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Does it ever end ?


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Why is it that real spammers grow and win while the general public chastises legitimate business owners for making contact of any kind ?

This was re-written from something that I received 5 or 6 years ago and was pretty much the public understanding. Today, people are victims period.

What does it take ? Does it ever end ?

Here's the message as it was:

Here’s an oldie but a goodie for people who make the mistake of crying “ spam ” regularly :

(reproduced from the early days of spam complaints)

ARE YOU HERE TO REPORT spam MR. OR MRS. BUSINESS OR ORGANIZATION ?

1. Are you here to report spam ? Y N

2. Are you filing a complaint as a member of an organization or business ? Y N

3. Does your organization or business operate a website ? Y N

4. Does your website contain contact information publicly displayed for any reason ? Y N

And most of all,

5. Do you invite the public to contact you for business regarding your organization ? Y N

If You have answered yes to these questions, GO AWAY and GET OVER YOURSELF.

ALL UNWANTED E-MAIL THAT YOU RECEIVE DOES NOT QUALIFY AS spam !

Hint: If you go fishing you never know what you’re going to catch. That’s part of fishing.

You don’t always catch what you want, even if what you want is the only thing you expect.

Sometimes you get what you want, sometimes you don’t, and sometimes you get both.

If you don’t want to fish anymore, go home and take your pole with you.

Otherwise, just throw ‘em back and keep fishing … Welcome to life !

- PLEASE COME BACK WHEN YOU HAVE A LEGITIMATE COMPLAINT -

WE ARE WORKING TO CATCH REAL SPAMMERS IN SUPPORT OF REAL VICTIMS.

It was a good one at the time and everyone got it. Now business are getting shut down because of ignorant spam complaints that go SUPPORTED BY SOME.

What's Up ?

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Spammers have spoiled email as a useful tool. The current situation was caused by the spamming pondscum sending an unending stream of mortgage quotes, penis enlargement, breast enhancement, weight loss, nude 40 year old teenage sluts, Viagra, vacation, lottery, prescription drug, business opportunities, genealogical, university degrees, gambling, get rich quick, MLM, pyramid schemes, Web Cams, Russian brides, work from home, stock scams, pirated software and everything else that is force fed into our inboxes ;)

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Hey Merlyn,

(LOVE your tagline !)

Yeah, I know.

I think that it is important for spam reporters to understand that legal action against them may be taken when they report something or someone as spam when it is not. People might love to "feel the power" of squashing bugs, but, they had better be certain of their right to do so according to law before they find themselves out of business themselves !

It's gotten out of control is all and people who report anything and anyone being accomodated by a service that supports their actions should pay more attention or all we do is fight and feed the lawyers. spam reports can certainly be better screened by a simple form and any service that threatens an ISP had better be real careful about what they choose to do or the real spammers win again when the service is gone ...

The simple phrase "contact us" alone publicly displayed means that you have "solicited" a response. You by law just gave up your right to claim that you've received anything as an "unsolicited" response, the primary qualification of spam. After that, see the fishing story and deal with it or qualify it !

That a service would support the mentally that someone should report it all is absurd and dangerous !

Someone better watch out, this path we've headed down isn't good.

You know what they say about a road paved with good intentions....

Thanks for your response ! (and Amen !)

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Personally, I think you're rattling empty cages here. You talk about "threatening ISPs" .. whereas the SpamCop parsing out is an advisory. The ISP is actually given several options if they wish to get active.

Your pitch and reference are targetted towards those running a web-site. But then you flip to "any and all spam reporters" .... The numbers of folks not running a web-site far exceed those that do, so the thought of an "open invitation" doesn't quite hold the massive generalization that you suggest.

Your threat of legal action against spam reporters is actually a bit funny. That a spammer would want to sue me in reality (noting that the threats of legal action in yet more spam e-mal correspondance just doesn't hold water) is a bit absurd, starting with that said spammer would have to reveal his/her true identity, business plan, etc. Now many times can you recall ever hearing of this happening? And let's ignore the cases of the spammers against the anti-spam organizations .. your point was to charge individual reporters with some sort of a criminal charge.

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Edit: I see you have to respond real fast around here. When I started writting the following that were no other responses. The topic has taken a bit of a turn based on the replies I found after posting this.

It is the same as flying. The action of a few bad apples causes grief and agravation and added cost for the rest of us. If you have been to the airport since 911 you will know what I mean.

Now business are getting shut down because of ignorant spam complaints that go SUPPORTED BY SOME.
I would have to say that any business that actually gets shut down due to spam complaints is guilty ignorance. No business that goes through the added grief and agravation and expense of setting up and maintaining clean mailing lists will actually get shut down. It is the ones who act out of stupidity and try to take the easy way out that are being shut down. Those who think that they can buy a mailing list for the purpose of sending email are spammers pure and simple. They are taking the easy way out. Trying to buy thousands or even millions of addresses for a few dollars is really no different than buying land for a few dollars an acre. You will probably find out that you bought swamp land in Florida (if you actually bought anything). It is a rip off. The main difference is that with the land buyer the rip off stops at the purchase. But lets carry that example a bit farther so that it more closely relates to the internet. Lets say that this business bought the exclusive right to sell land to the public for $50.00 an acre but never took the time to ckeck out the land that he would be selling. He just took the word of the original seller that it was prime land just waiting to be developed. But in reality it was protected swamp land that could never be developed. He now goes on his way reselling the land to others and can not understand why people are filing complaints about him and why he is now in court trying to stay out of jail. He has been put out of business. When anyone buys a mail list, that is exactly what they are doing (buying uninspected property- the email address is the property of its owner) The email address owner has the right to complain when someone uses his address without his permission.

So yes, the businesses that are being put out of business are victims; but they are not the victims of those who are compaining, but rather of their own greed and stupidity, that of buying and using addresses that really have no right to use.

Edit continued:

Those of us reporting spam do need to be careful what we do report. Remember that each report that we file does add to the grief, agrevation and expense of the one we are reporting and to all other parties that also receive the report or are affected by the results of the blocking lists fed by our reports. Try to remember that a lot of the spam that you recieve you did actully did sign up for. When you fill in a sweepstates form or enter a contest and give out your email address in most cases you are giving them the right to use you email address. Read the fine print. NOTHING IS EVER FREE. Someone is paying for it and expecting something in return. Greed reveals it ugly head in may ways and in many places. The old rule still holds true. If it seems to good to be true....

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Hey Wazoo,

I understand the ISP's feel that they have no choice but take drastic action on reports because they feel no recourse for the risk.

I flipped nothing, all was related to the website owners that report all unwanted mail as spam when it is not necessarily valid to do so.

That is if two people send someone a message that is perceived as spam and both are reported as spam there may be a legitimate legal issue involved.

If both are treated as spam and both parties receive negative action when only one is warranted, then a lawsuit by the party receiving repercussions for spamming when they in fact did not is certainly warranted.

I have threatened no one nor has anyone threatened me. I ask only why someone would perpetuate the mentallity that both parties must be dealt with as spammers without even validating the decision by common sense or by the law, and where does that lead ?

It leads to a legitimate business potentially being convicted of a crime they did not commit, and they will indeed fight and file suit to protect their interest to include identifying the reporting party or parties.

Happens every day in the courts that counter suits, appeals, and unjustified decisions are countered with lawsuits. Anyone engaging in the elimination of spammers should be aware of the actions the "posse" out there is taking....

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Hey dbiel,

This incident was not mine and nothing to do with buying a clean mailing list.

This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

The business lost tons of revenue due to nothing more than a proprietors bad attitude and the actions of a reporting firm to an ISP while conducting normal business to business correspondance as it happens everyday.

Who's the victim ? Your neighbor today, not some jerk in Singapore...

Completely unwarranted....

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Hey dbiel,

This incident was not mine and nothing to do with buying a clean mailing list.

This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

The business lost tons of revenue due to nothing more than a proprietors bad attitude and the actions of a reporting firm to an ISP while conducting normal business to business correspondance as it happens everyday.

Who's the victim ?  Your neighbor today, not some jerk in Singapore...

Completely unwarranted....

22114[/snapback]

Thanks for the reply

To an extent I addressed this issue in my previous edit before seeing your reply but your providing additional information takes a different fork in the road.

I agree that we have to be careful what we report. I also agree that the excessive amount of spam recieved has resulted in an excessive response against it that does result in some inocent people suffering as well. Just as in war, the inocent die along side the guilty and in many cases there was nothing that they could have done to prevent it. We need to be as careful as possible to injure as few as possible while still trying to reach the goal.

The point is that blindly reporting spam is a bad as the sending of it in the first place. We all must be responsible. For every action there is a reaction.

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Boy, I almost did it to your reply as well !

Your point was VERY well received, thanks for reminding me of that avenue often forgotten as well !

The "Friendly Fire" has either gotten out of control or we never knew who the enemy really was before we took up arms. Either way it has gotten flat stupid.

Unfortunately when anyone "cries foul" it is the responsibility of the Referee to bear the repercussions of the call. Nobody likes a bad referee ! ( I've heard )

Happy New Year all, May 2005 bring better days and better ways ....

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This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

This also depends heavily on how the website "requests" the contact. My companies website is very specific. If you want informaion about our products or company, email info[at].. If you want to apply for employment, email jobs[at].. along with specific email addresses for information about each individual product we offer. All of this has been discussed with our attornys and they feel quite confident I can report any business partnership emails with no upholdable legal recourse. Under my website, there is no submit your business propositions address, because we simply would not be interested in any business proposition that was not important enough to be opened with a phone converstion to find out the specific person it should be directed to. Keep in mind, it is usually the staff that manage those types of mailboxes, not the management who could do something about them.

I also have permission to report job applicants sent to the info address but I simply move them to the appropriate account. I have, however, reported employment agencies that have sent to our info address while not reporting the same message sent to the jobs address.

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Perfect because you've qualified the terms of use. On the other statement:

"Keep in mind, it is usually the staff that manage those types of mailboxes, not the management who could do something about them."

You mean like the telephone number(s) you offer the public ? ;)

I mean only that if you solicit a public response you are subjecting yourself to anyone's "normal" and interpretation will ensue because questions abound.

What you've suggested is certainly not everyone's modus operandi and no one would assume that you or anyone would or should automatically assume anything based upon unqualified public solicitation of contact information regardless of the method(s) used.

That someone assumes they have the right to take action against someone who innocently reached out is simply arrogance in action, regardless of the contact methods used, telephone, internet, postal mail, etc., etc., etc. ....

This has gotten to the point that perhaps we have the right to sue someone because you don't like short hair and someone walked into your facility with short hair. Perhaps they should have had a crystal ball or something, eh ?

Qualify it or deal with it.

It sounds like someone should simply password protect the contact information and have them call for a username and password in order to send e-mail via the contact information contained within. Of course you'd have to have an appointment to seek the proper telephone number, and of course you'd have to meet the criteria for requesting an appointment at which point have your lawyers talk to my lawyers and then perhaps ... Infinite stupity that never ends ...

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This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

So you're saying that party A sent a business proposal to party B and it was reported as spam? I'm going to trust you that parties A and B were somewhat vaguely in the same line of work and that party A wasn't asking party B if they would like to expand their line of imported cheeses and wines to also include V1AgARa and NUDE TEEN SLUTS!

And even if that is the case, an ISP that disconnects a business account over a single spam complaint is about as twitchy as Robin Williams on a 24-hour caffeine bender. Not even slightly a good business practice, IMHO.

I'm thinking that we're missing some details here. Can you elaborate?

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Actually they were exactly in the same line of work and it was as simple as a legitimate business offering business to business treated as if it were the colorful reference you indicated. Therein lies the arrogance and ignorance of many reports and supports, and the entire reason for this initial post way at the top.

Your reference to the ISP is perfect, and exactly what bothers me the most, because this is exactly how more than one are acting today as a result of " the witch hunt " ....

No details missing in this case, it was exactly as described and all within ONE HOUR of the proprietors unwarranted actions - seriously.

Witch Hunt is the key phrase and when anyone has a torch watch out, this isn't going to end in catching legitimate spam scum, especially when the referee's take no time to consider anything. ( Including the law or common sense apparently. )

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this is exactly how more than one are acting today as a result of " the witch hunt "

Not the better ones and not even most in my experience. Again, please indicate the actual ISP.

Again, my personal feeling is, any serious business proposal should be done face to face with the people capable of making such a decision. Yes, you call and ask for the appropriate email address to send such a proposal. Again, in my opinion, accepting business proposals is NOT in the normal expectations of any business, unless that is their business.

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This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

This is a very unlikely scenario, but let's assume it actually happened. If so, then the people who got disconnected should be going after their ISP, and NOT the people who reported them....period. The report probably shouldn't have been filed, but simply complaining about an email is NOT an actionable issue.

Your basic premise, that if a business publishes a contact email address then they shouldn't complain about any spam they receive, is inherently flawed and false. But what you finally got around to identifying probably wasn't even spam.

DT

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It is very easy for an ISP to investigate and make decisions on a report of spam. The fact that some overreact is not the fault of the reporter.

OTOH, published email addresses for businesses are generally meant for a particular type of email. I remember that one admin said that a resume sent to several published addresses was identified as spam by the sales address, the info address, but not by the jobs address.

The whole spam question is so simple - it is unsolicited email that the receiver doesn't want. Therefore, if you send an unsolicited email, you are taking a risk that it will be unwanted. It is unfortunate that many useful ways of using email have been ruined by the spammers because people will not accept any unsolicited email because it is too difficult to sort out what one wants from what one doesn't want and also because there is no way to define spam except by being unsolicited that does not open discussions of censorship or create lots of false positives using content filters. It is also only the 'sending' end that can do anything constructive about stopping unwanted, unsolicited email. The whole concept is not rocket science; yet people don't want it to apply to them - only to other people.

Don't send unsolicited email unless you are willing to take the risk that it will be considered unwanted.

Miss Betsy

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This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

22114[/snapback]

do you have any idea how many dodgy-sounding "solicitations for business partnership" I get a day as spam? the recipient was correct to report it as spam, and if your ISP disconnected you, more power to them.

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Just as in war, the inocent die along side the guilty and in many cases there was nothing that they could have done to prevent it. We need to be as careful as possible to injure as few as possible while still trying to reach the goal.

We've just had our host close us down without notice, and without offering us any proof that we'd done anything wrong. Most importantly we hadn't done anything wrong. As a consequence, I find the quotation above rather scary.

Unless I misunderstood this comment (and, if this is the case, I apologise), I find it incredible that the website of a legitimate, rule-abiding business can be closed down and this justified as:

the inocent [sic] die along side the guilty.

We employ six people. Most have been with us for over ten years. They have wives and children to feed, mortgages to pay, etc. Most of our sales come to us via the internet. We promote our products with press releases (sent in the post, the old-fashioned way, or posted on PRWeb), Google advertisements, and regular advertisements in newspapers and magazines.

When our web site is shut down, our orders go away. But apparently the feeling is that were in some sort of war zone, where

the inocent die along side the guilty.

There absolutely should be consequences for sending spam --- but, equally, there should be consequences for falsely reporting a message as being spam. If I say (in writing) you're breaking the law and you're not, that's libel:

A tort consisting of false and malicious publication printed for the purpose of defaming a living person.

The battle against spam may be "a war," but judging from the daily (heck -- the hourly) contents of my in-box, it doesn't look like a particularly victorious one.

Alas.

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And as pointed out in your other discussion, without knowing what the rest-of-the-story is, this "problem scenario" is still based on a decision made by that ISP. Again, if you could provide the IP address of where the "alleged too much spam" came from, that would be a starting point (from this side of the screen) ...

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And as pointed out in your other discussion, without knowing what the rest-of-the-story is, this "problem scenario" is still based on a decision made by that ISP.  Again, if you could provide the IP address of where the "alleged too much spam" came from, that would be a starting point (from this side of  the screen) ...

22311[/snapback]

Or the alleged site that the ISP thought was the problem. ;)

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Guest SkydiveMike
This was someone that picked up the yellow pages, found a company advertising a website, visited the website, sent a single message to the proprietor as an invitation to partner in business, and, instead of simply ignoring the message, replying and saying thank you no, or anything, decided to report the message as spam for which the ISP disconnected the account without any prior incident.

Completely unwarranted....

22114[/snapback]

Simple question: was the "invitation to partner in business" solicited? If the answer is yes, you have a vliade point. If the answer is no, then the invitation is "unsolicited," (and by your statement above is commercial) and therefore the entire email is unsolicited commercial email a.k.a. spam.

Completely warranted (if there was no solicitation).

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Simple question: was the "invitation to partner in business" solicited? If the answer is yes, you have a vliade point. If the answer is no, then the invitation is "unsolicited," (and by your statement above is commercial) and therefore the entire email is unsolicited commercial email a.k.a. spam.

Completely warranted (if there was no solicitation).

22421[/snapback]

Interesting to note the newly revised reporting rules. spam is now defined as Unsolicited Bulk Email. An Email sent directly to the individual from another individual appears to no longer qualify for reporting under the revised rules.

Unless I'm reading the rules incorrectly... <_<

Andrew

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Interesting to note the newly revised reporting rules.  spam is now defined as Unsolicited Bulk Email.  An Email sent directly to the individual from another individual appears to no longer qualify for reporting under the revised rules.

Unless I'm reading the rules incorrectly...  <_<

Lets just say the the newsgroup traffic on this recent and unannounced FAQ change is a bit wild right now .. still waiting for someone to show up and talk to the change, maybe explain what is actually meant .. maybe even offering a clue as to who changed it and when <g>

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....

  Under my website, there is no submit your business propositions address, because we simply would not be interested in any business proposition that was not important enough to be opened with a phone converstion to find out the specific person it should be directed to.  Keep in mind, it is usually the staff that manage those types of mailboxes, not the management who could do something about them.

I also have permission to report job applicants sent to the info address but I simply move them to the appropriate account.  I have, however, reported employment agencies that have sent to our info address while not reporting the same message sent to the jobs address.

22134[/snapback]

For a consumer oriented viewpoint, it would also be good practice to give a "uniquely identifiable" email address for each business contact.....

Not to promote any email service in particular, I have used a service that generates such email addresses and provides a very efficient way of whitelisting by tagging the header with that info.

It is much easier and it has worked for me for over three years now. I have literally hundreds of such addresses given out and have not received "one" spam email with the exception of spam to the one posted in public and you can guess which one that is!

These are "semi-disposable" depending upon how careful one is about informing the business contact to avoid sharing that email address with any one else.

Since my dealings online have been to legitimate businesses, I have not had one single problem with spammers whatsoever . Businesses are very careful about divulging email addresses these days anyway - but that responsibility I share. I have ensured that the email I do receive is coming to me because I asked for it - mailing lists, etc.

I document each email address with the expected folder path of it's origins. My personal spammed box (1 email, 1 ISP) is solely for family and friends so it is real easy to guess who the spammers are. Iwill not bow to them by giving up my personal email, but instead will continue to report their abuse.

Just my input, and a question about what qualifies as UBE sent to many people. It is not easy to tell to whom that spam was sent to. In particular, how would one tell that a spam was sent to multiple recipients when it is clearly a spam message?

I get some with an email address that is not mine but nevertheless I received it. Is this a message sent to me by Bb copy? Messages sent by Bb are hidden from others in the headers (from what I understand).

I will report these and continue to do so unless someone can show that the hundreds of messages I receive daily (Literally) are NOT UBE messages sent to multiple parties.

Clarification please....

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