Re: More on spam
On Fri, 17 Oct 2003 at 16:07 GMT, Derrick 'dman' Hudson penned:
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> On Fri, Oct 17, 2003 at 11:56:33AM -0400, Jeff Elkins wrote:
>| On Friday 17 October 2003 11:21 am, Paul Johnson wrote: | >Munging
>considered harmful. http://www.interhack.net/pubs/munging-harmf= ul/
>|=20 | OK, I gave it a scan. I don't think it applies to the debian web
>archives= =2E=20 | Blanking out the addresses from an easily-scraped
>web page would break th= e=20 | internet how?
>
> Consider "John Doe", a new user of debian who does his homework by
> searching the web and the archives for the solution to problems he
> encounters before posting to the list. Now suppose John finds some
> information in the archives that seems relevant to his problem, but he
> doesn't find all the information he needs about the solution. Now
> suppose the addresses are available, as they are now. John can
> contact the individual directly and ask for clarification on something
> or more details or whatever. If the addresses weren't available John
> would be unable to ask the person directly, and if the person is no
> longer following list mail then John might not get the support he
> needs.
This doesn't sound like a strong argument to me. A lot of people use
throw-away addresses for usenet/mailing lists and never even check them.
A lot of people use email addresses like tissues, switching them as the
spam piles up. Email addresses are no more permanent than physical
addresses, and generally less traceable.
Besides which, I've had people email me directly regarding archived
posts before, and I would really much rather they have posted to the
newsgroup, possibly with a link to the archived posts they were using as
references. I'm not really sure why you think it's so important to
preserve strangers' ability to email me out of the blue about something
I posted 4 months ago. I am not a reference material; I am a person who
occasionally, when I have the time and inclination, tries to help out
others on public fora. If someone has a question prompted by a mailing
list archive, they should direct their question to the mailing list.
Sorry. Grouch mode off.
--
monique
Unless you need to share ultra-sensitive super-spy stuff with me, please
don't email me directly. I will most likely see your post before I read
your mail, anyway.
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