>The First Amendment says that the government can't make laws against >you speaking. It doesn't give me the obligation to assist your speech >by allowing it in my network, or on the side of my house.
It also doesn't give you permission to interfere with with that speech. >I understand that you don't like the listing of IP addresses that >belong to spam-friendly ISPs. That's *your* interpretation of what I like, and it's incorrect. What I don't like is when other people (or blocklisters) propose that they are better-equipped to decide what I like than I am and then refuse to consider the possibility that their decision wasn't perfect and they made a mistake. >First, what _right_ does the target have to receive the email? >Second, there are still plenty of ways for you to communicate, if the >target wishes. You could telephone him. You could send snailmail. The target has the same right to receive mail as he does to receive any other communication, just like that First Amendment guarantees. And yes, I could send snail mail, but that's not the point of this conversation, is it? >Go ahead and run one that doesn't list any IP address from which >non-spam might emanate. I don't think your empty list will get many >users. Everything in life does not have to be black or white. There *are* gray areas, so the means of dealing with an IP address from which non-spam might emanate is to test it before blocklisting. Do you have a problem with a blocklist doing that? >>I suspect they didn't, that's why they're so incompetent. > > Matter of opinion, but no bearing on the subject at hand. >So why did you bring it up? *You* are the one who wrote "I suspect they didn't", not me! >Feel free to start your own ISP with that policy. If people like your >policy better than the policies of other ISPs, you'll get rich. If >they stay away in droves, you'll lose your money. And your point is....? Are you just arguing for the sake of arguing? >That's right. ISPs make policies for their own property. If you >don't like a business's policies, you don't have to do business with >it. That's right. ISPs make policies for their own property, *not* laws for the state or country, so if there are no loaws to make spam illegal the door has been left open. >There are several issues at hand. >You apparently don't like the idea that some ISPs block email from >spam-friendly ISPs. While that doesn't solve the spam problem, it >helps. I'm glad you finally admitted that it doesn't solve the problem. That's exactly the point I've been trying to make. >It's a very simple standard: "Don't spam." I don't support blocklists >that spam. Neither do I. The difference is that I also don't support blocklists that don't act responsibly toward those they list. > I'm not pro spam, I'm anti-irresponsible interference. There is a > difference. >Doing things your way is better for spammers than doing things some >other ways. Verifying what you block is better for spammers? How? >Given that nobody is doing anything they lack the right to do, I don't >see a problem. If you don't like the way somebody runs his ISP, don't >use it. Spammers have the right to spam (at least they do in my state because it's not illegal there). Are you sure you don't see a problem with that? It sure sounds like you do. >I've seen a number of major providers start acting against spammers in >the recent past. Good. Imagine what the results could be if we worked together to pass more laws and responsibly blocklist spammers so that there would be even more support to do things the *right* way. >The ISP your company uses apparently does welcome spammers to use its >services. Not according to what they've told me. > but it's still not appropriate to assume that ISP's should be the > only ones to take responsiblity for the problem. >Who is making just what assumption? You. I believe your statement was "ISPs that publish Terms of Service that say spamming isn't allowed, but fail to act against spammers when complaints arrive, are the ones who are irresponsible." >How could somebody "just fix the problem"? The only entity that could >do that (by kicking the spammers off) is the ISP that has _failed_ to >do precisely that. Blocking more and more of its IP addresses, so >that its non-spamming customers leave, has the effect of encouraging >it to get rid of its spammers. Blocklists could start to fix the problem by checking for spam coming from the addresses they block before they list them. Blocking more and more of its addresses so that it's non-spamming customers are victimized by the blocklists is *not* a good way to win support for the cause. >>Spammers from legitimate ISPs lose their accounts quickly, and those >>ISPs do not find their IP space listed on blocklists. > > But legitimate ISPs, by your own admission, are not the problem, so > what difference does that make? >That was in response to a statement by you that spammers do not lose >their account. And my statement stands. >How would you encourage ISPs that don't cancel spammers to start >cancelling spammers? Make them *legally* responsible for doing so or else they could be responsible for the damages. >If BellSouth has spammers operating from its IP space, then listing >BellSouth IP space in a list of "This IP space belongs to >spam-friendly providers" is correct. Just maintaining a benign list of addresses is one thing. Interfering with legitimate business of people who had nothing to do with it is another. >OsiruSoft does relay testing themselves, and also mirrors other DNSBL >sites. Was your IP address listed because OsiruSoft thought it >relayed, or because it was mirrored from another site? Testing by >OsiruSoft would not remove it from the site being mirrored, or from >the mirror copy. I wouldn't know since they refused to respond to my inquiries about exactly these items. >Blocking spam-friendly sites helps a lot. What sort of "working >together" do you suggest be done? Passing laws to make spam illegal, whitelisting instead of blacklisting, a setup similar to the one posted previously where a whitelist is set up for a company based on what e-mail is sent out from that server. >No, they are saying that _they_ don't want email from your servers, >and other people are welcome to follow their lead. >There's no reason for them to check with every user of their lists; in >fact, they can't, since anybody can query their lists. And that's exactly the problem with their system. It forces everything to be either black or white, but no gray. Gary exists. >Do you think a movie reviewer should check with every reader of a >newspaper before giving something a bad review? No, but movie reviewers don't block me from seeing the movie for myself. >The blocklists have absolutely no way to prevent their subscribers >from whitelisting any IP address that the subscriber wants to. I certainly didn't see any info on OsiruSoft's web page about how their subscribers can request a whitelisting. >Take that up with the subscribers. Oh, wait, you're not their >customer, so why should they care what you want? Because they want to buy my company's product. >When an ISP does not cancel its spammers after receiving complaints, >it is demonstrating that it's not interested in working together with >the rest of the Internet to cut down on spamming. Or that it doesn't have the legal backing to do so. When an ISP gets an erroneous blocklisting cleared up it demonstrates that it's being more responsible than the blocklisters themselves, who wouldn't even listen to my request. So who's not working with who? It's going to take the efforts of the ISPs, the subscribers, *and* the blockers to resolve the problem, not just one or the other. _______________________________________________ spamcon-general mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.spamcon.org/mailman/listinfo/spamcon-general#subscribers Subscribe, unsubscribe, etc: Use the URL above or send "help" in body of message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Contact administrator: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
