Date: Wed, 11 Jun 1997 11:05:30 EDT From: kryptonite for the superego Subject: FILLER: What's A Spam? [hurried, harried, and probably going to raise some hackles, but...I think it needs to be said somehow...] How do they spam? Let me count the ways... 1. Without consideration of the focus or purpose of the list. Writers is a workshop for writing. Pleas for political action and other postings that have no relationship to that purpose are questionable, at least. This is the main mark of the spam, that it sits like a lump unrelated to the list. [Do you like green eggs and spam? Do you like them, tink I am?] 2. With multiple addresses and crossposting all in the header. Not all spams contain this layer of larding, but the finer ones proudly display the lack of relevance to this list by including a wide smattering of other addressees in the header. After all, if it doesn't relate to this list, it probably doesn't relate to lots of lists! [I do not like green eggs and spam! I do not like that spam I am, I do not like it on the list, I do not like it in the midst!] 3. With short memberships or none at all... While our list does not allow non-members to post, some people take advantage of the ease of automated membership to join, post their spam, and leave. The person whose sole purpose in joining seems to have been to send out something that looks like a spam, smells like a spam, and throws fat around like spam...sure seems like a spammer to me! [Would you like it in a box? Would you like it wrapped in faux?] 4. With protests that they are members of the list, so what they post can't be spam! Wrong. Admittedly, being a member of the list means you should know better. You've seen the problems, you've probably read me ranting about stuff in the past, and you know that this is a workshop for writing, not a general purpose open mike for broadcasting. That doesn't mean you can't misuse the list, it just means I'm even more disappointed when you do. [I would not like it in a box, I would not like it in a faux, I do not like that greasy spam, I do not like it where I am!] 5. With protests that this isn't illegal or commercial, I just think it's really important that everyone read it! Certainly the periodic "Make Money Fast" and other scams or commercial efforts are pretty obviously misuses of the list. But even the best causes should not misuse the list like this. When you post to this list, there should be some relationship to writing or WRITERS. If you can easily come up with other lists where you want to post this, just because you want people to read it, then you probably shouldn't post it on WRITERS. This is the place where the spam gets grey. The keynote here has to be flexibility, and looking at the purpose of the posting. If it is to provoke or provide fodder for thought and writing, if it is part of questioning the world we write about, and especially if YOU WROTE IT and want help improving the writing, then it probably isn't slipping into the canned meats. On the other hand, if you are just forwarding something someone else wrote (hopefully, with permission, since we should respect copyright!), if you are just provoking the world, or if you're just using us as a mound to climb on for general broadcasting--spam, spam, spam, spam...and EGGS! [Would you like to warn the spammers? Would you like to crack the shells?] When I see things that look like spam on the list, I start checking. Who is this poster? Have they joined and left? Does it have multiple addresses in the header? Is it relevant to the list? My first defense is to limit the person's privileges on the list. After that, I usually report the spam to the ISP (Internet Service Provider -- who you dial into and pay). Most of them are quite aware of the problem of spam and react rapidly to reports. Of course, some people use the anonymous remailers (hotmail, rocketmail, etc.) Fortunately, even the anonymous remailers agree that spam is bad, and they have been cooperative in the past about removing accounts and passing on the word to the individual's ISP. I don't ask them to break privacy and tell me who it was, I just ask them to relay the information. I know that at least one spammer of this list has lost both anonymous remailer account and home account as a result of their activities. [Would you like green eggs and spam? Would you like them, tink I am?] Well...I would like green eggs, without spam! I want this list to be a vibrant, fun place, where people are writing and working together, growing, and learning. or as I said in a previous posting in this vein... [from http://web.mit.edu/mbarker/www/writers/fill951205.txt ] Last night, Peter, Paul and Mary (on one of the PBS stations) sang about lighting one candle. I realized that all we need is one candle. Not a box of don't's, just a light shining in the darkness, showing us ways that we can grow. (-:It was our last, best hope for peace... A shining beacon in space, all alone in the night... It was the dawn of the Third Age of Mankind...the year the Great War came upon us all...:-) We've got lots of folks ready to light that candle. And if all else fails--I'll be in my sandbox, with a candle. You'll recognize me, 'cause I'll be hunched over it, protecting that flame, waving at passing children with a smile, and humming. "Deep in my heart, I do believe, that we shall overcome some day..." {the whether started getting mixed, and I forgot the tune, but you'll never be completely adrift here on tink's crazy list...} So, let me suggest that as long as people are trying--whether they can only write something short or whether they are great cornucopia of words bringing forth weighty volumes--as long as someone is trying to do something on this list, damn the flames, full writing ahead! write unto others as you would have them...well, you know how that comes out. {so sit right back and write a tale, a tale of a fateful trip, that started with an exercise, here on this very list...!} anyway, instead of whipping ourselves into a frenzy about abuse, let's work on that great writing. [and the world will be better for this, that one human, scorned and tattered and torn, still wrote with his last drop of blood... still clicked at a keyboard with dreams... still strove to reach the unreachable staaaaars! hum. not quite there yet...but I'm going to keep trying!] keep writing. tink