Re: [Asrg] Another criteria for "what is spam"...

Bill Cole <aarg@billmail.scconsult.com> Wed, 04 June 2003 14:40 UTC

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To: asrg@ietf.org
From: Bill Cole <aarg@billmail.scconsult.com>
Subject: Re: [Asrg] Another criteria for "what is spam"...
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Date: Wed, 04 Jun 2003 10:28:34 -0400

At 11:47 PM -0700 6/3/03, Dave Crocker wrote:
>Bill,
>
>BC> Spam is email which is sent without a well-founded belief on the part
>BC> of the sender that he has the specific permission of the recipient to
>BC> send that mail and which is substantially identical form to mail sent
>BC> to multiple recipients.
>
>Imagine a student who is researching a paper and hears about a number of
>different people who might have relevant knowledge.
>
>The student does not know any of these people. The means by which the
>student obtains the names (and email addresses) of these people is not
>through "mutual friends", nor public rendezvous mechanisms (such as web
>pages listing addresses), nor anything else that might be construed as
>giving permission, explicit or otherwise...
>
>The student sends the same query for assistance to each of these people.
>It does not matter whether the student sends a different copy (with the
>same text) to each recipient or puts all of the recipients into the
>address list of the same.

Oh, you mean survey spam?

Hypotheticals are a problem because one can hand-wave relevant 
details. Your ellipsis is telling. How DID this student get my 
address? That's an important bit of information, and one which you 
are treating as unknown in its details.

(and yes, I have in the past and will in the future treat survey spam 
as spam. In most cases it is not simply rude and unjustifiable 
unsolicited bulk email, it is also a terrible research methodology.)
-- 
Bill Cole
bill@scconsult.com

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