Re: Spamming (Good or Bad?)

[tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)]

At 6:04 PM 8/21/96, Gary Howland wrote:

>I always send a quick one liner - "Please send me more information".
>Often I'll ask a stupid question too ("Does your software work in
>France?").  If more people did this, then they'd have to choose their
>victims a bit more carefully in the future (assuming of course they're
>trying to sell something).

As I said in my last message, I don't even do this--I just bounce it back
to them.

I see no need to "ask questions" (such as "Does it work in France?") to,
perhaps, "establish legitimacy." If they sent it to me, I can send it back.
Simple.

And if their software is set up in a brain-damaged way, so that my bouncing
it back to them also sends it out to their list, so much the better...at
least in terms of helping to anger their potential customers.

--Tim May

(By the way, some of you younger folks may not remember all the creative
ways people used to have to deal with unwanted junk mail. For "return
postage provided" replies, they would often attach the return forms to
large packages of stuff (sometimes even organic, stinky stuff) and let the
junk mailer eat the postage charges at his end. Or they'd fill out the "get
free stuff" forms with the addresses of local officials.)

We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Licensed Ontologist         | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."