, I do not want government mandates if the market
>can
>develop mechanisms to cause spammers to pay their way.
Yet almost everything you've talked about involves the use of the government legal system against spammers.
>Government has always loved to use abuses in systems as excuses to regulate
>and take over markets. This only occurs when the parties in the market
>refuse to do something about a problem.
No, it occurs when people like you rush around claiming there's a big problem when there isn't. It occurs when people like you ask Big Mummy to make laws to protect them rather than protect themselves. I rarely see spam because I have filters to delete it automatically. Why don't you?
>I want to keep the internet a tax free, free speech, free encryption, and
>generally do as you please zone.
Then why are you pushing to ban anonymity? And encryption will follow soon after so that ISPs can guarantee that their users aren't sending encrypted spam out.
The way to keep the Internet a free zone is to stop pushing for laws to regulate it. You don't make it more free by passing laws.
>Because the Constitution explicitly states that the feds do have authority
>to
>regulate international commerce and communications, and to negotiate and
>ratify
>treaties, the feds can easily put up outright blocks or merely tariffs
>on foreign
>spammers, on foreign servers, on foreign software companies, etc. to make
>them pay
>the cost of their externalizations.
The government is going to cut Russia, China and the Third World off the Net to stop spammers?!!?!? Get real.
And even if they do, that's a horrendous precedent to set. Once we accept that the government should stop things passing over the Net that we dislike, they'll immediately start blocking remailers, political web sites, and anything else that is a threat to the government. I can't believe that the Mike Lorrey of old would support government censorship of the Net. Will the aliens please give us back the real one?
Mark