Spam
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Ed,
I enjoyed reading your insights on this issue. I was previously not sure why I had some trepidation moving from my local ISP to Comcast. I thought it was the fact that I've been using the same dialup account since 1994. Yikes! Now I'm thinking that a 28k modem may not be so bad. Having all of my email, Web site and logs resident on a locally owned and trusted provider did provide me some sense of security. Going forward I'm going to miss that sense of "family" as I get swallowed up by Comcast. Maybe there's comfort in numbers, or can I count on "security through obscurity"? When you consider that we're sending every email as though it were written on a postcard, we shouldn't expect privacy. Furthuremore, the use of "free" services like Hotmail and Yahoo mail have hidden costs. Not having service guarantees is one of them. Perhaps this is the time for us to regain control over certain "services". I see the need for transparent point to point private email services. I should be able to send secure emails with delivery guarantees. The technology is all around us like encyption proxies etc. Has anyone figured out how to make money addressing this need? Chris >From: Edward A. Puckett <[hidden email]> >Reply-To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> >To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> >Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Spam >Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 11:40:00 -0700 > >I'm still hovering at about 600 spam messages per day, perhaps because I'm >a contact on numerous domains. I wonder if Earthlink has installed some >new spam filtering and that might account for your decrease. > >On a somewhat tangential subject, spam filtering is starting to cause me >concern. While it's good not to be receiving so much junk, the process of >spam filtering has the potential of turning into censorship, especially as >these filtering processes become more and more centralized. > >Here's a case in point. I maintain a Web/email-based group in which we do >periodic electronic polls. Most members are in the medium to low range in >terms of computer skills. When started our first poll, I was surprised at >the low turnout. Then I starting some emails complaining that people had >not received their "vote ticket". The vote ticket is sent automatically >from my server, but I found that many people did not receive theirs. After >investigation, I found that in most instances the email had been filtered >without the knowledge of the recipient. In fact, most people I've worked >with on this issue did not even realize there was a spam filter in place. >I walked one guy through the process of getting to his blocked email only >to hear "Oh, there's that email I was waiting for" in regard to email sent >to him from a friend. He had thought the friend was mad at him and not >replying. > >The thing that really bothers me is the centralization of these spam >filtering services. Here, local providers such as cybermesa.com and >newmexico.com use a service called "postini" in California. All mail sent >to customers of cybermesa.com and newmexico.com goes to postini, and then >only the unquarantined mail is sent to the servers at those providers. >(Check out the MX records for these providers.) > >The big providers like AOL, MSN and Earthlink have their own in-house >filters. An ex-colleague of mine at AOL recently showed me their "caught >spam" counter available to this internal account. It was up to about a >billion for that day! > >In the case of my vote emails, they were categorized as "special offers" by >postini. And there is essentially no way for a small fry like me to >contact postini and do anything about it. All I can do is to encourage >people behind the postini shadow to add me to their "approved senders" >list. But with my user base, that's somewhat akin to asking them to go out >and tweak their car's carburetor.... > >What really worries me is the diminishing number of "switches" that can be >turned to the off position for certain senders, without notice or recourse, >and with no interaction from the affected customers or even their ISPs. >The old adage that "the Internet treats censorship like damage and routes >around it" is becoming less and less true because their are fewer routes. > >A few months ago I read an article by John Walker called "The Digital >Imprimatur" (http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/) in >which he warned about these sorts of things. Serendipitously, I have since >witnessed first hand the emergence of one of the processes of which he >warned. > >We need to be vigilant about being done to the infrastructure of the >Internet. > >-Ed Puckett. > > >On Dec 13, 2003, at 8:26 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote: > >>My "spam receipt rate" has dropped to almost zero. Could this be a result >>of the arrests in Virginia? Have others experienced this? >> >>Frank >> >> >>============================================================ >>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >>Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >>Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >>http://www.friam.org > > >============================================================ >FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >http://www.friam.org _________________________________________________________________ Get dial-up Internet access now with our best offer: 6 months @$9.95/month! http://join.msn.com/?page=dept/dialup |
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Chris:
Why are you moving to Comcast? The availability of a broadband cable connection? Richard -----Original Message----- From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]]On Behalf Of Christopher Jungmann Sent: Tuesday, December 16, 2003 1:24 PM To: [hidden email] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Spam Ed, I enjoyed reading your insights on this issue. I was previously not sure why I had some trepidation moving from my local ISP to Comcast. I thought it was the fact that I've been using the same dialup account since 1994. Yikes! Now I'm thinking that a 28k modem may not be so bad. Having all of my email, Web site and logs resident on a locally owned and trusted provider did provide me some sense of security. Going forward I'm going to miss that sense of "family" as I get swallowed up by Comcast. Maybe there's comfort in numbers, or can I count on "security through obscurity"? When you consider that we're sending every email as though it were written on a postcard, we shouldn't expect privacy. Furthuremore, the use of "free" services like Hotmail and Yahoo mail have hidden costs. Not having service guarantees is one of them. Perhaps this is the time for us to regain control over certain "services". I see the need for transparent point to point private email services. I should be able to send secure emails with delivery guarantees. The technology is all around us like encyption proxies etc. Has anyone figured out how to make money addressing this need? Chris >From: Edward A. Puckett <[hidden email]> >Reply-To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> >To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> >Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Spam >Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 11:40:00 -0700 > >I'm still hovering at about 600 spam messages per day, perhaps because I'm >a contact on numerous domains. I wonder if Earthlink has installed some >new spam filtering and that might account for your decrease. > >On a somewhat tangential subject, spam filtering is starting to cause me >concern. While it's good not to be receiving so much junk, the process of >spam filtering has the potential of turning into censorship, especially as >these filtering processes become more and more centralized. > >Here's a case in point. I maintain a Web/email-based group in which we do >periodic electronic polls. Most members are in the medium to low range in >terms of computer skills. When started our first poll, I was surprised at >the low turnout. Then I starting some emails complaining that people had >not received their "vote ticket". The vote ticket is sent automatically >from my server, but I found that many people did not receive theirs. After >investigation, I found that in most instances the email had been filtered >without the knowledge of the recipient. In fact, most people I've worked >with on this issue did not even realize there was a spam filter in place. >I walked one guy through the process of getting to his blocked email only >to hear "Oh, there's that email I was waiting for" in regard to email sent >to him from a friend. He had thought the friend was mad at him and not >replying. > >The thing that really bothers me is the centralization of these spam >filtering services. Here, local providers such as cybermesa.com and >newmexico.com use a service called "postini" in California. All mail sent >to customers of cybermesa.com and newmexico.com goes to postini, and then >only the unquarantined mail is sent to the servers at those providers. >(Check out the MX records for these providers.) > >The big providers like AOL, MSN and Earthlink have their own in-house >filters. An ex-colleague of mine at AOL recently showed me their "caught >spam" counter available to this internal account. It was up to about a >billion for that day! > >In the case of my vote emails, they were categorized as "special offers" by >postini. And there is essentially no way for a small fry like me to >contact postini and do anything about it. All I can do is to encourage >people behind the postini shadow to add me to their "approved senders" >list. But with my user base, that's somewhat akin to asking them to go out >and tweak their car's carburetor.... > >What really worries me is the diminishing number of "switches" that can be >turned to the off position for certain senders, without notice or recourse, >and with no interaction from the affected customers or even their ISPs. >The old adage that "the Internet treats censorship like damage and routes >around it" is becoming less and less true because their are fewer routes. > >A few months ago I read an article by John Walker called "The Digital >Imprimatur" (http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/) in >which he warned about these sorts of things. Serendipitously, I have since >witnessed first hand the emergence of one of the processes of which he >warned. > >We need to be vigilant about being done to the infrastructure of the >Internet. > >-Ed Puckett. > > >On Dec 13, 2003, at 8:26 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote: > >>My "spam receipt rate" has dropped to almost zero. Could this be a result >>of the arrests in Virginia? Have others experienced this? >> >>Frank >> >> >>============================================================ >>FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >>Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >>Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >>http://www.friam.org > > >============================================================ >FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >http://www.friam.org _________________________________________________________________ Get dial-up Internet access now with our best offer: 6 months @$9.95/month! http://join.msn.com/?page=dept/dialup ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: http://www.friam.org |
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Administrator
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In reply to this post by Christopher Jungmann
An interesting alternative to the standard ISP model is to augment the
standard ISP with a "web hosting" service like HostGo. Stephen and I have been using them for quite a while, and Carl just joined up. (Are there others of us?) My son Tim has gotten an account for his family there recently as well. And our local Casino Management Services group has gotten an account as well. HostGo provides a bottom end service for ~$10/mo which basically provides you with a remote server with 200MB of storage. It provides mail, web, database, chat, and other services, basically anything you'd put on your own server. They provide domain name services too. And if you fax them a picture ID, they let you have shell access via SSH. All for only $10/mo! Initially I used CyberMesa for my mail simply because they are such a great ISP with absolutely great personal service. And their dialup is fine for when I'm traveling. And luckily for me, my Quest DSL allows me to have CyberMesa as the ISP for the DSL service .. splitting the bill roughly half & half between Quest & CyberMesa. The great thing from a mail standpoint is that I get absolute control over my mail service. So I've chosen to use IMAP rather than POP (lets me access the mail easily from any computer and keep all my folders on the server), and I can tune Spam Assassin however I'd like. They also have filtering so that I can sort incoming email into several "inboxes". This is great for my use of a Treo cell phone email reader which would be overcome if all my non-spam went into my basic inbox. This was a life-saver while traveling for a month in Italy: I mainly used my phone to read email. Yes, there are problems. Sometimes the remote services get hung up. Sometimes the services that I really want are not available. But their service turn-around via email is quite nice. And its let me go to a laptop-only computing model, because many of the things I need 24/7 I can now do on my HostGo personal server. Owen On Dec 16, 2003, at 1:24 PM, Christopher Jungmann wrote: > Ed, > > I enjoyed reading your insights on this issue. I was previously not > sure why I had some trepidation moving from my local ISP to Comcast. > I thought it was the fact that I've been using the same dialup account > since 1994. Yikes! Now I'm thinking that a 28k modem may not be so > bad. > > Having all of my email, Web site and logs resident on a locally owned > and trusted provider did provide me some sense of security. Going > forward I'm going to miss that sense of "family" as I get swallowed up > by Comcast. Maybe there's comfort in numbers, or can I count on > "security through obscurity"? > > When you consider that we're sending every email as though it were > written on a postcard, we shouldn't expect privacy. Furthuremore, the > use of "free" services like Hotmail and Yahoo mail have hidden costs. > Not having service guarantees is one of them. > > Perhaps this is the time for us to regain control over certain > "services". I see the need for transparent point to point private > email services. I should be able to send secure emails with delivery > guarantees. The technology is all around us like encyption proxies > etc. Has anyone figured out how to make money addressing this need? > > Chris > > >> From: Edward A. Puckett <[hidden email]> >> Reply-To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group >> <[hidden email]> >> To: The Friday Morning Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]> >> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Spam >> Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2003 11:40:00 -0700 >> >> I'm still hovering at about 600 spam messages per day, perhaps >> because I'm a contact on numerous domains. I wonder if Earthlink has >> installed some new spam filtering and that might account for your >> decrease. >> >> On a somewhat tangential subject, spam filtering is starting to cause >> me concern. While it's good not to be receiving so much junk, the >> process of spam filtering has the potential of turning into >> censorship, especially as these filtering processes become more and >> more centralized. >> >> Here's a case in point. I maintain a Web/email-based group in which >> we do periodic electronic polls. Most members are in the medium to >> low range in terms of computer skills. When started our first poll, >> I was surprised at the low turnout. Then I starting some emails >> complaining that people had not received their "vote ticket". The >> vote ticket is sent automatically from my server, but I found that >> many people did not receive theirs. After investigation, I found >> that in most instances the email had been filtered without the >> knowledge of the recipient. In fact, most people I've worked with on >> this issue did not even realize there was a spam filter in place. I >> walked one guy through the process of getting to his blocked email >> only to hear "Oh, there's that email I was waiting for" in regard to >> email sent to him from a friend. He had thought the friend was mad >> at him and not replying. >> >> The thing that really bothers me is the centralization of these spam >> filtering services. Here, local providers such as cybermesa.com and >> newmexico.com use a service called "postini" in California. All mail >> sent to customers of cybermesa.com and newmexico.com goes to postini, >> and then only the unquarantined mail is sent to the servers at those >> providers. (Check out the MX records for these providers.) >> >> The big providers like AOL, MSN and Earthlink have their own in-house >> filters. An ex-colleague of mine at AOL recently showed me their >> "caught spam" counter available to this internal account. It was up >> to about a billion for that day! >> >> In the case of my vote emails, they were categorized as "special >> offers" by postini. And there is essentially no way for a small fry >> like me to contact postini and do anything about it. All I can do is >> to encourage people behind the postini shadow to add me to their >> "approved senders" list. But with my user base, that's somewhat akin >> to asking them to go out and tweak their car's carburetor.... >> >> What really worries me is the diminishing number of "switches" that >> can be turned to the off position for certain senders, without notice >> or recourse, and with no interaction from the affected customers or >> even their ISPs. The old adage that "the Internet treats censorship >> like damage and routes around it" is becoming less and less true >> because their are fewer routes. >> >> A few months ago I read an article by John Walker called "The Digital >> Imprimatur" (http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/digital-imprimatur/) >> in which he warned about these sorts of things. Serendipitously, I >> have since witnessed first hand the emergence of one of the processes >> of which he warned. >> >> We need to be vigilant about being done to the infrastructure of the >> Internet. >> >> -Ed Puckett. >> >> >> On Dec 13, 2003, at 8:26 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote: >> >>> My "spam receipt rate" has dropped to almost zero. Could this be a >>> result >>> of the arrests in Virginia? Have others experienced this? >>> >>> Frank >>> >>> >>> ============================================================ >>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >>> Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >>> Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >>> http://www.friam.org >> >> >> ============================================================ >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv >> Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe >> Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: >> http://www.friam.org > > _________________________________________________________________ > Get dial-up Internet access now with our best offer: 6 months > @$9.95/month! http://join.msn.com/?page=dept/dialup > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9AM @ Jane's Cafe > Lecture schedule, archives, unsubscribe, etc.: > http://www.friam.org > Owen Densmore 908 Camino Santander Santa Fe, NM 87505 [hidden email] Cell: 505-570-0168 Home: 505-988-3787 AIM:owendensmore http://complexityworkshop.com http://backspaces.net |
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Owen Densmore wrote: > > Yes, there are problems. Sometimes the remote services get hung up. > Sometimes the services that I really want are not available. But > their service turn-around via email is quite nice. And its let me go > to a laptop-only computing model, because many of the things I need > 24/7 I can now do on my HostGo personal server. I'm in complete agreement about the concept. I've used www.pair.com for web, mail, and domain hosting services since 1999. I chose them partly because it was $6.95/month to host my website, discounted 8% for 12 month prepayment, but mostly because they were clearly geeks who were building the absolute best hosting system they could and proud of it. I've had no reason to regret that choice. They claim better than 99.9% availability but I have no evidence that it isn't better than that. Until last week I was hosting 4 domains for $13.95/month (before prepayment discount). I bumped my service level so I'm paying $21.95 /month this week. They have 4 independent fiber links, two OC-12c and two GigE, which connect to 6 different internet backbones. The data center has a 750,000 Watt diesel generator for power backup. They upgraded all the shared hosting machines to RAID-2 this year. They've never increased the price nor reduced the level of service for any of their entry level service plans since they opened for business in January 1996, so you can still get your first domain up for $6.95/month and start filtering your own spam. -- rec -- |
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Administrator
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In reply to this post by Owen Densmore
Well, turns out that HostGo and I are trying to figure out a weird
problem with spam. I've been flooded recently with spam that is not scored or even seen by Spam Assassin, their spam filtering software. Turns out that the problem relates to html email! It is more difficult to run the filters against and the spammers can use stunts to scramble the text that is not visible when you read it! (insert <...> segments in the html that have no effect on the resulting visible document) Unfortunately, the spam bill recently passed in the congress is considered flawed by most experts, and indeed mainly opens the door to "legitimate businesses". But its at least a step. Owen Densmore 908 Camino Santander Santa Fe, NM 87505 [hidden email] Cell: 505-570-0168 Home: 505-988-3787 AIM:owendensmore http://complexityworkshop.com http://backspaces.net |
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