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Michigander Beats Spammer With "Junk Fax" Law
TastyWords writes "According to this link, it's possible to apply the 'junk fax law' to successfully sue a spammer in small claims court. For those who are stuck in states which either have worthless (or near-worthless) anti-spam legislation, this creative approach of the law presents a creative method of turning the table on those who choose to spam first and ask questions later. All of the details are available for enterprising anti-spammers!" Update: 02/25 00:30 GMT by T : OK, so it's Michigander, not Michiganian. Too long as a Texon, Marylandite and Tennesseenaut.
we're Michiganders BTW
I want 2D games back.
You have failed to fail.
Congratulations!
So, are you happy now ?
Now the world has gone to bed, Darkness won't engulf my head, I can see by infra-red, How I hate the night.
And 99% of the spam to one of my old email accounts is korean...
(of course, spamassassing is very effective at filtering that).
--- Hindsight is 20/20, but walking backwards is not the answer.
And for those who haven't read the article, one of the key things as far as I am concerned is the fact that the plaintiff won an award of $539.00 (including court costs). Multiply that by a-very-large-number-of-spam victims and I think some damage will be done.
Never, ever lose a file again. Ever.
Sounds like a rather creative way of defining a computer as a fax machine.
Does this mean that if I get an unsolicited marketing call (over the telephone line, just like a fax machine), then transcribe the call onto my computer (so it is stored in the computer memory, just like a fax machine) then finally print that transcription out (again, like a fax machine) I could successfully sue them under the junk fax law too?
E000-VB14-G8RY
At my work, my bos is collecting all of the junk faxes he gets, and someting he is going to take all of these to small claims court. This is great for a precident to be set against an online junk emailer. The problem is identification, though.
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
They didn't appeal, I got my check. They also sent out a contract thing they wanted me to sign as a disclaimer of responsibility and liability and all this nonsense. I talked to their attorney and he said it was standard. I said, "Not standard for me and I'm not signing it, I will be depositing your check however." He wasn't too happy about that, ... Iwonder what was in the disclamer?
I seem to remember seeing Ralksy's address somewhere (wink, nudge)... he's a resident of Michigan. Now we just need every citizen of the state to sue him for a couple hundred bucks each.
General Geekery
You can use a stick to beat a spammer.. however, you can't do it in small claims court, and you must be a fast runner...
---
What this country needs is a good five cent ANYTHING!
1) Hunt down spammers
...and now we have the missing step 2. Thanks Mark!
2) ???
3) Profit!
Shameless plug for my photos on Flickr
Read the article. His tenuous argument is that email is similar to a fax, because he uses a dialup fax modem to read his email. Sounds like a very confused argument to my ears. On that note, how many of us use a fax modem any more? (Perhaps I could use this line of reasoning too because I have a fax machine on my DSL line?)
I hope this has some affect but I don't see how it can. If spammers can be sued in Michigan, or even in all of America, what stops the spammers using nations do not recognise US law? Instead of Sears now shutting down it's spam operations (which I assume are incredibly popular) won't it just contract it out overseas through some shady company? Surely it must be proved that they were indeed the originators of the spam?
--
On Slashdot I'm a lawyer.
As ink and paper is physical, while bandwidth and CPU time is not. I can't say what my stand is about that, because I don't think the fax law should apply...yet I hate spammers !
According to the article, he argued that because he was using a fax modem, fax software, scanner, and printer, his computer was like a fax machine. So, I guess this means that all of us broadband users can't use this tactic. Sorry, speedy.
no, but I feel validated.
" For those who are stuck in states which either have worthless (or near-worthless) anti-spam legislation..."
Uh.. what? What states don't fall in that category?
Seriously, is there a state that's got the problem under control?
"Standard" is one of the most abused words on Earth. You can use it to attempt to convince anyone of anything:
A new mother asks: "Why did you chop off some of the skin on my son's penis?" The doctor answers: "Oh, that's just standard practice, nothing for you to worry about."
--sex
Very popular slashdot journal for adul
I was first, and I feel validated. yet, I do... really. but I'm not happy about it.
It's all very well of you trying to tell people what is moral and what isn't .. but I'll figure out my own morals, thanks. And if that includes getting revenge on people that piss me off, so be it.
You spout that off as if there is an absolute moral code than should be followed, when it is blatantly obvious just by looking at the huge range of moral values displayed by people around the world that there is none.
E000-VB14-G8RY
Although I think laws such as the junk fax law are a step in the right direction, the problem I see with most spam is that the headers have been forged to the point of illegitimacy. Sure, if they include a link to a website, you could go after the person or people listed in the WHOIS record, but it would be easy for the administrative contact to claim that he or she didn't send the spam.
Sears is an easy target -- they probably sent semi-legitimate spam that included contact and/or removal information, as well as the Sears website. However, I doubt that $500 will steer Sears in the right direction regarding spam. For $500, it's easier for them to write a check than to pursue it in court. I'd guess they made several thousand dollars off the spam mail, and that the $500 was written off as a cost of doing business.
My point is, that between completely illegitimate spam that doesn't even have any real contact information, and companies that make a lot of money off of spam and who don't mind writing a $500 check every once in a while, this law won't be very effective.
I will continue to argue that spam is a technical problem and needs a technical solution to solve it. Ultimately, even if the big companies like Sears stop spamming, there will always be the spammers who send out 100 million penis enlargement spam mails with fake headers and fake return addresses that render the spam nearly impossible to trace. The illegitimate spam problem won't be solved by laws -- it will be solved by the intelligence of the Internet community. I'd rather see this solved by technical prowess than by laws that will only encourage spammers to fake their mail headers to avoid lawsuits.
Simpli - Your source for San Jose dedicated servers and colocation!
"Under United States law, it is unlawful "to use any telephone facsimile machine, computer, or other device to send an unsolicited advertisement" to any "equipment which has the capacity (A) to transcribe text or images (or both) from an electronic signal received over a regular telephone line onto paper." " Seems like this would be a nice source of spare income if it could be done reliably, but do I have to use a modem? :P
The trick appears to be making sure you sue someone you can actually drag into court. Sears for instance has a location very near to me, so it was easy to sue. Other companies that spam may be on the other side of the country or overseas and very, very hard if not impossible to go after, I think.
So it seems that you can probably only apply this to companies dumb enough to identify themselves in their spam. If Home Depot started sending out spam, they could be sued like this. However, all those viagra/porn/spam blocker/Nigeria spams will be impossible to target this way.
I've always suspected that it will come down to small claims court to bring spammers down. And it won't be attorneys, it'll be the little guy like you and I.
Here's why:
1. We have the time. A reward of $500 a day isn't too bad, tax free, I assume. Getting the headers, and finding a local spammer is the most difficult part of our task.
2. It pays. Illegal acts are being committed, even without the fax laws, there are truth-in-advertising laws, smut laws, etc.
3. Spammers are in your state. The sheer volume of mail sent means you're likely to eventually getting spam that originates from your state. This is important as most small claims courts will require both parties reside n the same area.
I'm employed, not really worth my time, but there's a business model and a "Support-your-American-Economy" cheeriness about this. Now go take on the day!
fslg503-985-8686503-985-8686503-985-8686503-985-8
This isn't about spamming a spammer. You used the example that we don't rape rapists. You're exactly right: we don't spam spammers, we punish them just as we punish rapists. That's what this story is about. RTANT (read the article next time)!
The definition of a fax machine under the TCPA does cover a computer with faxmodem and printer. There are many lawyers who argue that it is not intended to be used that way and the courts will not support it. I have been unable to find any binding case (ruled on by an appeals court) in the country that has said a computer with faxmodem and printer does not qualify as a fax machine. The only case that comes close is one that argues over jurisdiction in state of federal court. The appeals court mentioned that it was spam in a footnote, but took no action. As this was an appeals of a summary judgment, the court had the ability to dismiss on the issue of spam TCPA not applying to spam, but did not do so.
More information is at http://www.phillipsnizer.com/int-art111.htm
Fight Spammers!
The parent post is commenting on a section of the article. How in the world is it off-topic?
I was wondering how one might argue that e-mail == fax (unless the law is very loosely worded) from the write-up. Here's what the article says:
/dev/null to your printer, and watch the money roll in. It's like printing currency!
Essentially, I argued that under the title code, my computer is also a fax machine and that email is really no different from fax. My computer has a fax modem, fax software, a scanner and a printer, I received this email using a dial up phone line connection and printed the message.
That's really creative! (Especially from a non-lawyer).
It's not even particularly deceitful -- the reason fax spamming is illegal is because you use the resources of the recipient fax machine and associated items (fax paper, ink).
E-mail does, in fact, use the resources of the recipient computer, not least of which is the downward ISP connection, for which recipient pays a monthly fee, and which has limits imposed.
Still, it's pretty creative to say: "I printed it out. Now it's a fax. Pay!"
So, if you think the decision will be upheld on appeal, you might as well start cashing in in advance: Change your spam redirect from
For more information, please send a self-addressed stamped envelope to the e-mail address in my profile, along with a check made out to my username in the amount of $3.99. This includes shipping.
It's an informational brochure with no obligation. This guy is making it big. After a careful study of his case (IANAL), I've concluded that so can you.
You'll never have to work again.
Note: If you print this message you agree to opting in to my Slashdot Troll Service and may not sue me for junk faxing you. (If you don't print it it's not a fax).
--
I took some notes on our conversation, and then he sent me a fax. Do you want to see them?
Just the fax, ma'am.
Suddenly there is a use for those things!
but the point being expressed is that, given the choice, the better person does not need to lower themselves to prove that they are better.
now on revenge, best of luck, those spammers seem to be an evil bunch with the choice of harrassing people.
onepoint
if you see me, smile and say hello.
I think the judge screwed up here, and this will likely be reversed on appeal. Even if you accept that Mark's computer qualifies as a "telephone facsimile machine" under the terms of this act, it's pretty tough to make the argument that what Sears did was "to send an unsolicited advertisement to a telephone facsimile machine". They sent an email message to an SMTP server, which stored it in Mark's mailbox. Using his fax modem to dial his ISP and retrieve the message was Mark's choice. Printing it out was Mark's choice. I'm very surprised that the Sears lawyers didn't slam-dunk this one.
This article is about a guy that used a punitive damage law to punish a spammer. Hardly and eye-for-an-eye. That would be spamming a spammer. See a slashdot article from a couple of months ago for that.
1. That Ralsky fellow, him what allegedly got millions by spamming, lives in Michigan. 2. So do many Slashdotters. Hmm....
Here's my canned reply for these:
....
;)
I would like to see citations (especially case law) that specifically address your claim that 47 USC 227(a)(2)(B) is applicable in this case. In particular, such legal advice as I've seen states that this is *NOT* applicable to E-mail in general, and for this statute to be applicable, there would need to be a finding of fact that E-mail is legally a FAX. If E-mail *was* ruled to be legally fax, then you would have to comply with all the legal requirements that would entail.
In particular, I suggest that you also read 47 USC 227(d)(1)(B),
which states:
(d) Technical and procedural standards
(1) Prohibition
It shall be unlawful for any person within the United States -
(A)
(B) to use a computer or other electronic device to send any
message via a telephone facsimile machine unless such person
clearly marks, in a margin at the top or bottom of each
transmitted page of the message or on the first page of the
transmission, the date and time it is sent and an
identification of the business, other entity, or individual
sending the message and the telephone number of the sending
machine or of such business, other entity, or individual.
Be careful what you ask for, you may get it....
(Hint - was *your* e-mail stamped with the originating phone number at the top of each page?
What about faxs that come from Russia? When faxer pays Russian mob to look the other way? When police want to wheel and deal with George Bush instead of listen to him like they should (in order to take care of Russian crime with advice and recommendations)?
Other countries may be so corrupt that their affairs are not in order. They can not deal with some problems effectively, which means that we may feel the pain for some time. Pricey faxes are only one of them.
I suggest you read Slashdot
Okay, but my point is that they are not necessarily a 'better person' - that distinction is very arbitrary and dependant on the observer.
E000-VB14-G8RY
Well, just consider their spamming him as "The Software Side of Sears."
<duck>
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
This post is from the Slashdot Troll Archive.
:)
Here's the link to this particular post: Lex Talionis is a morally bankrupt code
If you're going to troll, may I suggest The "Moon": A Ridiculous Liberal Myth? It's one of my personal favorites.
Simpli - Your source for San Jose dedicated servers and colocation!
"Ask yourself this: should we rape the rapist? If not, why not? "
No, we shouldn't rape rapists. We should shoot them. Twice. Once in the crotch, let them suffer the pain and loss of manhood for a few minutes, then shoot them in the head. None of this rehabilitation crap.
So. This guy successfully sued his local Sears branch for sending him a piece of Spam mail, for a total award of $539. The theory is that (being that Sears is a place you can sue), them sending it to his computer, means that the Sears store, wherever it is, is culpable for doing 'damage', 'irritation', or whatever, to his computer. Great, good for him.
How do we apply this logic to things like copyright infringement over county, state, national, international borders?
This is bullshit.
The same people who are cheering this ruling, convinced it will slow down or stop spam, because those damned spammers will be liable for the shit they send will be the very same people screeching in horror because the **AAs are 'breaking into your computer' by browsing what's already there to find illegally traded files.
Ladies and gentlemen, you can't have it both ways. Either computers exist on the internet, so they exist in all countries at once and are obligated to follow any law in any place someone decides to sue them with, or they're not. But I for one am sick and tired of reading what feels like opportunistic banner-waving: if it serves my interests, then that's what I want.
Look at the bigger picture. Please.
A reward of $500 a day isn't too bad
I'm sure it took Mark more than a day to get a reward for his work.
Should we rape rapists?
Morals and law are two totally different concepts.
The problem with your argument is that you ignore the true purpose of punishment: discouragement. The purpose of the penal system is to essentially produce a Pavlovian response towards 'bad' behavior in the subject. Unfortunately, given the structure of most prisons, the 'justice' system does more to reinforce said behaviors than prevent them.
If one man kills another, he has already violated the covenant of society. No number of speeches by defenders or flowery declerations of sorrow by the accused can bring the dead man back to life. It may not be impossible for a sinner to repent, but fear of punishing one should not overcome the dangers of his actions encouraging others.
Will raping rapists discourage others from doing the same?
Therein lies the question.
-Brett
Spammers do just that, it is called a Joe Job, and is done for revenge purposes.
Can't we all just accept the fact that we are all Earthikans and live in peace?
Vote Nixon in 3000!
(it's a Futurama joke)
Over 10 years ago (back when I still lived in Michigan), a resolution was adopted by the state legislature that formally dubs residents of Michigan Michiganians.
Yeah, it's a stupid monkier and no one follows it, but it could be worse. The 2nd choice was "Michiganeers".
The person who spearheaded the legislation found being called a duck insulting.
"Ask yourself this: should we rape the rapist?"
That's between him and his cellmate.
Damn. I got played like a $2 slide whistle.
...the funny thing is the people who replied even AFTER the guy who spotted it from the troll bank. It's really getting too damned easy.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Agreed, but what most want is justice, not revenge.
.
Spammers use very slimy methods in the way they do thier business in order to avoid what would be appropriate justice - namely, having any e-mail sent by them filed immediately in the bit-bucket. Since there are currently no legally prescribed means of stopping the deluge, people become outraged, and well, you can figure out what's going on from there,
While it's not really an excuse for questionable behaviour, these "businessmen" are actually inviting it by continuing along as though people actually want thier wares. As long as they do that, normally reasonable people will want to see all spammers get thier just reward - in spades.
Besides, there's and old saying that fits here:
"Turn-about is fair play."
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
I read it as:
"meshugener(1) beats spammer!"
Ahhh.... violence that everyone agrees to....
(1) madman in yidish
^_^
I've been spammed by Sears for vinyl siding and other unsolicited offers, and it was always delivered by some third party on their behalf with the typical forged headers, i.e., they subcontracted to some low-life advertizer. Unfortunately, Sears was stupid enough to allow the use the Sears name within each spam. I even called Sears customer relations and complained, they seemed oblivious. Perhaps no more.
Lex talionis is not, and never has been, "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life". Lex talionis is a view towards law that treats justice as interchangeable with retribution. If someone puts out your eye, then go over and slaughter the sonufabitch--that's lex talionis in a nutshell. What the lex talionis codes did was codify this pre-existing principle and give it color of law.
On the other hand, Hebrew law has not been viewed as proscriptive, but rather prohibitive. Instead of saying "retribution is justice", the Hebrew scriptures actually put limits on the government's ability to authorize retribution--you were forbidden from exacting vengeance past the wrong done to you. If someone put out my eye, I wasn't allowed to put their entire family to the sword.
"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life" is, like much of the Old Testament, usually read with absolutely no clue about the context in which it was written. Look at the Code of Hammurabi, which is another legal code from roughly the same period in antiquity. The Code can be summed up as "if you transgress these laws in any way, you're going to get killed. Or if your transgression was really minor, just permanently maimed." That was a helluva system of laws, let me tell you. That's all it was: a system of laws. There was no concept of justice at that time, just pure, unadulterated law, and if you broke it, you died.
Then along come the Jews and their principle of "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life"... and this system of laws was hailed as moral, merciful, and just. Why? Because it established limits on what the government could mete out for punishment.
So the next time you feel like condemning Hebrew law ("an eye for an eye") as a "morally bankrupt code", please consider the other options available at the time. And also consider that you're completely misunderstanding what the entire point of the Hebrew "an eye for an eye" instruction was and is.
It was, believe it or not, perhaps the first time in human history that someone put limits on the power of government and established that there were moral limits to governmental power. As such, it deserves our respect.
I'm more of a fan of Rapists getting a STD that can only be cured with liberal use of lye and sand paper...
If we all do this, this would cause the collapse of the small claims court system as we know it. Someone would notice, if only the millions who watch Judge Judy!
Gentlemen,
While this small victory is somewhat nice, it is quite too early to celebrate. It's a simple algorithm: take the number of emails produced by a spam-king, multiply by the number of possible suckers (gross profit), subtract the $500 per infraction of those willing to take the time and effort (net profit), and the result is well a very, very large pot minus a few pennies.
I would suggest taking a drug that fixes the infection rather than the symptoms. But I could be wrong.
Peace out
"This isn't a study in computer science, its a study in human behavior"
I was hoping to see a title like "Michiganian Beats Spammer With A Baseball Bat". THAT would have been more to my taste.
Follow your Euro bills at EBT
I fail to see how suing a spammer in small claims court is "an eye for an eye". What exactly are you arguing against here?
This is just a lot of moral outrage obviously espoused by someone who spends very, very little time in the real world. There are victims created from good actions and bad actions. In life, usually someone wins and someone loses. Who decides who has been vicitmized?
There are actions and there are consequences. It's not ideal, but it's the truth.
What kind of giddy moral superiority do you get sitting at home criticizing people are out there actually trying to do something to make the world a better place?
I'm really surprised that a company as "prestigious" as Sears is sending spam. I would have been interested in seeing the full headers.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
Some will say the TCPA applies to fax, some will not. Most will not -- most don't even know much about it, let alone have a willingless to stretch it to define an E-mail as a Fax.
Sadly the TCPA is fairly toothless. Yes, you can sue for $500 and you might win. I have done so myself, and collected. But after spending several hours of work, and the average amount of time spent per successful collection is normally high enough that it's not worth your trouble.
Some small claims judges think you can't sue somebody out of state, some thing you can. Even on spam laws where there isn't the TCPA question.
There is a valid question of whether you should be able to sue somebody out of state in small claims court for $500. Think about it -- it costs $500 at least to come and defend yourself in an out of state case, so how can you win, even if you are totally innocent?
How would you feel if you -- not a junk faxer at all -- got a summons to appear in court on the other side of the country to face a $500 payment for junk faxing? You could go and defend yourself, but it would cost you way more than $500 in costs, don't even talk about your time. You can't send a lawyer, if somehow that would save money.
So it's tough to figure out how to allow this. And spammers and junk faxers are rarely local, though sometimes they are.
What if you took the risk that if you sued an out of state spammer, you would have to pay his expenses to come out if you lost, or take them out of your winnings if you won? I would not.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Whether or not there is an "absolute moral code" or not is beside the point. What is not beside the point is whether various relevant moral codes can be evaluated against some meaningful standard (not necessarily an absolute standard, just a standard that the various people involved can agree is "meaningful"). If you believe there's a rational justification to objecting to my "punch you because I feel like it" morality, then you implicitly agree that it's possible that there's a rational justification for the other poster's criticism of your lex talionis morality.
When you write "you spout that off as if there is an absolute moral code than should be followed...", you're being intellectually lazy in two distinct ways. The first is you're inferring the writer is an absolutist and then knocking down that inferred straw man. The second is that you probably don't even realize that you were knocking down a straw man because it appears that you think that advocating a moral position necessarily implies absolutism. It doesn't.
You must be crazy. $539 is all Sears paid out. Just directing their own attorney to draw up papers and file for an appeal, let alone investigate the validity, would cost far more than $539. Besides, I don't think you can haul an atty into any small claims court. I don't think you can appeal outside, though I may be wrong.
BTW, that paper he refused to sign may be a tough nut for them to swallow, as they don't want anything like his case to establish precedence, so they may yet revisit this, but as it's small claims, it would be intriguing to see how it plays on appeal.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I thought you guys were Michiganders???
[self-modded -1: Off Topic by the "No Karma Bonus" selection]
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
...and start an organization that gathers the email/snail mail addresses of spammers and signs them up for every junk mail publication known to man.
IANAL but I believe that the reason he was able to sue Sears in small claims court was the fact that Sears was doing business in the same state.
If the party you are sueing is out of state, you have to take the matter to district court. The filing fee is usually only a little more, but if you don't win your case, you can expect to be held accountable for the spammers attorney fees.
-Scott scott@surrealistic.org
Hey, of course I would complain. I realise that your morals may dictate that that is acceptable behaviour to you, but it does not imply that it is acceptable to me.
As for the rest of your comment - there's no need to get so uptight about my comments. I did not have the goal of presenting a logical argument to his views in the first place. Just commenting of some things I thought of while reading it.
E000-VB14-G8RY
What I find most interesting about this is not the use of the junk fax law, but that Mark was able to sue Sears about it. This is something I've been wondering lately anyway: even if it might be next to impossible to track down the sender of a spam email, could you not still hold the company whose products are being advertised responsible for the spam?
IANAL, but I don't find it a fair stretch to say that, possibly even in a legal sense, the spammer was respresenting the company. The same can extrapolated to cover owners of websites, etc. -- any person, company or service that is the subject of the spam.
I was doubtful of this until now -- it seems like Mark pulled it off!
So then, why we don't stop trying to stop spammers, and go after the source? By attacking those that fund the spammers the spammers will still go down, and the targets are easier to find.
Punctanym: alternate spelling of words using punctuation or numerals in place of some or all of its letters; see 'leet'
...and if it works, I might retire. :)
Go Nebraska!!! 1997 National Champions!
After receiving 80+ spams a day, you have a bunch of good feelings for spammers that don't include brutalizing, raping by guards, or even remove one or both eyes. Not that this are good ideas, but you simply want some more effective.
:) or at least, should pay for what they acknowledge that are bad things and harm people. The last ones, in the other hand, must understand why this is bad, and a good hint is giving them a good taste of their own medicine (after all, is his idea that this don't annoy anyone). Of course, you can't decide when a spammer belongs to a category or the other, so you must take some intermediate path.
Now, you can have 2 kinds of spammers, those that act knowing how bad it is, and those who think that is ok, that they are not harming anyone sending 5M messages a day, nor slowly killing the most basic communication protocol on internet. The first ones, well, must be raped
And since we can buy and sell CPU time, cpu time, as a commodity, is just as real, and therefore has a physical existence.If you don't think time is a real physical entity, just like space, does this mean you're not able to bill by the hour?
Very nice to see someone take action on this. Now, if there is a lawyer out there who wants to get an uber-class action together, tie this law in with the info on at the Spam Haus Project (http://www.spamhaus.org), and you could net yourself a really big fish, and hopefully take them down as well.
Too bad spam isnt criminal; I would love to see the Spam King in jail, gettin the "Oz" treatment. Well, I wouldnt really want to *see* it...
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
Amazing, he did the right thing. He modified his computer until it fell under the fax machine law. He uses a modem to connect over telephone lines (not cable, not dsl). He prints his email to paper, and he has fax software installed to send scanned paper documents to other fax machines. So his equipment can be considered a fax machine.
We saw a similar thing recently, with Lexmark. Everybody can produce a plastic box that fits into Lexmark printers, and nothing can stop them from doing so. Except Lexmark & the DMCA - Lexmark found that they have to mix the plastic box (which is not protected by law) with an intellectual property item (which is protected by copyright) and an access restriction (which is protected by DMCA). Glue all 3 things together, and voila. You've got a plastic box which can not be legally copied.
So, when the law works AGAINST us consumers so often, why shouldn't it work FOR us once or twice?
Michiganiacs!
:)
but Ted is a somewhat eccentric native
Michigan is two peninsulas, the good folks who live in the Upper Peninsula are Yoopers. We are fun, we even have our own band - Da Yoopers. They sing great songs like The Couch That Burps and the Three Month Late Polka.
Those who live in the Lower Peninsula, under Da Bridge, are trolls. This guy is from D'troit, he's a troll. When I say Da Bridge, I mean Da Big Mac.
Or a 20 pound sledgehammer. Or a Scottish claymore? Fuck the baseball bat.
Lex Talionis, the principle of an eye for an eye, is a morally bankrupt code of law we've been moving away from for the past few thousand years, thankfully.
Wrong. Lex Talionis was the principle that you take NO MORE than an eye for an eye - promulgated as an "improvement" in an era where the response to losing an eye (or a purse) might be to do in the alleged perpetrator and confiscate all his worldly goods.
It's morally bankrupt, all right. But only to the extent that if the theif only loses what he stole, and has a nonzero chance of getting away with it, thevery remains a profitmaking enterprise despite full enforcement of the law. So it becomes an endorsement of theft as a lifestyle. This is why there are "puntitive damages" - extra penalties to punish the perpetrator (thus making continued misbehavior a losing proposition even in with imperfect law enforcement).
None of which applies here. Applying "Lex Talionis" to the spammer would mean spamming him, rather than seeking compensatory and puntitive damages.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So here's my suggestion- get a group of lawyers to form a firm that fights spam. They establish a physical location in several states; their main income is getting a cut for suing companies like Sears on customers' behalf. All Joe Spamhater has to do is call the firm, provide the details, and take home say $300 of the $500. The firm does the rest.
-zf
How about Michican? It even rhymes!
How does one obtain a so-called "REAL email address" that passes through filters that block paying MSN subscribers and paying AOL subscribers?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Asking you to sign a contract when they lost in court, is pretty goddamned sleazy. I'd suggest you send a copy of that to the court, and ask the court to bitch-slap Sears and their law firm for that.
You don't have to enter into any kind of agreement with someone who owes you money pursuant to a judgement in order to collect what they owe you.
BTW, Sears has a long history of sleazy shyster tricks. Look up what they did to the inventor of the socket wrench sometime. When I want tools, I go to snap-on.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I think you mean a Texan. A Texon would be, like, the quantum unit of Texases.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I really don't care if a big company like Sears spams me, as long as they aren't abusive and maintain a "do not mail" list. What I hate (and I think everyone else hates too) are the fly-by-night overseas operations. Every week I get: Enlarge your penis! Enlarge your breasts! Make money fast! Sueing Sears does nothing to prevent this. The odd thing is though - it only happens on my hotmail account. All my other email accounts are 99% spam free.
Hunt down spammers for fun and PROFIT!!!
Fscking troll.
Simpson, that is:
"Ahh, Michigan. The cause of, and cure to, so many of life's Spams"
Many states will not honor small claims suits if it can be determined that the venue is improper. In California, you can go after somebody if you have a REALLY good reason outside of state lines.
It's why that pet supplies guy can't legally sue somebody outside of his area. You file an improper venue plea and they effectively dismiss the case with prejudice.
This sig no verb.
I think I'd rather be "spammed" than "Michiganed."
Well the mountains (30 minutes north) are filling up with the white fluffy today. But right now in LA, it is a comfortable 70F, not some insane -15F.
I think I will go surf this after noon, and do a little skiing tonight.
Oh, im sorry, I didn't mean to make you feel jealous...
Stupid michigonians.
It is Michiganian. Check out the Michigan Secretary of State website here for a quick overview. Technically there is no "right" term, but our government uses Michiganian, not Michigander.
Why not use a shot gun the first time and let them bleed to death... you save a shot then.
and then how will we feel when we find out the bitch lied about being raped? for actual rapists, your solution sounds brilliant. but if we're wrong, then fuck :-(
Sorry, I don't mean to get too off-topic, but I'm outright insulted by your comment about rape offenders.
Judging by recent lawsuits, no one knows what rape is anymore. Half the time, the victim doesn't make it clear that she (assuming typical circumstances, the victim is female) refuses intercourse. Furthermore, current laws do not recognize anal rape as rape. And what is to say for statutory rape?
No, I'm not a rapist nor a rape victim. I ask you to think before you speak.
is good for the michigander. (So they say).
There are two kinds of people in the world: those with loaded guns, and those who dig.
I was born and raised MICHIGANIAN.... i'm not a goddam duck.
Aberdeen, Scotland -- Aberdonians
Afghanistan -- Afghans
Alabama -- Alabamians, Alabamans
Allentown -- Allentonians
Argentina -- Argentines
Arkansas -- Arkansan, Arkansawyer (NW Arkansas only)
Arizona -- Arizonans
Austin -- Austinites
Bahamas -- Bahamian
Boston -- Bostonians
Camden -- Camdenites
Cincinnati -- Cincinnatians
Colorado -- Coloradans
Delaware -- Delawarians
Florida -- Floridians
Ghana -- Ghanaians
Gibraltar -- Gibraltarians
Greece -- Greeks
Houston -- Houstonians
Illinois -- Illinoisans
Indiana -- Hoosiers
Key West -- Conchs
Los Angeles -- Angelenos, Los Angelenos
Louisiana -- Louisianans
Madagascar - Madagascans
Maine -- Mainers
Maryland -- Marylanders
Miami -- Miamians
Michigan -- Michiganders
Naples -- Neapolitans
New Jersey -- New Jerseyans
Ohio -- Ohioans
Oregon -- Oregonians
Phoenix -- Phoenicians
San Antonio -- San Antonians
San Francisco -- San Franciscans
Seattle -- Seattleites
Sierra Leone -- Sierra Leoneans
Singapore -- Singaporeans
St Louis -- St. Louisans
Switzerland -- Swiss
Tennessee -- Tennesseans
Texas -- Texans
Turkey -- Turks
Twin Cities -- Twin Citians
Utah -- Utahans
Wichita -- Wichitans
Just get a couple of lines and have your modems set to answer. The place I work at gets about 120 if these scams a day. One lawyer working for a third of the award can generate some big bucks. I envision lawyers lining up to do this sort of litigation! My place of work has 4 phone fax lines. Woot!Lets do the math, er arithmetic.Let us say that we actually get 50 of these shitty sendings. 50 times 3 equals 150. Then multiply times 3 equals 450 units of SPAM. Now say we get the minimum...450 times 500 equals 225,000 dollars in SPAM charges. Woot, a land slide and out lawyer gets 1/3 of that. That would be 75,000 a month for mere fileings, seems fair to me. If they fail to pay, report them to a credit/collection agency and watch their credit drop to nil. Anything you get is well worth the time and money. Bonus bucks!
I say nail the niggers!
In Soviet Russia, the fax sends YOU! ...more seriously, the parent post here slightly misses the point. Our laws don't have jurisdiction (yet) over people doing things in Russia. The point of this article was that you can get back at the home-grown spammers, on the theory that every little bit helps.
-Steve
No, we shouldn't rape rapists. We should shoot them. Twice. Once in the crotch, let them suffer the pain and loss of manhood for a few minutes, then shoot them in the head. None of this rehabilitation crap.
When I was young, reading about the atrocities commited by the SS and the Einzatsgruppen, I always wondered what kind of people who could shoot fellow humans in the back of their head, for 8 hours a day, come home covered in blood, gore and brain matter, and then next day continue, and do this for weeks.
At first I thought that it took some kind of special, twisted, sick mind to eg. bayonet a one year old baby. But the real horror was, when I discovered that these killers were totally ordinary people; I mean really ordinary people, with normal families, normal jobs, normal political beliefs, in short people like you and me.
The recipe for getting normal people to commit atrocities like hanging an 11 year old girl in a piano wire, is really simple; just dehumanize the victims. When normal people are convinced about their own moral superiority, and that the victims are not really humans, they can commit the most extreme violence without blinking with their eyes, like shooting other people in the crotch and to enjoy them suffer.
It's a good thing that the legal system can't distinguish between a junk fax and a spam email.
Go here to create your own Slashdot dis
"I received this email using a dial up phone line connection and printed the message."
It seems to me the junk FAX doesn't apply unless you automatically print out all your e-mail. Otherwise, you're not using paper and ink for an unsolicited ad. Voluntarily printing out an e-mail just to take the spammer to court sounds like it oversteps the bounds of the law since at this point you chose to use the printer, not the spammer. I'm surprised any judge would convict. It probably will be overturned if it becoomes a big problem for spammers. People have been trying unsuccessfully to use the junk FAX laws to prosecute spammers for years now.
Vote for Pedro
There is a valid question of whether you should be able to sue somebody out of state in small claims court for $500. Think about it -- it costs $500 at least to come and defend yourself in an out of state case, so how can you win, even if you are totally innocent?
That's why most small claims court laws require you to sue in a court near where the defendant lives or works.
As the plantif you get to bear the cost of going to a place near him. (And if you win, try to get your travel expenses reimbursed, too, as "reasonable costs". B-) )
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Those darn Oklahomos!
Dude, didn't you pick that up when you were attending the University of Michigan?. I know that you were here for at least 4 months, because we shared a damn room together.
That's right - I'm your former roomate. I remember that god-awful train alarm clock that you used to sleep through, and how you preferred to use that old-skool early-80's IBM clickety-keyboard on your mac.
- Willie
Michigan doesn't exist. If you think I'm crazy, ask yourself "Have I met anyone who claims to be from Michigan?"
Of course you haven't. Nobody in their right mind would claim that they are from Michigan. In truth, Michigan is a myth invented by liberals from Ohio.
(OK, I'll come clean. I was born a Michigander.)
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
I'm on broadband, my PC doesn't even have a modem in it. Even if I dropped a cheap fax modem in, the spam still doesn't *arrive* by phone line, so this law doesn't apply.
I am NOT a man!
I am a free number!
First off, in Micigan, we relate distances in miles, not minutes. 30 minutes for us could be 50 miles.
;^}
Second, I didn't say I am in Michigan. I am in a warm part of the country too, so don't worry about making me jealous.
He didn't go after the spamming company he went after the company that paid the spammer.
You can always find the originating company cause those are the links that work 99% of the time or spam would indead have no value.
Go after the companies that are hiring these low life scum to fill up our printers with that garbage.
BTW my printer is a fax/printer. HP got to love them. Like printing cash...........
Jurisdiction and venue are both easier and harder than you paint them. There are entire law courses on things like jurisdiction.
Then there is subject matter jurisdiction versus personal jurisdiction, and the constitutional limits on jurisdiction versus the prudential rules of venue. If you're going to small claims court you hardly have to worry about all that. The pivotal issue is fairness. Sears was "present" locally, both because they had a store and because they inflicted an injury on the plaintiff in his home jurisdiction (imagine they'd sent him a bomb -- no one would quibble that it was "unfair" to drag Sears to the plaintiff, and the prosecutor). The small claims court has subject matter jurisdiction under the federal junk fax law, meaning they were the right place to hear this sort of case. And so on.
The bomb example is a little unsubtle, but an illegal email is just a milder example of the same sort of civil wrong. It would be quite unfair to force the plaintiff to go to whatever rock the defendant was lurking under to litigate a $500 claim.
If you really want to bend you mind, sometimes a place is appropriate for the lawsuit to be heard, but the law of another jurisdiction is applied (choice of law). Then you may find yourself applying a mix of local procedural law and foreign substantive law.
I really wish I could agree with you, that there is a tech solution to spam. But I refuse to believe that spammers can't in time outsmart a dumb filter. The filters performs very well now -- I use one -- but how long will that last? Few people are blocking spam at all, but when they do the spammers, like the Borg, will adapt.
Moreover, the mere transmission of spam is causing harm. It clogs the arteries of the Internet. The ISP's despise it, and spend money fighting it -- my money. Finally, even though I have broadband it takes significant time for me to download those extra 20 messages. Thanks to some idiot out there who typed in my email as his, I've seen geometric growth in spam lately, from maybe 10% to 60% of incoming material.
It is often argued that if you make something illegal people will just break the law, but that proves too much --- the same argument would supposedly undermine every law. Making it illegal will scare off the legit or semilegit bulk emailers, and it will make the shadiest spammer tempting targets for the prosecutors who has much better investigatory abilities than we do. I've talked to one of these guys, an assistant attorney general in Washington state, and was impressed how much work it took them to pin down one spammer. The state spam law was the hook they used to snare him, then they could also be sure to put him out of business. Believe it or not, there are smart people working for government, and in that case they even hired some outside help, PI's to track the guy down (he was quite slippery).
I don't like the idea that the defense to burglars is better locks, and I'm willing to ask for the government's help on this one.
You're right, those are valid points.
First, about that suit that the "rape victim" said she had to go home, during the middle of completely consenual sex, and that meant any further activity constituted rape, that case was completely ridiculous. She knows she wasn't raped, but people around her sure had a grudge about something. So, the "rapist" in that case should have been found innocent. Maybe shoot the prosecutor in that case instead for morbid stupidity.
Second, any forced sexual procedure should be recognized as rape. Where did they come up with the theory that forced anal-rape isn't rape? And I'm not talking about some guy that tries to get kinky with his wife or girlfriend, and she doesn't want to, and shuts him down. I mean the cases of legitimate rape in the anus rather than rape in the vagina. Any time a guy, (building on your assumption, assuming typical circumstances, the attacker is male) forces his penis into an unwilling or resisting person, it is rape no matter which bodily opening it is. (And unconciousness can be counted as unwilling if the victim would have not agreed to sex if she/he had been fully concious. Again getting slightly kinky with a significant other is different.) For legal clarification, the lawyers who say otherwise to get their clients off should ask Vietnam vets if they were in a war. Remember it officially wasn't a war, only a conflict or police action, but the people in it would say otherwise.
Third, statutory rape is a very nebulous term to begin with. If a 14-year-old puts on make-up to look 18, goes to a bar, gets picked up by a man and has sex with him, should he be found guilty of statutory rape for not verifying with her parents and 3 other people that she is legal age? On the other hand if some sleazy character sweet talks a 14-year-old into thinking he truly loves her, just so he can have sex with her, most agree he should be found guilty of statutory rape. But it isn't actually forcible rape, because he talks her into consenting. I think the term should be changed from statutory rape, but to what I don't know.
So to sum up the above three paragraphs, if anyone forces a person to have sex, oral, anal, or vaginal, it is rape. Rapists should be shot. Twice.
I thought you guys were Michiganders???
gander n. A male goose.
But what about the Michigeese?
Will I retire or break 10K?
I adore this state, but I draw the line at calling myself a "Michigander!" I am not a male goose!
yeah, and im actually in Paris, studying for the semester!
I want 2D games back.
Sorry, but your examples of similarities are way off. I never said shoot babies twice, or shoot innocent people twice. I said shoot rapists twice. Not walk around shooting people in the street for 8 hours every day, or even shooting rapists for 8 hours a day. Shoot rapists as they are found guilty. Within a month the number of rape cases in any large city would certainly be no more than one a week.
That is the problem with capital punishment, and its naysayers. No matter what method of execution is used, people want to liken it to the most horrendous crimes commited in history. Saying it lowers us to the level of the people who commited the crimes. As if the rest of society is going to turn into a murderous mob if a serial murderer is executed, because they have lowered themselves to his level anyway.
And I never said to dehumanize the rapists, just shoot them. Just like I never dehumanized the chickens, rabbits, ducks, etc. that we butched and ate when I was a kid. We killed them because it had to be done. (I guess we could have just cut off a leg, and left the animal alive, but that seems too cruel.) Why would you have to dehumanize a person to execute him? Recognize the person is a human being, a human being who attacked, raped, or killed other people, and will do so unless stopped, and then stop him or her forever. That's all.
By the way if I was so convinced about my moral supiority as you imply, I wouldn't be reading Slashdot right now, there are plenty of people around town who deserve one or two bullets.
Just an FYI, the "defendent" can always file a counter suit for travel costs and time.
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
If email sent to a given address is carbon copied at your end to an Email->Fax gateway, then their spam emails are indeed being sent to a Fax machine and are protected by the law.
The trick is to redirect messages that seem to be spam; you'll get the occasional false positive, which is totally fine; at the end of the day, you shred the positives and pick a spam to write up a small claim about.
Hell, you could profit off of this, with the quantity of spam that's out there. Make a living off of receiving spam, perhaps.
If it was accepted as a valid use of the law, that'd destroy the spammers pretty quickly, with the effort of Slashdot behind those fax machines.
Imagine the force of Slashdot behind an initiative to print out and submit a small claim for at least one spam a day, per user. Thousands of claims would be filed in a single day against the same small set of companies. Some spam companies pull you off their list if you bring legal action against them, so a few hundred Slashdot users stop getting spammed by someone.
Repeat this daily for a month; you can also file multiple suits per day, if you have time. The sky's the limit (and your 100% recycled printer paper). Make some friends at the court; people will consider you a superhero if you help shut down spamming as a profitable enterprise.
I hope this case is validated; if so, there's ways to make people listen. Perhaps file a thousand small claims in a thousand courts on a single day, providing attached to the claim a list of all thousand courts. Send a press release to the major papers (and the local papers), tv & radio at 12pm after the filings, and see what happens.
The way to end spam is to make it unprofitable.
Michigander sounds like there can be only one. The Michigander hunts down others like him and decapitates them with his fearsome small claims court.
Beginning to wonder about the water quality here in Colorado. Or maybe it was that slightly mouldy bread I had at lunch...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Look for the word unless in the quoted snippet. The quoted passage is a restriction on the sender, not the reciever. That is, you can't send messages to a fax unless you properly identify yourself in the fax.
In this case Mark's computer met the definition of a telephone facsimile machine as laid out within the law. Once that is established, he can sue anyone who sends him email and doesn't include their phone number. (Normally he wouldn't be so nasty. But he could be.)
Don't sue corporations in Delaware; Delaware sells itself as corporation-friendly.
This is an understatement. It seems like nearly every other corporation I look at is incorporated in Delaware. While IANAL, there has to be some pretty serious advantages for so many corporations to incorporate there. Even existing ones transfer their incorporation there.
Actually, there's no such thing as citizen of Illinois. Illinois state court has jurisdiction over residents of Illinois, who may or may not be US citizens. Pedantic I may be, but a lawyer should get it right!
..or were you just letting off steam? Not that I'm complaining, it's an interesting tale.
http://www.spamhaus.org/rokso
The more prolific spammers you can identify. Go get $500 from them. Have seconds!
Put it on your website WITHOUT a referring link from the html of your site. Then advise /. of the url, anonomously, along the lines of 'gosh, look wot I found!'. You'll then be wearing underwear (ie your ass will be covered).
Oh. A parasite?
... to nominate this guy for the Nobel Peace Prize?
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
The term ``telephone facsimile machine'' means equipment which has the capacity (A) to transcribe text or images, or both, from paper into an electronic signal and to transmit that signal over a regular telephone line, or (B) to transcribe text or images (or both) from an electronic signal received over a regular telephone line onto paper.
e phonenumber.iddd.tpc.int somewhere where the spam robots will find it, and voila, junk faxes for you to profit off of.
So let's say you don't use a phone line to connect to the internet, so Mark's claims don't really work for you, but you have a regular fax machine you'd like to see get a few more junk faxes.
(Disclaimer: please don't abuse the following free service. I'm not responsible for your actions.)
The fine folks at TPC.INT have a free e-mail to fax service. So just leave the e-mail address remote-printer.yourfirstname_yourlastname@yourtel
Happy spam hunting.
Aren't there better laws for prosecuting spam? Specifically, if the headers are obviously intentionally faked, isn't that a form of hacking?
Lying about your identity for a login is illegal.
Why isn't it illegal for a spammer to use fake RFC 821/822 fields (Return-path, From, and "Received from", Subject) to bypass spam filters?
"What would Homer do?"
Ben in DC
"It's the mark of an educated mind to be moved by statistics" Oscar Wilde
And I'm sure he wasn't working on the case full-time. It'd take a few hours to write up your case and file it, perhaps a few more hours sitting in court. Most of the time you're just sitting around waiting for the hearing, so why not have five or more cases on the go simultaneously..?
Here's a business plan for you;
455fe10422ca29c4933f95052b792ab2
The snipets state that the machine must be capable of bla bla bla bla. As long as you have a fax modem in your computer, it doesn't matter if you received the transmission through the cable line.
The key phrase here is "or cause to be e-mailed". That would appear to make the advertiser liable, even if they hired some third party to do the spam run.
On that note, if you recently received unsolicited E-mail advertising "New Century Mortgage Corporation" of Irvine, California, and live in California, I would like to hear about it. Thank you.
I've created a standard email that feigns interest in, but declines their product. I then try to interest them in baseball, providing a few radio clips (about 4 MB total) in case they want to listen.
The email sounds very sincere, which should have the double effect of confusing them while filling their inbox.
I also try to email real people at the soliciting website, and not the reply email in the spam.
*cough*
Article XIV, Section 1 I could go on and quote Amendment XI as well as similar references in Articles III and IV. Despite efforts by the federal government and major political parties (so far), we are still a union of sovereign states. Things would be better in this country if more people remembered this.
Hammurabi's Code of Laws
196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out.
197. If he break another man's bone, his bone shall be broken.
200. If a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out.
"Those who don't believe in magic will never find it." - Roald Dahl
I sit corrected! So... which of federal and state has first claim on loyalty, i.e. bearing arms in defence? In law, that is.
If a spammer would've shown up in small claims court or if they would've appealled, then it would've been a true test of whether the junk fax law can be used to stop spam.
As it is, it can still be a deterrent if 10000 unemployed dot commers file suit similtaneously, it'll be like spamming the spammers.
If you live in New York, more than likely you can sue any public company. Any companies registered with the New York Stock Exchange, American Stock Exchange, probably Nasdaq, and other exchanges are required to be registered in New York. In order to be registered in New York, they MUST have a physical address in New York. Whether it is an actual office, or a physical mail drop doesn't matter (no po boxes). It has to be a place where they can be served with official papers. This means that you need to find out where this office is, and send the paperwork (summons) there.
When I sued an international bank, the clerk at small claims was helpful with filling out the paperwork, but I had to find out on my own where the physical location was. I didn't know about this until I arrived at the court house. I didn't want to make a second trip, so I called the number for the credit card (of the bank) and the without telling the customer rep why, I was able to get her to give me a physical address to send a notice to.
There are other ways of finding out physical addresses, but I forgot what they were. I would assume that the place where you register your business in the state would have physical locations to serve them with papers.
Of course, if it is a retail business, use the address of one of the stores if you can't get the main physical address, or if the main headquarters is located outside the state.
And of course, you have the long reach of left coast states that like to nail businesses even if they are on Mars. If you live in one of those states, it may not matter if there is a physical location in your state.
As for other states, you have the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in Illinois, and exchanges in other states. These other states may have the same requirements that New York does for registering and physical locations for serving papers/documents.
Nail the spammers. To the wall. Then pass the nail gun.
I recently installed a "realtime blackhole list" filter on my Exchange 2000 server. Shout outs to Martijn - the man who wrote the free "ORFILTER". So far, this thing works GREAT. I can't believe how much spam we don't get now!
l t. htm
I've had two instances here where someone wasn't getting their mail. In both cases, the ISP was contacted and they fixed the problem. NO ISP wants an open relay, but sometimes it happens through negligence or incompetance. Closing or blocking these open relays is a great first step in the fight against spam.
Oh, and to check out this filter - go here:
http://www.martijnjongen.com/eng/orfilter/defau
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
"I sit corrected! So... which of federal and state has first claim on loyalty, i.e. bearing arms in defence? In law, that is."
Ask ten people and get ten different answers. The Civil War never really sorted that one out, and even the last clause of the Fourteenth Amendment seems to leave that one open to debate.
Spamassassin is great - it is used (C, not perl) at the server side to shift the business and data logic to the server, and is monitored easily!
http://tomgould.com/
Please forgive my ignorance if I am so.
But I believe the answer is in petitioning ISPs, mail server developers, standards organizations, network admins, etc. to come up with and implement identity verification and forged mail header detection into their products so that spammers cannot hide behind fake information.
Yes it would suck and be a pain in the ass to transition (as many have mentioned here on
It appauls me that I can so easily fake information in mail headers that SHOULD NOT be fakeable.
What do we need to do to get this started, and if it already is, where can I go to sign up?
Okay, but I've heard other reasons to not eat pork:
(1) [biggie, for me, discounted by most]: it is beginning to appear that all mammalian meat is subject to prion diseases, and may have prion-related illnesses spring from him. MS [Multiple Sclerosis], Alzhimers, and other things *look* enough like prion diseases, that I'm going to stay away from Mammal meat period.
(2) Bottom feeders and garbage eaters [including pork] have flesh that is typically more toxic than plant eaters. So shellfish have a greater risk than cod, for example. Hawk meat would be riskier than pigeon meat [remember DDT?]. And pork flesh will be typically more toxic than horse flesh.
That said, your highest concentrations of toxins, no matter what the animal, are going to be in the skin fats. Remember how LSD users can have flashbacks when they go on a diet? It's the toxins that have been packed away into the fats, being released again.
Anyhow, just a thought: sometimes blind obedience is better, even if you *think* you know the score. That said, I am all for learning the score better.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
...
...
195. If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off.
196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out. [ An eye for an eye ]
197. If he break another man's bone, his bone shall be broken.
198. If he put out the eye of a freed man, or break the bone of a freed man, he shall pay one gold mina.
199. If he put out the eye of a man's slave, or break the bone of a man's slave, he shall pay one-half of its value.
200. If a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out. [ A tooth for a tooth ]
201. If he knock out the teeth of a freed man, he shall pay one-third of a gold mina.
202. If any one strike the body of a man higher in rank than he, he shall receive sixty blows with an ox-whip in public.
203. If a free-born man strike the body of another free-born man or equal rank, he shall pay one gold mina.
204. If a freed man strike the body of another freed man, he shall pay ten shekels in money.
205. If the slave of a freed man strike the body of a freed man, his ear shall be cut off.
206. If during a quarrel one man strike another and wound him, then he shall swear, "I did not injure him wittingly," and pay the physicians.
207. If the man die of his wound, he shall swear similarly, and if he (the deceased) was a free-born man, he shall pay half a mina in money.
208. If he was a freed man, he shall pay one-third of a mina.
209. If a man strike a free-born woman so that she lose her unborn child, he shall pay ten shekels for her loss.
210. If the woman die, his daughter shall be put to death.
211. If a woman of the free class lose her child by a blow, he shall pay five shekels in money.
212. If this woman die, he shall pay half a mina.
213. If he strike the maid-servant of a man, and she lose her child, he shall pay two shekels in money.
It's actually "troll".
Seriously, ask anyone from "Da UP" and see what they say.
I can get away with this by the way. I'm engaged to a Saginawian (okay..i made that word up)
"Fighting the underpants gnomes since 1998!" "Bruce Schneier knows the state of schroedinger's cat"
according the michigan.gov's official website:0 -15481_208 26_20829-54118--,00.html
http://www.michigan.gov/hal/0,1607,7-16
and the slashdot editors are from michigan...
get it right fool!
Texon? Don't people spell-check articles any more? The correct spelling is Texxon, of course. (And remember, what's good for the Michigoose is good for the Michigander.)
...so I guess that makes me a Tampon.
I do live in Michigan, Detroit area, and travel is almost exclusively expressed as a function of time, rather than distance. If someone gives me a distance figure, I find myself translating it to travel time. "How far is it?" "About 45 minutes."
I know, waaaaay off-topic.
Sigmentation fault - core dumped
One would think the message I'm replying to would be rated higher
-- Boycott Shell
Oh, that's great. Let's give people who forcibly have sex with their victims a painful and difficult-to-cure disease THAT IS SPREAD BY HAVING SEX.
Now their next victim not only gets raped, but gets the added bonus of receiving the same punishment as a convicted rapist.
Umm, no. :-P The word is Tennesseean.
(This link shows the proper nouns for residents of all 50 states)
Is your fax machine flooded with junk faxes? I don't think so.
Maybe it's just a big city thing then. Over on the west side of the state I never heard anyone say they were 30 minutes outside of Grand Rapids. Also, don't you know the traffic speed changes several times a day? That is what really gets me, at 9am 45 minutes is about 10 miles, but at noon it can be 30 miles, and at midnight it can be 60 miles. I'm an optimist, I always use the the midnight distance in my calculations. ;^)
you stupid, sarcastic bastard... don't you realize that if the chick is hot enough to have someone rape her, she is probably a sinner and deserves a disease to keep her chaste?
SlashChick was the number one troll in the most recent Monthly Trollback. Who is she to call out the Trolls, I ask you? Who indeed?
This is Mark Reinertson. You have no idea what you're talking about. Sears showed, they argued, I argued, I won. Period. They declined to appeal.
Who do you think Hammurabi was, just some guy, Joe Peasant?
Well, here's a hint, pal; he was the fucken government.
Thanks for playing, and better luck next time.