Gartner Blog: 90% of All Communications Have Always Been, and Will Always Be, spam

[turetzsr]

...Full article.

...Excerpts:

Symantec’s MessageLabs unit recently reported that 90% of email is spam.

<snip>

Even before Internet email, 90% of corporate email was spam by this definition of spam- the dreaded “reply-all” function guaranteed that.

<snip>

Nine out of ten faxes were spam ....

<snip>

90% of meetings are spam! Billboards are spam!

<snip>

I was just about to suggest that Christmas carolers email out .mpg files instead of spamming my front door.

[Miss Betsy]

Christmas carols via mp3 are definitely next!!

There is/was an organization to stamp out 'Street spam' -those signs stapled to utility poles. I tried to get my husband interested, but he is not a joiner - he just tears them down if they are out of date!

Miss Betsy

[rconner]

Can't argue much with his interpretation of the Spamhaus definition, but I think we still have to draw a distinction between most of the items he lists (on one hand), and spam e-mail (on the other).

I think only the junk faxers are directly comparable, because both they and the drugz-pr0n-watchz spammers steal from the recipients in order to send their advertising.

Not many people like billboards, but at least we do not have to pay for their delivery as we do for spam & junk fax.

I also get a lot of "reply-all" mail at the office, but I do not imagine these people have it in mind to swindle me when they send to me, and they usually don't try to cover their tracks by manipulating the message itself.

Yes, meetings in the office are often unproductive, but we can't really say that they are "unsolicited" -- we consent to go to such meetings by virtue of the jobs we hold. And, we can opt out of them (either by not going to them, or in the last resort by quitting the job).

-- rick