What Constitues SPAM? (Or....Who Called the E-Mail Police?)

By Denise Hall (c) 2003


There have been several issues pertaining to SPAM and SPAM
filters recently. Ezine publishers and other legitimate
business owners have been running in circles, fighting just
to earn a living. ISPs have imposed SPAM filters on our
e-mail to stop SPAM from getting to our inboxes.

Now there's a company that wants to step in and really
make things tough. They want to sell internet business
owners a license to be able to send e-mails to their
customers to ensure the e-mails get through the filters!
The license will cost $200 a year for small business owners!

We've been getting junk mail in our snail mailboxes all of
our lives. Why hasn't the U.S. Postal Service thought of
that? They could make a killing!

Who has the right to tell me what kind of e-mail I should
receive? I should be the one to decide that. I get SPAM,
too, but sometimes what my ISP thinks is SPAM might be
something I've requested. Who are they to decide for me?

Other times something that should be filtered out because
it really is SPAM gets to my inbox anyway. Below I've
copied and pasted an e-mail I received recently. Read it
carefully, then I'll dissect it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
From: "Admin"
To:
Subject: msg from poolofgold.net Admin
Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 09:30:45 -0800

Hello e-gold members. here is the Admin of


http://poolofgold.net!


I want to tell you about a great new investment that
pays me 9 days
alredy ! they don't miss one payment! because of their
automatic pay ! ! !
so you don't need to worry about that you will don't
get payment!
the program is this :
its very simple all you need is to invest 5$ and you
will get 10$ after
one day (24 hours)


if you want to try them go here :


http://www.quick-gold.tk


Bye
Admin.
NEVER SEND SPAM. IT IS BAD.

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Well, wasn't that interesting? First, let me say that this
person was addressing "e-gold members." I've never been an
e-gold member! Second, the English, punctuation, spelling
and grammar are attrocious! Third, look at the horrible
format! This is not a true business person sending a nicely
put-together ad! This is definitely SPAM! And what is the
very last sentence? "NEVER SEND SPAM. IT IS BAD." Excuse
me, dude! I believe you just SPAMMED me!

Granted this was received in my Yahoo mail account, not my
ISP mail account, but they have filters in place, too. Yet
I inevitably receive at least one e-mail per week that
looks like this. I don't worry about it, though. I just hit
the delete key.

My point is that this kind of junk, and there is no other
word for it, gets to our inboxes. Yet legitimate offers,
ezines, etc. that we've requested don't always make it
through the filters.

What happened to our freedom of choice? How about freedom
of speech? Did they get lost among the companies that think
they should be the "e-mail police?" The last I knew, this
was a free country.

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Denise Hall is the owner of Home Business on a Budget which
specializes in tools and resources for your home business
needs. Visit http://www.home-business-on-a-budget.com today.
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