- From: Greg FitzPatrick <greg@skical.org>
- Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2002 12:46:46 +0100
- To: <www-rdf-calendar@w3.org>
Actually spamers miss as many opportunities as they take. Can you imagine what a monkey wrench they could have thrown into the works of napster-kazaa etc., if every other Madonna hit downloaded was really an obnoxious jingle about how to get rich by operating a call centre out of your own home. Strange that did not happen. The RIAA could have seed funded the operation. G || ||1. Ironically, the title you choose for your email 'Out of curiosity' ||illustrates a problem many email discussion groups are ||increasingly burdened ||with - Spam. The only reason I opened your email Jeff, was that ||I am trying ||out a new Spam filter and taking a look at what it kills - like mention of ||'weight loss' 'work at home' 'dentist bills' or any of 299 variations for ||saying 'get rich' in the subject or text fields of an email. || ||The community has not come to grips with this rapidly deteriorating ||situation, though some mailing lists have voluntary human ||sentinels. I read ||the other day that without filters at various places in the ||message chain we ||(normal email users) can expect up to 4000 objects of Spam a day ||by the end ||of this year. || ||That wonderful era when you could write to anyone and get mail from anyone ||is over; for some it has been over for quite a while. I remember ||the first ||time I wrote Dan Connolly and got back an automated reply 'I'm ||sorry I cant ||read this because I don't know you'. || ||A few years ago I started a discussion on the RDF Interest list with an ||email entitled 'A certain difficulty' which resulted in hundreds of ||messages. Today such a title would lead Spam killers to assume that this ||was a pitch for incontinence aids or tax problem solvers and the ||discussion ||would never have gotten off the ground. Your innocent title 'Out of ||curiosity' is in the same category. || ||Not that extremely explicit subject headers will always solve the ||problem - ||clever spamers can take snippets of commonly occurring phrases in a ||discussion and reuse them. || ||I have often toyed with creating a filter somewhat like Connolly's - only ||giving people a second chance through a challenge system - replying to ||unknown senders with something like the following: || ||"I am terribly sorry but you are not registered in my 'friends' ||list. Could ||you perhaps resend your message? If you have changed your email address ||recently please indicate that. If you are a long last friend - ||write a line ||about how we met. If you are interested in my research 'write a ||line about ||that' || ||Of course eventually bots will learn how to foil such a system, but it ||should work for a while. || ||***** || ||If anyone has read to the bottom of this email they will realize ||that it is ||the equivalent of Spam itself. It has nothing to do with the subject this ||list is supposed to cover and it is sent out with no idea who ||will read it. ||All that is lacking is a final pitch: || ||...and the email blocker I have just described is available for download ||absolutely free... || ||2. || ||Some of the discussion that could or should take place on this ||list does so ||in the form of IRC, Internet Relay Chat. Libby Miller might like to ||describe how that works? It is too complicated for me to understand. || ||Greg || || || || || || || ||||I have been subscribed to this RDF Calendar for a couple months ||||now, and all ||||I seem to be receiving is advertising and other information ||||straight to the ||||listserv. |||| ||||Is this typical, can it be stopped, or are there other places that this ||||discussion takes place at? |||| ||||thank you, ||||=========================== ||||Jeff Weidner ||||jkweidn@ilstu.edu || ||
Received on Monday, 11 February 2002 08:40:08 UTC