XS4ALL Wins Anti-Spam Suit
johnpc writes: "In a court case started by Dutch ISP XS4ALL, a judge ruled yesterday that spam outfit AbFab is forbidden to send spam to all subscribers of said ISP. The judge writes: 'The essential point is that XS4ALL has no legal conveyance obligation. (...) XS4ALL does not wish to convey messages which its customers have not asked to receive and therefore does not wish these messages to be delivered through its systems, in this case from Abfab. The question of whether the unsolicited sending of large volumes of advertising messages by e-mail should be referred to as 'spam' or 'electronic direct marketing' is not relevant to this dispute.' This is obviously not a solution to the spam problem within the Netherlands, but it is a step in the right direction. You can read an english abstract of the ruling. Unfortunately, most of the actual case documents are in dutch, some of which are still being translated."
OK...I'm a loser.
I win, pussy.
Is for Rackrent on Fark! I am teh fat kitty!
This is a stunning victory against the forces of spam.
Now if my own country (United states) would get a similar precident....
Horray for XS4All!
(reads more closely)
If the US congress tomorrow passes a law that clearly and completely illegalizes spam, the amount of pr0n and online diploma spam I get will drop ZERO PERCENT.
How do you sue? Like I'm going to sue a korean mail relay. Stop. You are wasting my time. This problem can't and won't be solved by Trent Lott and Tom Daschle. Stop pretending it will.
Instead of fighting HUGE spammers, why not take smaller ones to court to set precedents. Then build up to larger and larger ones?
This is a great step in the correct direction.
Die spamers!
Sapere Aude - Homer
Now if we can get all the other ISP's to get on the bandwagon to just use the threat of litigation where a precedent has been set.
Expect to see more of this on Slashdot, which will post basically anything spam-related in the news. Companies sue other companies for spam. Your ISP fights for you. Things work out...
Gotta win one of these in the US to make it a reality though.
Synergy is your friend
The sentence translates to:
The sentencing judge:
everyone who holds an e-mail address ending in a domainname containing the word XS4ALL, explicitely inluding domainnames: XS4ALL.NL, XS4ALL.com, XS4ALL.net, XS4ALL.org, XS4ALL.co.uk, XS4ALL.be, and the domainnname hacktic.nl.
StarTrek.org Free Webmail
Fantastic, Dutch ISPs will now be able to block spam with impunity. However, I don't really see how this will help the state of affairs for the majority of the global online populous (aka netizens).
I am gay, I love COCK! Someone please come and roleplay on IRC. Or else I will kline you! Heh heh heh
-Emad El-Haraty
I developed a system which I run on our Beowulf cluster of Linux boxes. It monitors connections on port 25, and rejects any that match any of the following criteria: originator is on cable or DSL: originator has an open relay: originator is running servers on port greater than 1024. Works great, spam has dropped and so has total cost of ownership; our eCommerce bussiness is thriving. Just another reason why Open Source is good for the post-September 11 economy.
Only sick perverts enjoy anime
Similar rulings in the United States would start detailing the landscape of rights of website owners to keep SPAMMERS from scraping.
Fight Spammers!
Unfortunately, most of the actual case documents are in dutch, some of which are still being translated.
Well, I read the 8 page verdict, and there's not a whole lot there that's not in the English abstract. So don't worry, I don't think you're missing a lot.
(Sorry, I'm not going to translate 8 pages of Dutch legalese into English).
MSN 8: Now Microsoft even has bugs in their ad campaigns.
One thing I am really confused about is what makes congress fellows hesitate about passing a law to ban spam? Does that conflict their personal interests, or is that (possibly?) unconstitutional, or is it just technicalities? Doesn't banning spam benifit everybody except spammers?
Fuck Subscription!
J U N K B U S T E R
Just say NO to annoying StinkGeek banners and in-line 200x200 pixel "Do YOU have reliable [foo]...? Then you NEED SourceForge(TM) Enterprise 2002...! Order today."-esque ads.
CmdrTaco, Homos, Gayme, CowboiKneel, et. al..: GET REAL FUCKING JOBS!
Thank you.
disclamer: I only ask that you READ all the way through this mess before modding it as troll. thx.
/. address my "main"? Not even close!! I have a personal address which I give out to coworkers, close friends, etc., which they have instant access to. The access list blocks any emails orginating from unfamiliar territory. I check my other, public list as I need to, and filter out the crap that builds up in there.
Get ready for a long one. YES, spam sucks. We all know it, we agree with it, no one likes it. Guess what? DEAL with it!
In order to legislate the Internet, parallels must be drawn between it and regular society. Why? Because the Internet IS regular society, en masse. You've read all the shite about it being a global community, well, it IS!
We've all seen the posts before comparing spam to junk mail and why that makes it legitimate. No one has bothered to fully explain that so I'm going to, because IT'S TRUE.
You move into/purchase/rent/lease a house. Your address is thereby registered in various marketing pools. By participating in surveys, signing up for credit cards, buying various things, your Home Address gets propagated around the Real World net. Advertisers troll these networks and eventually pick up that you, Person A, live at Address B. And so they begin to send you mass mailings. The ones you receive may be personalized to your community. Depending on how much information you've volunteered to the Network, they may be personalized to your age/sex/religion/choice of pets/favorite video game console/etc. These people pay money to the (very much legitimate) US Postal Service to see that their advertisements/coupons/etc. are mailed to you.
Now we move to the Internet parallel. You have signed up for an Internet Address. The Internet is public. I will repeat this. The Internet is PUBLIC. Therefore people on the Internet can determine your address, just as much as I can browse the white pages looking for Real World home addresses. Depending on how much information you have submitted through various channels to the Internet, people may have put together certain profiles about you. Just as in real life, they will determine which advertisements are best suited to you, and make sure to send them to your PUBLIC address.
Being that this is Slashdot and no space to write novels, I would hope that we have all seen the obvious parallels between Home Addresses and Internet Addresses. If not, reread the above paragraphs until it makes sense.
Now, onto the problem (and indeed, I will propose the Solution)...
The US Postal Service requires MONEY in order to send out bulk mailings. The cost IS proportionate to the amount of mail that one wishes to send out. If I wish to print one million full color ten page Pennysavers and send them out to my "most likely to buy stuff" list of targets, I must pay a requisite sum to the Postal Service in order to see that these ads are delivered. This is where the Internet FAILS MISERABLY. ISP's do not care about bulk mail. Open relays allow far too many people to send far too many identical messages without caring about how many poor souls are copied on the same duplicated message. The ISP level is where it MUST CEASE. The current system is retarded and asinine. Those that maintain SMTP servers MUST begin to charge appropriate rates for bulk mail. There is no reason not to do this. Yes, I hear you whiners coming with "I'm a busy business professional, mail rates will hamper me!" BULLSHIT. *I* am an extremely busy business professional. I send AT MOST fifty emails a day. DAMN sure that they are all NOT identical ads merely being copied to various other people. At the ISP level, this is not in any way difficult to filter out and charge for.
I propose a simple and effective email charge system, where bulk mailers are FORCED to pay an appropriate amount in order to mail to a few thousand, tens of thousand, etc people.
The problem now is that our "open" network allows spammers to do their business virtually for free. If we can force them to conform to a business model that mimics the Real World and no longer lives in Fantasy Land, I will guarantee you that our goal of receiving less spam will be accomplished. However, I can't say this enough: Attempting to legislate against this practice is not only ineffective, it is UNCONSTITUTIONAL and completely worthless. Restricting people from advertising their products to PUBLIC networks and PUBLIC addresses on those networks goes against everything our country was founded on.
There also exists a second solution, which I'm sure many people will bitch about as well. But it's simple: Maintain TWO email addresses. Keep one public, open to any senders. Go through it as your business needs demand, and filter out any important emails. Keep the second address PRIVATE, that is, only accept emails from people on your "accept" list. I submit that this is really not that horrible a thing, and many of us are doing it already. Is my
In short summary, legislating against spam is yet another of the giant wastes of time that government spends its time doing. It needs to be addressed from the economical model (reasonable ISP charges) or from the personal level (maintain public/private email addresses). Anything else does nothing but waste clock cycles.
--t
MAJORITIES AND MINORITIES
.
.
We do not recognize the right of the majority to impose the law on the minority, even if the will of the majority in somewhat complicated issues could really be ascertained. The fact of having the majority on one's side does not in any way prove that one must be right. Indeed, humanity has always advanced through the initiative and efforts of individuals and minorities, whereas the majority, by its very nature, is slow, conservative, submissive to superior force and to established privileges.
But if we do not for one moment recognize the right of majorities to dominate minorities, we are even more opposed to domination of the majority by a minority. It would be absurd to maintain that one is right because one is in a minority. If at all times there have been advanced and enlightened minorities, so too have there been minorities which were backward and reactionary; if there are human beings who are exceptional, and ahead of their times, there are also psychopaths, and especially are there apathetic individuals who allow themselves to be unconsciously carried on the tide of events.
In any case it is not a question of being right or wrong; it is a question of freedom, freedom for all, freedom for each individual so long as he does not violate the equal freedom of others. No one can judge with certainty who is right and who is wrong, who is closer to the truth and which is the best road to the greatest good for each and everyone. Experience through freedom is the only means to arrive at the truth and the best solutions; and there is no freedom if there is not the freedom to be wrong.
In our opinion, therefore, it is necessary that majority and minority should succeed in living together peacefully and profitably by mutual agreement and compromise, by the intelligent recognition of the practical necessities of communal life and of the usefulness of concessions which circumstances make necessary.
As well as their reason and experience telling them that in spite of using all the alchemy of elections and parliament one always ends up by having laws which represent everything but the will of the majority, anarchists do not recognize that the majority as such, even if it were possible to establish beyond all doubt what it wanted, has the right to impose itself on the dissident minorities by the use of force.
Apart from these considerations, there always exists the fact that in a capitalist regime, in which society is divided into rich and poor, into employers and employees whose next meal depends on the absolute power of the boss, there cannot be really free elections.
REFORMISM
The fundamental error of the reformists is that of dreaming of solidarity, a sincere collaboration, between masters and servants, between proprietors and workers which even if it might have existed here and there in periods of profound unconsciousness of the masses and of ingenuous faith in religion and rewards, is utterly impossible today.
Those who envisage a society of well stuffed pigs which waddle contentedly under the ferule of a small number of swineherd; who do not take into account the need for freedom and the sentiment of human dignity; who really believe in a God that orders, for his abstruse ends, the poor to be submissive and the rich to be good and charitable-can also imagine and aspire to a technical organisation of production which assures abundance to all and is at the same time materially advantageous both to the bosses and to the workers. But in reality " social peace" based on abundance for all will remain a dream, so long as society is divided into antogonistic classes, that is employers and employees. And there will be neither peace nor abundance.
The antogonism is spiritual rather than material. There will never be a sincere understanding between bosses and workers for the better exploitation of the forces of nature in the interests of mankind, because the bosses above all want to remain bosses and secure always more power at the expense of the workers, as well as by competition with other bosses, whereas the workers have had their fill of bosses and don't want more! '
[Our good friends] are wasting their time when they tell us that a little freedom is better than a brutal and unbridled tyranny; that n reasonable working day, a wage that allows people to live better than animals, and protection of women and children, are preferable to the exploitation of human labour to the point of human exhaustion; or that the State school, bad as it is, is always better, from the point of view of the child's moral development, than schools run by priests and monks . . . for we are in complete agreement. And we also agree that there may be circumstances in which the Election results, national or local, can have good or bad consequences and that this vote might be determined by the anarchists' votes if the strength of the rival parties were equally balanced.
In most cases it is an illusion; when elections are tolerably free, the only value they have is symbolic: they indicate the state of public opinion, which would have imposed itself by more efficacious means, and with more far reaching results, if it had not been offered the outlet of elections. But no matter; even if some minor advances were the direct result of an electoral victory, anarchists should not flock to the polling booths or cease to preach their methods of struggle.
Since no one can do everything in this world, one must choose one's own line of conduct.
There is always an element of contradiction between minor improvements, the satisfaction of immediate needs and the struggle for a society which is really better than the existing one. Those who want to devote themselves to the erection of public lavatories and drinking fountains where there is a need for them, or who use their energies for the construction of a road, or the establishment of a municipal school, or for the passing of some minor law to protect workers or to get rid of a brutal policeman, do well, perhaps, to use the* ballot paper in favour of this or that influential personage. But then - since one wants to be "practical" one must go the whole hog - so, rather than wait for the victory of the opposition party, rather than vote for the more kindred party, it is worth taking a short cut and support the dominant party, and serve the government already in office, and become the agent of the Prefect or the Mayor. And in fact the neo-converts we have in mind did not in fact propose voting for the most " progressive " party, but for the one that had the greater chance of being elected . . But in that case where does it all end? . .
In the course of human history it is generally the case that the malcontents, the oppressed, and the rebels, before being able to conceive and desire a radical change in the political and social institutions, restrict their demands to partial changes, to concessions by the rulers, and to improvements. Hopes of obtaining reforms as well as in their efficacy, precede the conviction that in order to destroy the power of a government or of a class, it is necessary to deny the reasons for that power, and therefore to make a revolution.
In the order of things, reforms are then introduced or they are not, and once introduced either consolidate the existing regime or undermine it; assist the advent of revolution or hamper it and benefit or harm progress in general, depending on their specific characteristic, the spirit in which they have been granted, and above all, the spirit in which they are asked for, claimed or seized by the people.
Governments and the privileged classes are naturally always guided by instincts of self preservation, of consolidation and the development of their powers and privileges; and when they consent to reforms it is either because they consider that they will serve their ends or because they do not feel strong enough to resist, and give in, fearing what might otherwise be a worse alternative.
The oppressed, either ask for and welcome improvements as a benefit graciously conceded, recognise the legitimacy of the power which is over them, and so do more harm than good by helping to slow down, or divert and perhaps even stop the processes of emancipation. Or instead they demand and impose improvements by their action, and welcome them as partial victories over the class enemy, using them as a spur to greater achievements, and thus they are a valid help and a preparation to the total overthrow of privilege, that is, for the revolution. A point is reached when the demands of the dominated class cannot be acceded to by the ruling class without compromising their power. Then the violent conflict inevitably occurs.
It is not true to say therefore, that revolutionaries are systematically opposed to improvements, to reforms. They oppose the reformists on the one hand because their methods are less effective for securing reforms from governments and employers, who only give in through fear, and on the other hand because very often the reforms they prefer are those which not only bring doubtful immediate benefits, but also serve to consolidate the existing regime and to give the workers a vested interest in its continued existence. Thus, for instance, State pensions, insurance schemes, as well as profit sharing schemes in agricultural and industrial enterprises, etc.
Apart from the unpleasantness of the word which has been abused and discredited by politicians, anarchism has always been, and can never be anything but, reformist. We prefer to say reformative in order to avoid any possible confusion with those who are officially classified as " reformists " and seek by means of small and often ephemeral improvements to make the present system more bearable (and as a result help to consolidate it); or who instead believe in good faith that it is possible to eliminate the existing social evils by recognising and respecting, in practice if not in theory, the basic political and economic institutions which are the cause of. as well as the prop that supports these evils. But in any case it is always a question of reforms, and the essential difference lies in the kind of reform one wants and the way one thinks of being able to achieve it. Revolution means, in the historical sense of the word, the radical reform of institutions, achieved rapidly by the violent insurrection of the people against existing power and privileges; and we are revolutionaries and insurrectionists because we do not just want to improve existing institutions but to destroy them completely, abolishing every form of domination by man over man, and every kind of parasitism on human labour; and because we want to achieve this as quickly as possible, and because we believe that institutions born of violence are maintained by violence and will not give way except to an equivalent violence. But the revolution cannot be made just when one likes. Should we remain inactive, waiting for the situation to mature with time?
And even after a successful insurrection, could we over night realise all our desires and pass from a governmental and capitalist hell to a libertarian-communist heaven which is the complete freedom of man within the wished for community of interests with all men?
These are illusions which can take root among authoritarians who look upon the masses as the raw material which those who have power can, by decrees, supported by bullets and handcuffs, mold to their will. But these illusions have not taken among anarchists. We need the people's consensus, and therefore we must persuade by means of propaganda and example, we must educate and seek to change the environment in such a way that this education may reach an ever increasing number of people....
We are reformers today in so far as we seek to create the most favourable conditions and as large a body of enlightened militants so that an insurrection by the people would be brought to a satisfactory conclusion. We shall be reformers tomorrow, after a triumphant insurrection, and the achievement of freedom, in that we will seek with all the means that freedom permits, that is by propaganda, example and even violent resistance against anyone who should wish to restrict our freedom in order to win over to our ideas an ever greater number of people.
But we will never recognise the institutions; we will take or win all possible reforms with the same spirit that one tears occupied territory from the enemy's grasp in order to go on advancing, and we will always remain enemies of every government, whether it be that of the monarchy today, or the republican or bolshevik governments of tomorrow.
ORGANIZATION
ORGANISATION which is, after all, only the practice of co-operation and solidarity, is a natural and necessary condition of social life; it is an inescapable fact which forces itself on everybody, as much on human society in general as on any group of people who are working towards a common objective. Since man neither wishes to, nor can, live in isolation-indeed being unable to develop his personality, and satisfy his physical and moral needs outside society and without the co- operation of his fellow beings-it is inevitable that those people who have neither the means nor a sufficiently developed social conscience to permit them to associate freely with those of a like mind and with common interests, are subjected to organisation by others, generally constituted in a class or as a ruling group, with the aim of exploiting the labour of others for their personal advantage. And the age-long oppression of the masses by a small privileged group has always been the result of the inability of most workers to agree among themselves to organise with others for production, for enjoyment and for the possible needs of defence against whoever might wish to exploit and oppress them. Anarchism exists to remedy this state of affairs....
There are two factions among those who call themselves anarchists, with or without adjectives: supporters and opponents of organisation. If we cannot succeed in agreeing, let us, at least, try to understand each other.
And first of all let us be clear about the distinctions since the question is a triple one: organisation in general as a principle and condition of social life today and in a future society; the organisation of the anarchist movement; and the organisation of the popular forces and especially of the working masses for resistance to government and capitalism....
The basic error committed by those opposed to organisation is in believing that organization is not possible without authority.
Now, it seems to us that organisation, that is to say, association for a specific purpose and with the structure and means required to attain it, is a necessary aspect of social life. A man in isolation cannot even live the life of a beast, for he is unable to obtain nourishment for himself except in tropical regions or when the population is exceptionally sparse; and he is, without exception, unable to rise much above the level of the animals. Having therefore to join with other humans, or more accurately, finding himself united to them as a consequence of the evolutionary antecedents of the species, he must submit to the will of others (be enslaved} or subject others to his will (be in authority) or live with others in fraternal agreement in the interests of the greatest good of all (be an associate). Nobody can escape from this necessity; and the most extreme anti-orgnisers not only are subject to the general organisation of the society they live in, but also in the voluntary actions in their lives, and in their rebellion against organisation, they unite among themselves, they share out their tasks, they organize with whom they are in agreement, and use the means that society puts at their disposal. .
Admitting as a possibility the existence of a community organised without authority, that is without compulsion-and anarchists must admit the possibility, or anarchy would have no meaning-let us pass on to discuss the organisation of the anarchist movement.
In this case too, organisation seems useful and necessary. If movement means the whole-individuals with a common objective which they exert themselves to attain-it is natural that they should agree among themselves, join forces, share out the tasks and take all those steps which they think will lead to the achievement of those objectives. To remain isolated, each individual acting or seeking to act on his own without co-ordination, without preparation, without joining his modest efforts to a strong group, means condemning oneself to impotence, wasting one's efforts in small ineffectual action, and to lose faith very soon in one's aims and possibly being reduced to complete inactivity....
A mathematician, a chemist, a psychologist or a sociologist may say they have no programme or are concerned only with establishing the truth. They seek knowledge, they are not seeking to do something. But anarchy and socialism are not sciences; they are proposals, projects, that anarchists and socialists seek to realise and which, therefore need to be formulated as definite programmes....
If it is true that [organisation creates leaders]; if it is true that anarchists are unable to come together and arrive at agreement without submitting themselves to an authority, this means that they are not yet very good anarchists, and before thinking of establishing anarchy in the world they must think of making themselves able to live anarchistically. The remedy does not lie in the abolition of organisation but in the growing consciousness of each individual member.... In small as well as large societies, apart from brute force, of which it cannot be a question for us, the origin and justification for authority lies in social disorganisation.
When a community has needs and its members do not know how to organise spontaneously to provide them, someone comes forward, an authority who satisfies those needs by utilising the services of all and directing them to his liking. If the roads are unsafe and the people do not know what measures to take, a police force emerges which in return for whatever services it renders expects to be supported and paid, as well as imposing itself and throwing its weight around; if some article is needed, and the community does not know how to arrange with the distant producers to supply it in exchange for goods produced locally, the merchant will appear who will profit by dealing with the needs of one section to sell and of the other to buy, and impose his own prices both on the producer and the consumer. This is what has happened in our midst; the less organised we have been the more prone are we to be imposed on by a few individuals. And this is understandable.
So much so that organisation, far from creating authority, is the only cure for it and the only means whereby each one of us will get used to taking an active and conscious part in collective work, and cease being passive instruments in the hands of leaders....
But an organisation, it is argued, presupposes an obligation to co-ordinate one's own activities with those of others; thus it violates liberty and fetters initiative. As we see it, what really takes away liberty and makes initiative impossible is the isolation which renders one powerless. Freedom is not an abstract right but the possibility of acting: this is true among ourselves as well as in society as a whole. And it is by co-operation with his fellows that man finds the means to express his activity and his power of initiatives
An anarchist organisation must, in my opinion [allow for] complete autonomy, and independence, and therefore full responsibility, to individuals and groups; free agreement between those who think it useful to come together for co-operative action, for common aims; a moral duty to fulfill one's pledges and to take no action which is contrary to the accepted programme. On such bases one then introduces practical forms and the suitable instruments to give real life to the organisation. Thus the groups, the federation of groups, the federations of federations, meetings, congresses, correspondence committees and so on. But this also must be done freely, in such a way as not to restrict the thought and the initiative of individual members, but only to give greater scope to the efforts which in isolation would be impossible or ineffective. Thus for an anarchist organisation congresses, in spite of all the disadvantages from which they suffer as representative bodies . . . are free from authoritarianism in any shape or form because they do not legislate and do not impose their deliberations on others. They serve to maintain and increase personal contacts among the most active comrades, to summarise and encourage programmatic studies on the ways and means for action; to acquaint everybody with the situation in the regions and the kind of action most urgently needed; to summarise the various currents of anarchist opinions at the time and to prepare some kind of statistics therefrom. And their decisions are not binding but simply suggestions, advice and proposals to submit to all concerned, and they do not become binding and executive except for those who accept them and for as long as they accept them. The administrative organs they nominate - Correspondence Commissions, etc.-have no directive powers, do not take initiatives except for those who specifically solicit and approve of them, and have no authority to impose their own views, which they can certainly hold and propagate as groups of comrades, but which cannot be presented as the official views of the organisation. They publish the resolutions of the congresses and the opinions and proposals communicated to them by groups and individuals; and they act for those who want to make use of them, to facilitate relations between groups, and co-operation between those who are in agreement on various initiatives; each is free to correspond with whoever he likes direct, or to make use of other committees nominated by specific groupings
In an anarchist organisation individual members can express any opinion and use every tactic which is not in contradiction with the accepted principles and does not interfere with the activities of others. In every case a particular organisation lasts so long as the reasons for union are superior to those for dissension: otherwise it disbands and makes way for other, more homogenous groupings.
Certainly the life and permanence of an organisation is a condition for success in the long struggle before us, and besides, it is natural that every institution should by instinct aim at lasting indefinitely. But the duration of a libertarian organisation must be the result of the spiritual affinity of its members and of the adaptability of its constitution to the continually changing circumstances. When it can no longer serve a useful purpose it is better that it should die.
We would certainly be happy if we could all get along well together and unite all the forces of anarchism in a strong movement; but we do not believe in the solidity of organisations which are built up on concessions and assumptions and in which there is no real agreement and sympathy between members.
Better disunited than badly united. But we would wish that each individual joined his friends and that there should be no isolated forces, or lost forces.
It remains for us to speak of the organisation of the working masses for resistance against both the government and the employers.
. . . Workers will never be able to emancipate themselves so long as they do not find in union the moral, economic and physical strength that is needed to subdue the organised might of the oppressors.
There have been anarchists, and there are still some, who while recognising the need to organise today for propaganda and action, are hostile to all organisations which do not have anarchism as their goal or which do not follow anarchist methods of struggle.... To those comrades it seemed that all organised forces for an objective less than radically revolutionary, were forces that the revolution was being deprived of. It seems to us instead, and experience has surely already confirmed our view, that their approach would condemn the anarchist movement to a state of perpetual sterility. To make propaganda we must be amongst the people, and it is in the workers' associations that workers find their comrades and especially those who are most disposed to understand and accept our ideas. But even when it were possible to do as much propaganda as we wished outside the associations, this could not have a noticeable effect on the working masses. Apart from a small number of individuals more educated and capable of abstract thought and theoretical enthusiasms, the worker cannot arrive at anarchism in one leap. To become a convinced anarchist, and not in name only, he must begin to feel the solidarity that joins him to his comrades, and to learn to cooperate with others in the defence of common interests and that, by struggling against the bosses and against the government which supports them, should realise that bosses and governments are useless parasites and that the workers could manage the domestic economy by their own efforts. And when the worker has understood this, he is an anarchist even if he does not call himself such.
Furthermore, to encourage popular organisations of all kinds is the logical consequence of our basic ideas, and should therefore be an integral part of our programme.
An authoritarian party, which aims at capturing power to impose its ideas, has an interest in the people remaining an amorphous mass, unable to act for themselves and therefore always easily dominated. And it follows, logically, that it cannot desire more than that much organisation, and of the kind it needs to attain power: Electoral organisations if it hopes to achieve it by legal means; Military organisation if it relies on violent action.
But we anarchists do not want to emancipate the people; we want the people to emancipate themselves. We do not believe in the good that comes from above and imposed by force; we want the new way of life to emerge from the body of the people and correspond to the state of their development and advance as they advance. It matters to us therefore that all interests and opinions should find their expression in a conscious organisation and should influence communal life in proportion to their importance.
We have undertaken the task of struggling against existing social organisation, and of overcoming the obstacles to the advent of a new society in which freedom and well being would be assured to everybody. To achieve this objective we organise ourselves in a party and seek to become as numerous and as strong as possible. But if it were only our party that was organised; if the workers were to remain isolated like so many units unconcerned about each other and only linked by the common chain; if we ourselves besides being organised as anarchists in a party, were not as workers organised with other workers, we could achieve nothing at all, or at most, we might be able to impose ourselves . . . and then it would not be the triumph of anarchy but our triumph. We could then go on calling ourselves anarchists, but in reality we should simply be rulers, and as impotent as all rulers are where the general good is concerned.'
I am into the copy and paste.
What the fuck is a matter with you all?
Spam kicks fucking ass. I get mine in cases of 14 at Costco every week and I eat nothing but it execpt on fridays because it's LENT right now (sinners)
All of you who want to ban span can go suckle on my young, nubile pentil.
The Internet is generally stupid
What's the point? Spam will exist whether legal action is taken against some spammers or not. Spam is global, and the only way to really stop it is to hack into the offending mail system and cut off its head.
Usually what I do to the boxes that are spamming me is this: If the machine is running a Microsoft OS I'm even harsher, with the Unix boxes I find doing this I will let them off the hook about 8/10 times, unless they really, really annoy me.I find the state of spam on the Net somewhat unnacceptable, especially in the last year or so, and to be honest I really don't have time to deal with it most of the time. Hopefully my actions, when I do choose to take action, will make one or two incompetent mail administrators think for a second or two.
cheers,
Steven WostoenLead Programmer,
J-j-j-julius Games
Currently spam is frictionless; that is, there is almost zero marginal cost associated with spamming, hence the constant increase in junk email.
Something like this in the US would undoubtedly increase the cost of doing business for spammers aned their clients.
Some spamming companies would get caught, have judegements filed against them, and have to pay up. Korean mail relays notwithstanding.
No, I don't agree with your assertion that a judegement like this in the US would cause spam to "drop ZERO PERCENT".
I'm willing to listen to your arguement, but as you've presented it its baseless.
A message from our sponsor
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I'm sorry if I rant, or come off as an 'astro-turfer' (whatever that means), but I prefer to think of myself as an evangelist. Simply put, HoTMaiL.NET is the finest e-mail system currently in use, and I would have no problems whatsoever in recommending it to anybody who would rather receive less unwanted mail. I'm sure that when the Netherlands receives access to the civilised Internet, the judge's decision will be overturned as their population migrates to a powerful, easy-to-use system such as MicroSoft's spam filter.
Greetings, for free software!
Artist: Beck
Song: Loser
In the time of chimpanzees I was a monkey
butane in my veins so i'm out to cut the junkie
with the plastic eyeballs, spray paint the vegetables
dog food stalls with the beefcake pantyhose
kill the headlights and put it in neutral
stock car flamin' with a loser and the cruise control
baby's in Reno with the vitamin D
got a couple of couches sleep on the love seat
someone keeps sayin' I'm insane to complain
about a shotgun wedding and a stain on my shirt
don't believe everything that you breathe
you get a parking violation and a maggot on your sleeve
so shave your face with some mace in the dark
savin' all your food stamps and burnin' down the trailer park
(yo cut it)
Soy un perdedor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
(double-barrel buckshot)
Soy un perdedor
i'm a loser baby, so why don't you kill me?
Forces of evil in a bozo nightmare
banned all the music with a phony gas chamber
'cuz one's got a weasel and the other's got a flag
one's got on the pole shove the other in a bag
with the rerun shows and the cocaine nose job
the daytime crap with the folksinger slop
he hung himself with a guitar string
slap the turkey neck and it's hangin' on a pigeon wing
you can't write if you can't relate
trade the cash for the beef for the body for the hate
and my time is a piece of wax fallin' on a termite
who's chokin' on the splinters
Soy un perdedor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
(get crazy with the cheeze whiz)
Soy un perdidor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
(drive-by body pierce)
(yo bring it on down)
soooooooyy....
(I'm a driver I'm a winner things are gonna change I can feel it)
Soy un perdidor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
(I can't believe you)
Soy un perdidor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
Soy un perdidor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
[repeat]
(Sprechen sie Deutches, baby
Soy un perdidor
I'm a loser baby so why don't you kill me?
(Know what I'm sayin'?)
I am into the copy and paste.
XS4ALL have said that they have no legal obligation to deliver all mail that their customers are sent. While true, using this as a reason to ban certain e-mail from their system is a little worrying.
Why? Because it means that screening e-mail will become commonplace and ethically acceptable in future.
Take a less essential system such as IRC. Large channels often have ridiculous bans in place.. for example, kick/ban all those with French hosts, AOL users, people from Asia, people with nicknames they don't like.. and so on and so forth. E-mail could become a similarly uncontrolled system.
Do you really want to use a provider who, yes, blocks spam.. but, if the administrator doesn't like the French.. oh well, that means no-one using that ISP will receive any e-mail sent from French ISPs? Or, say, mail from Middle Eastern countries?
So, yeah, blocking spam is good.. but making this screening behavior morally acceptable simply means that a lot more mail is going to be screened in the future.. and you might not be getting all of the e-mails you are due.
mogorific carpentry experiments
Dear Troll,
We are sad to inform you that, after careful consideration , we have rejected your troll submission to the Troll Library.
You show a a poor skill at trolling. Please go read Troll Howto, and try again. Either that, or stick to adequacy.
I am into the copy and paste.
I really think it's great that you have reduced the amount of spam you get, but by your ruleset, you wouldn't be able to read this if it were an email message. And rest assured I'm not running an open mail relay.
BTW, just how long does it take your mailserver to check each and every email coming in for these criteria? Beowulf cluster of Linux boxes does this work? Really?
political_news.c: warning: comparison is always true due to limited range of data type
Now, XS4ALL is not an U.S. based ISP, so certain concepts like that of common carrier status may not apply. But such things used to apply in the U.S., even if they don't apply today.
The reason this isn't a victory is that it essentially declares that the ISP may transport ("convey") whatever data it pleases.
Well, it is a privately owned company, and I can see some merit to the argument that what it does with its resources is its own business.
But now apply the same logic to all ISPs, particularly the large ones, in light of the behavior of the media. That's right, folks: this ruling means that ISPs have the right to refuse to transmit any data they see fit. In short, they have the right to censor. After all, there's nothing that prevents them from selectively filtering.
How would you like it if an ISP decided that it didn't want to bother transiting any Slashdot traffic? Or Kuro5hin? Or any non-mainstream web source? What if they start dropping data based on the content of the data itself? Think it can't happen?
You say you could go to another ISP? Tell us that when the only ISPs left are AOL/TW and AT&T (the former, at least, has a very large interest in being selective about what you, the audience, see).
This may be a "victory" in the fight against spam, but it has ramifications that are so bad that I'll take the spam, thank you.
Use 'slashdot stuff' in the subject line in any email you send me if you want to get past the spam filter.
Congratulations. That was your third post ever, and you're still a fucking moron. That post will, however, still look interesting to potential moderators. So since it's 3:49am and I'm an insomniac so lemme do the work for you. MODERATORS: Read this before modding the parent, and I could care less about my own karma, but don't mod this down. Other moderators need to see this as well.
/ any offending mail server he chooses. That's not even worth the time to debunk.
Post 1
He actually seems to know what he's talking about, but it's rare that someone not in the codec industry to know this much about codecs. This is most likely the search-copy-paste routine: Google the current story, clip what you find, post a reply. As proof, read his post and then read this. It's a direct rip.
Post 2
Wow! That's some heavy code he displays as a "hack I devised". Well then he may want to take a look here because it displays the exact same code. Somehow I don't think they are the ones performing the ripoff. Another classic search-copy-paste routine. He also makes references to coding a "next-gen" game engine for Cinemaware. Why? So they can make better versions of Wings, Defender of the Crown, and The Three Stooges?
Post 3
Off the bat it seems he's getting lazy. There don't seem to be any outside sources "cited". But he makes a fatal flaw and shows he's just a simple idiot, claiming to rm -rf
If there ever was a good example of who to add to your Foe list, this is it. Yeah, I'm probably an idiot for even bothering with this, but I already do origami and listen to George Michael so why not nail the coffin shut.
I'm against picketing, but I don't know how to show it.
How to Write Modern Poetry: A Primer
By Patrick Highgate
Lets face it. Everyone loves poetry, but so few know how to write it. Fewer still know how to write it well. How many times have you walked down the street or sat in your bedroom, feeling a little melancholy and thought 'Hey, I should write a poem about this!'? That feeling is important, and there is sorry shortage of poetry in our coffee shops and Internet web sites that explore vague and trivial experiences. We need more. We need more from you. We're here to help.
The first question you might ask is, where do I start? Try to think of something that mildly registered inside of you as an emotion. Did that girl walking down the street remind you an ex-lover? Were you staring at your shoes and remember something insightful? Seemingly unimportant memories are perfect for a poem. Don't worry if your experiences are only really relevant to you. Everyone wants to know how your feel.
Remember, nobody else has ever felt the same way as you, and most likely what you feel has not been articulated more eloquently by thousands of others, over and over again or could be found ad nauseam at poetry slams or in online diaries. You are unique.
So you've been inspired. Great! You're ready to begin.
A lot of people wonder what tone of verse and word usage they should employ. Academia provides us mountains of poetry throughout the ages we could study and learn from. The modern poet, however, understands this is completely unnecessary and an un-learned approach to the craft is far more rewarding to both the author and the reader. You may worry that your imagery makes no sense to anyone other then you because it could appear fractured and makes allusions to non-universal experiences. Trust me. There is no reason to worry. The educated connoisseur of the genre will know exactly what your talking about, and those are the only ones you should care about. Anyone who scoffs at your work is probably jealous of you.
As you write, take special care in word usage. In the past, poets confined themselves to the vernacular of their language to illustrate their work. The modern poet knows no such restraint. Making up words is encouraged. As an example, you may want to say 'very deplorable'. That just doesn't sound poetic, does it? Try 'Hyperdeplorable' instead. It gets the message across, and does it in a slick edgy way. Your critics will be pleased with your cleverness.
All good poems need props to set the scene, so to speak. When dealing with props, it is important to remember the cardinal rule of modern poetry: ALWAYS INCLUDE A CIGARETTE. There is no such thing as a good poem that doesn't mention smoking, cigarettes, ash treys, or any other reference to the habit. There may be a little voice inside your head that says 'no, it's been overdone and makes the poem sound like the sophomoric ramblings of a confused high school student who is a prime candidate for advanced ADD treatment'. Kick that voice in the teeth; it doesn't know what it's saying.
You may want to spice your poems up with other props, such as naming the street you were on when you were inspired, coffee, or the name of a band you like to listen to. Basically, including anything cliché that pops into your head is not only good form, it is required.
Where should I come from? In the past, poets tried to write from a universal perspective that could be relevant to the common conditions of mankind. Boy, were they ever wrong! These days, there are really only two appropriate perspectives to have:
1. Sexually confused and depressed teenager
2. Somebody in there 20s or 30s who is still sexually confused and depressed, but has the advantage of experience to hone their innate bitterness.
It's always important to remember your audience. Remember, if you put your poem on the Internet there are going to be a lot more people then just a few friends and woefully bored strangers enjoying your work. So make sure to make references to things that only people who know you will understand. This may seem contradictory, but it's required if you ever want to be taken seriously.
Finally, choose the perfect ending. You may be tempted to think of a way to finish off the poem that completes it. This is a mistake. You've worked hard on your verbiage; why should you have to give the poem structure? After you've completed a line you feel particularly shows how completely smart you are, just stop the poem. It will designate you as a master, and leave your readers wanting more.
To conclude, we've concluded a textbook example of a perfect modern poem.
As I walk down 10th street
I hear ultrarock come from nearby clubs
Like doves
Leaving a church (on Halloween)
I light up a cigarette
And I viddy the slow pain she caused
When I was still young
And knew how to screw
Before . . . before.
That fucking whore
We went to Sammy's
And had a drink
I did not pay that night
I didn't have to.
The reason it went to court was that XS4ALL did not wish to censor any of the incoming traffic, as it had committment to deliver everything that was sent to its customers to its customers.
It could have filtered out all their mail, but chose rather to try and get Abfab to stop sending the mail, therefore meaning that it has not had to do any censorship at all.
first of all a disclaimer, I've been a proud xs4all user for many years now so I'm a little biased ;)
:) ) ISP's I know... trust me on this, applying censorship is the last thing they want to do...
anyway in can understand that some people may see this as an ISP trying getting censorship power this way... but if you now enough about what XS4ALL stands for, you will know that is absolutely NOT their intention... XS4ALL is by far one of the most cyberrights-aware (if that's a word
Ricardo.
Rather than repeating yourself, it would have been better to clarify which sense of "public" you meant. Open to all the people, like a public meeting? Maintained at the public expense, like a public library? Open to the view or knowledge of all, like when a fact goes public? I have a couple of servers permanently connected to the Internet, and only parts of them can be considered "public" in any of these senses (and not at all in the "funding" sense, alas). Perhaps you simply meant that you can't control what people do with information that you've disclosed (made public). I can agree with that, but I think "the Internet is public" is a poor way of expressing it.
I propose a simple and effective email charge system, where bulk mailers are FORCED to pay an appropriate amount in order to mail to a few thousand, tens of thousand, etc people.
Which bulk mailers will be forced how and by whom to comply with this?
If we can force them to conform to a business model that mimics the Real World and no longer lives in Fantasy Land...
Hate to burst your bubble, but at this moment in time the Internet exists in the real world, and your proposal exists in fantasy land. How were you intending to transpose them?
However, I can't say this enough: Attempting to legislate against this practice is not only ineffective, it is UNCONSTITUTIONAL and completely worthless.
To which constitution were you referring? The Internet does not have a "constitution" of which I'm aware. I take it that you're not proposing to legislate that ISPs should have to charge for bulk mail, then? Or would that be both constitutional and worthwhile? You mentioned forcing people to comply, so I assumed you meant law, but now I'm not so sure.
In short summary, legislating against spam is yet another of the giant wastes of time that government spends its time doing. It needs to be addressed from the economical model (reasonable ISP charges) or from the personal level (maintain public/private email addresses).
Oh, so you are against legislation in this case. You expect every ISP under the sun to spontaneously start charging for bulk mail. Well, if that's our only solution, then my guess is that spam is here to stay.
My bet is that an improved set of mail protocols will be the answer. That's why I'm working on them full time right now. Ask me about them in another four months or so.
proof, n. A demonstration that a conclusion is implied by certain premises and axioms.
Hey - where do I sign? I dont mind paying the international call charges - it will be worth it to get rid of the SPAM.
Hey now THERE's an idea; charging people SPAM protection money. Hmm...
(XS4all is my ISP since 1994 and I also do know a person working for the spamming company in this case, AbFab. I receive 15 spammails or so a day on that xs4all account)
.tw, .kr and .cn at least, but they don't do that for individual customers. Now the ISP can tell the smapping company to quit or they have to pay a fine, but this is not workable with oversees spammingfactories like the taiwanese and korean (which make up the fast majority of the spam IMHO).
There is a problem: The EU. They accepted a law that made spam 'opt-out' or in other words: the user should tell the smapping company to remove the emailaddress of the user from their list. XS4all was and still is fighting this stupid law, but with no luck so far. I've asked them several times to block anything coming from
AbFab is just a company sending email on behalf of mostly dutch companies. When you look at it that way, it's quite the same as the unsollicited mail you get in your snailmailbox: sometimes it's not totally useless, but most of the time it is: you get advertising shit about products you don't need or even CAN use. If advertising-mail is more targeted at people who will possibly be interested, it would be less annoying.
This verdict will probably the end of AbFab, since other ISP's will now also come with a block request and AbFab can't refuse that now. People will be out of a job.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
I should have used the preview button yadda yadda. haha :) what a stupid typo.
Never underestimate the relief of true separation of Religion and State.
Very Bad!
These guys have been on the forefront of allmost any ethical debate concerning the Internet and digital freedoms in general. XS4ALL was formed in 1993 by the infamous hackergroup Hacktic(RIP) and was the first dutch ISP to allow access to private persons. Since then they haven't like so many others sold out to profitmaking instincts but kept to their goal of providing high quality, afforable internet access to the masses. Over the years they've suceeded without giving in on netpolitical views like the right to privacy, freedom of speech and freedom of choice.
- On numerous other occasions they've been in court defending the privacy of their costumers and other basic rights.
- Threre's no single ad on any of their pages. They're an internet provider, not a advertising agency! Me and many others will gladly pay some more 's for that.
- They offer analog, isdn(128k), gsm, gprs and adsl access and their service includes free licences for mcafee virusscan and pgp software (all platforms). Do you know any other ISP that does that?
- There's a whole lot of other goodies you don't find at your average ISP: a telnet/ssh shell, static ip with bSMTP (if you want it), adfree secure webmail, and good public irc, gaming and hosting servers.
- Their bussiness services are also quite exelent.
- And they're definitly the only isp in the world that grows marijuana in the workplace!!! (in dutch).
[DISCL: No, I don't own stock or work there, I'm just a ver loyal costumer that has been with them since 1996 both privatly and professionaly.]
SqyD
In Scandinavian countries if you stalk on people's addresses without their consent and start sending them paper spam or SMS spam or whatever spam, you're in deep shit. The authorities will eat you alive.
The law is (at least in Finland) pretty strict about mass advertising needing to be specifically opt-in, unless it's delivered to every household. And even in that case you can just put a sticker over your post box which says NO ADVERTISEMENTS and lo and behold the amount of crap decreases to practically none.
We need a similar kind of system to the internet.
How about an extra feature on some-ones xs4all email box, that basicly says "Welcome, but unsollicited spamlike email not wanted". Lotsa dutch people have just the same sign on their snailmail mailbox.
Robert
And now it seems some centralised effort is spoiling the fun for the spammers!
Look at the example I copied to my website!
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
It seems to me that we should not receive spam for the same reason people with cell phones don't receive telemarketing calls.
That is, people who use cell phone pay for their service. Don't users of email similarly pay for their email?
Since I am paying for my email, not someone else, I would think I should not have to deal with SPAM.
Hmmm...
As a small ISP (just over 10 customers, over 40 domains) I have just printed a letter to Ab.Fab which asks them not to send any mail to my clients.
Given the ruling, I think they will have to comply with that.
I hope that lots of others do the same. Especially if you can legally claim to control more than a couple of domains.
I used the address that I found on their site as "how to find us":
ab.fab Interactive Media Group
Postbus 9088
1180 MB Amstelveen
[the netherlands]
I hope that this will at least stop the "spamfactories".
Roger.
I rarely respond to ignorant filth like this, but since you seem so inent on trying to discredit me, I might as well set you straight.
I guess you are familiar with this technique because you use it yourself, I, on the other hand, did not do this. If you do this yourself, then I can understand why you would think I also did it here, but that is quite cynical of you, I must say. Perhaps if you denounced your cynical and ignorant ways, instead of jumping to conclusions and trying to discredit people who are far superior in knowledge and skill to you, you would make progress in your own career and improve your own skills and knowledge to the point where you wouldn't need to rely on needlessly destructive criticism to "prove" yourself.
Yes, the text is very similar to my writing, probably because I read that very same text last week while preparing notes on whether or not it would be a good idea to implement part of our next-generation 3D engine with MPEG-4 interoperability support. If you don't understand what this means, I will gladly explain it to you, although it will be like a man explaining something to an to an ape, if you would just take the time to email me privately at woston@yahoo.com If you want to consider it a "direct rip", go ahead. Yes, the source is that article, but I memorized it, I did not cut and paste. I am not denying it. And yes, that WAS a hack that I devised. And yes - the author did rip it off from me, which I consented to - it is a pity that the author doesn't acknowledge the true source of the code, though. Well, there's that jumping to conclusions thingy again. Email me or even the author of the codeguru article for details. I'm sure that the author will deny it completely, though. Oh well - imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I'm not bothered by it. I'm sorry that you don't understand that no security measures are perfect, and I would say yes, approximately 90% of mail servers currently running are rootable remotely. Administrators who leave relaying on are usually not in the 10% that have a clue about security, so considering the fact that average mail server is rootable 9/10 times, the average mail relay is a pitiful joke as far as security is concerned. Not that I would expect you to know that, but perhaps my standards are just higher than yours, I don't know. Whatever. Either get your facts straight, or take your filth off this forum. This a pitifully pathetic attempt at discrediting me. Cinemaware are currently developing a whole slew of next-generation games, some of which are targeted for release later this year. You were on the Cinemaware site, but you didn't pick this up? I don't know what to say to you, really. Robin Hood: Defender of the Crown. Yes, it would seem they are indeed making a new version of Defender of the Crown. And they will be bringing out many original and rereleased titles. Learn what you are talking about before you talk.I do not punish or repremand unneccessarily, because I believe that everyone interested in technology or any other area has the potential to acheive things in their chosen field, and curiousity and throwing around of ideas is never a bad thing. Unfortauntely you chose to try and discredit me with misinformation. So I will give you this one chance. Start posting decent comments onto this forum. Show that you have a valid contribution to make. Let's try and be civilized here.
Until you do so, you are just behaving childishly by trying to get me "added" to the "Foe List". When you have as much experience and wisdom as I have gained during my time in the Industry, perhaps you will be in a position to criticise me, but most likely not - when you reach that level you will see the folly of criticisng someone who's only crime is trying to depart knowledge to others with less knowledge, in order to improve the computing industry, especially the gaming industry.
cheers,
Steven WostoenLead Programmer,
J-j-j-julius Games
and having (certain)websites that have all those checkboxes at the bottom of sign-up pages
(which after you uncheck them, and submit,
but forget to put in a password, they magicaly
become re-checked)
does not help make that line any clearer.
and in my opinion. anything i did not check my-self, or ask for would be spam. even if it is useful, i did not ask for it.
the only fact is that everything is an opinion
Geez, this is the second story in the past week where someone got marked Redundant for a near-first post. Did the early-post trolls come up with this idea before this guy?
No doubt by a lot of stonies. As if anything Dutch sets precedent anywhere but la-la land. Put your finger in it!
Filtering of customer traffic is already widespread. It isn't called censorship because it hasn't been based on content. But filtering is done by port (to stop inbound connections to customers), by protocol and direction (egress filtering to block email to non-ISP mail servers, or to block any spoofed packets, especially outgoing broadcast requests), etc. What you should be afraid of is a world where there is only one ISP to choose, because then you'll give what they get you and like it.
I am attempting to deal with spammers. Unfortunately, justice is thwarted by the law, so I cannot deal with spammers the way George Bush is dealing with al-Qaeda, but I get as close to that idea as I can.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
What really needs to be done is to make it a crime to dump e-mail into relays that you don't have specific expressed permission to use, weather they are locked or not. 99.99% of all spam that comes from bot harvested e-mail lists is rammed through open mail relays run by companies that don't know how to run their web servers properly (usually because they can hardly speak the language that the software is written, nevermind edit config files).
After all, this is exactly the same thing as if you walked into an office building and dropped off a box of mail needing to be stamped into the outgoing bin. If you can find a company dumb enough to stamp it and mail it out on their own dime, it's still theft. Just with e-mail, it costs about 1/10,000th less and is used to mail out 100,000 times more mail.
This would also clear any business who use their legit e-mail accounts and ISPs to mail to their established customers, thus addressing the concerns of nearly every opponent of every anti-spam bill proposed so far.
Stuart Kahler