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Re: [PLUG] cultural ethics of email and spam
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On Wed, 2007-10-17 at 16:00 -0400, John Von Essen wrote:
> Read your Terms of Service for your broadband internet provider.
>
>
> Residential user's email originating at an MTA behind their home
> connection is considered spam by most remote systems because that
> activity is not allowed.
...Ummm.. that's rather circular logic. If it were not allowed, you
wouldn't need to consider it spam, because it would never reach you.
Also, stating that it isn't allowed is only true with -some- ISPs.
> And I have no sympathy for people who run MTA's behind Comcast,
> violate ToS, then complain that they "should" be allowed to do this
> and why is everyone unfairly blocking.
>
> If you want to run a server, buy business-class cable or DSL. If you
> want to be cheap and break the rules to cheat the system, suffer the
> consequences.
Why should I? Because someone at a company that I have no relationship
with has decided that it should be so (talking about DUL maps)? Get over
it. The Internet is peer-to-peer by design, and you can't change that by
fiat. The fact that 95% of mail is now spam (granted, an arguable
figure) justifies my stance that the approaches we are using aren't
working.
It would be much more productive to implement a system that authorizes
mail servers, and hold the owners responsible for the actions of their
users. As an example, if every mail sender was required to have a
certificate, and would only talk to other mail servers with valid
certificates, everyone would know who to blame if they started to get
spam. This is also a much more reliable method of establishing trust
that "is that a dial up line?".
Also, you should take a look at Comcast's terms of service, while you
are at it. It does NOT say I cannot run a mail server. What it DOES say
is that I can't run -public- mail servers. Since my mail server is not
public (it only allows me and my in-house family to send/receive mail),
then I am within the terms. The terms also state I can't send spam.
I can live by those terms.
--Matt
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