The science missions were rapidly becoming useless anyway. Search for life my ass, they should have been exploring how exploitable the mineral resources were.
It's time to dump the stupid navel gazing telescopes and put some money into actually doing things in space instead of just looking at them.
It's morons like you who have made the U.S. fall behind in science. You see the spectacular pictures coming back from the Hubble Space Telescope and the only wonder you are filled with is wondering if there's a way to strip-mine the galaxy. Instead of having any wonder about how life began, how the universe evolved, and whether there is life on other planets, all you care about is turning NASA into an absurdly expensive mining company.
If you don't like science, then please don't post. You are just dragging down the level of the conversation and reinforcing the global belief that Americans are ignorant, greedy, and crass.
Bush's "mission to Mars" is just his attempt to neuter NASA, long-despised by the GOP because of its ties to the Democrats (e.g., Kennedy Space Center).
He will convince people (like you) that it's okay to kill off the Shuttle, the International Space Station, probes like the one being discussed here, and unmanned planetary missions -- because we're going to Mars. Then he'll use the fiscally irresponsible federal deficit spending (that he encouraged and approved) as a reason why NASA can't have enough budget for a manned Mars mission.
Adjusted for inflation, NASA's annual budget is half of what it was in 1966. How will we put men on Mars for half of what it cost to put men on the moon?
I just got a 1GB Sandisk Micro Cruzer for $49 after rebate. 512MB flash drives can be had for well under $30 while the 256MB versions are down under $20. Unless you work at McDonalds, your time is worth more than $30.
If, on the other hand, you have lots of time and want to express yourself artistically, I'd recommend that you look into fancy hardwoods from which to construct the case. You could even laminate thin strips of contrasting hardwoods like Babinga, Maple, Cherry, and Bloodwood.
>...And yet approximately half of them still voted for him.
From The Onion:
Nation's Poor Win Election For Nation's Rich
November 10, 2004 | Issue 4045
WASHINGTON, DC--The economically disadvantaged segment of the U.S. population provided the decisive factor in another presidential election last Tuesday, handing control of the government to the rich and powerful once again.
"The Republican party--the party of industrial mega-capitalists, corporate financiers, power brokers, and the moneyed elite--would like to thank the undereducated rural poor, the struggling blue-collar workers in Middle America, and the God-fearing underpriviledged minorities who voted George W. Bush back into office," Karl Rove, senior advisor to Bush, told reporters at a press conference Monday. "You have selflessly sacrificed your well-being and voted against your own economic interest. For this, we humbly thank you."
Added Rove: "You have acted beyond the call of duty--or, for that matter, good sense."
According to Rove, the Republicans found strong support in non-urban areas populated by the people who would have benefited most from the lower-income tax cuts and social-service programs championed by Kerry. Regardless of their own interests, these citizens turned out in record numbers to elect conservatives into office at all levels of the government.
"My family's been suffering ever since I lost my job at the screen-door factory, and I haven't seen a doctor for well on four years now," said father of four Buddy Kaldrin of Eerie, CO. "Shit, I don't even remember what a dentist's chair looks like... Basically, I'd give up if it weren't for God's grace. So it's good to know we have a president who cares about religion, too."
Kaldrin added: "That's why I always vote straight-ticket Republican, just like my daddy did, before he lost the farm and shot himself in the head, and just like his daddy did, before he died of black-lung disease in the company coal mines."
Kaldrin was one of many who listed moral issues among their primary reasons for voting Republican.
"Our society is falling apart--our treasured values are under attack by terrorists," said Ellen Blaine of Givens, OH, a tiny rural farming community as likely to be attacked by terrorists as it is to be hit by a meteor. "We need someone with old-time morals in the White House. I may not have much of anything in this world, but at least I have my family."
"John Kerry is a flip-flopper," she continued. "I saw it on TV. Who knows what terrible things might've happened to my sons overseas if he'd been put in charge?"
Kerry supporters also turned out in large numbers this year, but they were outnumbered by those citizens who voted for Bush.
"The alliance between the tiny fraction at the top of the pyramid and the teeming masses of mouth-breathers at its enormous base has never been stronger," a triumphant Bush said. "We have an understanding, them and us. They help us stay rich, and in return, we help them stay poor. See? No matter what naysayers may think, the system works."
CD's are still around, with the relative ease of maintaining software compatibility (rather than hardware which requires material support) I'd guess that AAC will be around for a while longer.
Okay, then please write an application which can play the DRM-encumbered AAC files sold through iTunes. For mainstream users, only the iPod, Apple's iTunes, and Quicktime-based apps allow playing of these DRM-encumbered AACs.
According to Apple, up to three computers (at one time) can be authorized to play purchased AAC's. But what happens when/if Apple decides to shut down the authorization service? What happens if they decide to move to a new format in the future and want you to have to repurchase all of your music?
Red Book CDs, on the other hand, have no DRM and are designed to be moved freely from player to player. Your computer doesn't need to contact Philips for permission to play the CDs.
Red Book audio has been around for 20+ years, why not AAC?
Again, you're confusing AAC and DRM. Sure, AAC may still be around in 20 years, but will you still be able to play the DRM-encumbered songs you bought from iTunes today?
Actually no- it can't be. FoxNews, again, tells the whole story.
Fox News is a joke. It would actually be funny if there were not right-wing nuts who believed that it was "fair and balanced."
Face it: Fox News was created to put out "news" with a right-wing slant because they saw a market there. They watched that drugged blowhard Rush Limbaugh pull in the ratings with his distortions, fabrications, and lies -- and realized that they could target that market, too. That people actually fall for it is really sad.
You are such a coward that you disgust me. You will destroy everything that made this country great, the very Constitution that men fought and died for, because you're so scared of Osama Bin Laden. Read the words of a true American and a patriot in an editorial he wrote for the Miami Herald. Then maybe you can understand what it is to be an American:
AFTER 9/11 Fear destroys what bin Laden could not ROBERT STEINBACK
One wonders if Osama bin Laden didn't win after all. He ruined the America that existed on 9/11. But he had help.
If, back in 2001, anyone had told me that four years after bin Laden's attack our president would admit that he broke U.S. law against domestic spying and ignored the Constitution -- and then expect the American people to congratulate him for it -- I would have presumed the girders of our very Republic had crumbled.
Had anyone said our president would invade a country and kill 30,000 of its people claiming a threat that never, in fact, existed, then admit he would have invaded even if he had known there was no threat - - and expect America to be pleased by this -- I would have thought our nation's sensibilities and honor had been eviscerated.
If I had been informed that our nation's leaders would embrace torture as a legitimate tool of warfare, hold prisoners for years without charges and operate secret prisons overseas -- and call such procedures necessary for the nation's security -- I would have laughed at the folly of protecting human rights by destroying them.
If someone had predicted the president's staff would out a CIA agent as revenge against a critic, defy a law against domestic propaganda by bankrolling supposedly independent journalists and commentators, and ridicule a 37-year Marie Corps veteran for questioning U.S. military policy -- and that the populace would be more interested in whether Angelina is about to make Brad a daddy -- I would have called the prediction an absurd fantasy.
That's no America I know, I would have argued. We're too strong, and we've been through too much, to be led down such a twisted path.
What is there to say now?
All of these things have happened. And yet a large portion of this country appears more concerned that saying "Happy Holidays' could be a disguised attack on Christianity.
I evidently have a lot poorer insight regarding America's character than I once believed, because I would have expected such actions to provoke -- speaking metaphorically now -- mobs with pitchforks and torches at the White House gate. I would have expected proud defiance of anyone who would suggest that a mere terrorist threat could send this country into spasms of despair and fright so profound that we'd follow a leader who considers the law a nuisance and perfidy a privilege.
Never would I have expected this nation -- which emerged stronger from a civil war and a civil rights movement, won two world wars, endured the Depression, recovered from a disastrous campaign in Southeast Asia and still managed to lead the world in the principles of liberty -- would cower behind anyone just for promising to "protect us."
President Bush recently confirmed that he has authorized wiretaps against U.S. citizens on at least 30 occasions and said he'll continue doing it. His justification? He, as president -- or is that king? -- has a right to disregard any law, constitutional tenet or congressional mandate to protect the American people.
Is that America's highest goal -- preventing another terrorist attack? Are there no principles of law and liberty more important than this? Who would have remembered Patrick Henry had he written, "What's wrong with giving up a little liberty if it protects me from death?"
Bush would have us excuse his administration's excesses in deference to the "war on terror" -- a war, it should be pointed out, that can never end. Terrorism is a tactic, an eventuality, not an opposition army or rogue nation. If we caught every person guilty of a terrorist act, we st
seriously, unless you commmunicate with terrorists, dont worry about your email.
So we're supposed to believe Bush when he tells us that the e-mail snooping done without judicial oversight was solely targeting communications with terrorists? If it was all so appropriate and justifiable, why did he circumvent the FISC, which is the court which is supposed to approve domestic spying?
Why you do or don't understand them is another issue alltogether, but by not addressing them and repeating your own argument over and over you did rather give the impression that I already mentioned, that of an agry teenager who doesn't get his way. I'm sorry if you feel insulted by that, but you have your own behavior to blame there.
I've addressed your points over and over. I have not ignored them.
But let's be fair: You have not always addressed my points (e.g., the increased ISP costs due to spam and how that affects the poor). And you keep repeating your argument that a substantial percentage of the world's population has a choice of only one ISP and that the ISP that they have available to them is a spam-haven listed on SPEWS. I find this difficult to believe, especially with no data to support that claim. Basically, you're doing exactly what you have accused me of doing.
To witness, my girlfriend lives in Berlin, Germany (which is not exactly a 3rd world location). She has a choice between 2-online DSL and t-online dialup, or spendign a fortune on per-minute connection costs.
And are those services listed on SPEWS? I don't think so. To be listed on SPEWS, an ISP must repeatedly provide service to spammers and not take reasonable steps to shut off spam when they are made aware of it. That describes a few rogue ISPs, not a significant number of ISPs.
You are right that so few peopel use it that it is not a real problem.
The reason why it's not a big problem is that the vast majority of ISPs have no blocks listed in SPEWS.
It will be when enough people use it to make SPEWS effective however. I intend to have this argument with as many peopel as needed in order to keep things that way.
I wish you no success. If the majority of domains in the world used SPEWS, spam would basically end. No ISP would dare risk getting on the SPEWS list because their service would be reduced in value to the point that they could not attract or keep customers. If they were the only ISP in town, another ISP would spring up to take advantage of their weakness. The ISPs would actively try to prevent spam. They would block port 25 for dynamic IP users. They would monitor mail volume through their servers and port 25 traffic from customers with static IP addresses to detect excessive volumes. They would employ e-mail filtering to stop the spread of trojan horse "zombie" software with which spammers turn home computers into spam servers. They would institute fines for spamming into their contracts (something that Earthlink does now). When informed of spam coming from their network or spamvertised web pages hosted on their network, they would act promptly rather than putting it at the bottom of a week-long queue as is done now.
The 'use a 3rd party' argument somewhat works, but still puts the damage (tho limited) onto people who are not directly involved (eventho you believe otherwise, I think that is where our real issue lies also).
That is a main difference that we have. If you give money to an ISP that supports SPAM, your hands are dirty as far as I am concerned. On that point, we will have to disagree. But limited damage for limited involvement seems pretty fair to me.
And yes, having to inform everyone about email address change can be costly in time, and it is very easy to miss a few people.
Agreed. But remember that SPEWS doesn't prevent you from receiving mail if your ISP is a spamhaus. It just causes you problems in sending. So even if you miss some people, they can still deliver mail to you.
I have been running smtp servers for the last 14 years, I am aware of all those problems, have been dealing with them for over a decade and for as far as my own domains go, pay for this from my own pocket.
It's when you run an SMTP server which supports a medium to large scale organization that it gets to be expensive.
Yes, it is annoying, yes, it even costs some money, bu
The point is, SPEWS cannot stop a newborn spammer; only one who has spammed in the past.
No, they can, and do, stop day-one spammers because many of those spammers end up in IP blocks that SPEWS has tagged as being spam sources. If SpamFriendlyISP has a history of selling services to spammers, then SPEWS can list SpamFriendlyISP's IP blocks. When a new spammer buys services from SpamFriendlyISP, they find that sites that use SPEWS refuse their spam from day-one.
I understand the idea behind the policy of SPEWS, I understand the logic of their reasoning, and I understand why people believe it should work. The ones who lack understanding of arguments here are people like you, who are so fanatic in their fight against spam that they forget that spam is a big and somewhat costly annoyance, but not the devil itself, and hence are blinded for any reasonable argumentation. That my friend is why I said you behave like an angry teenager.
You seem to believe that your lack of ability to convince me with your arguments means that I don't understand them. Well, I do. Insulting me in a public forum is not going to convince me that you are right (a fact that I would have expected someone so accomplished in "social dynamics" to recognize).
Your arguments focus on the tiny fringes -- like people in developing countries who have only one choice of ISP and the ISP is one that is a willing partner to spammers to the point that they are listed on SPEWS. I don't think that's a very common scenario.
Your arguments exagerate the harm caused by the so-called "collateral damage." You act as if bounced e-mail from the relatively small number of domains which use SPEWS is a disaster for the senders. It is, at most, a minor inconvenience. Senders who find themselves in this predicament can complain to their ISP, change ISPs (in most cases), or turn to reputable e-mail providers like GMail, Yahoo!, and Hotmail. Those who run a server can usually make relaying arrangements with a third party.
I see spam as a major problem economically. It puts a drain on economies throughout the world. It costs businesses and governments huge sums of money that would be much better spent on other things. Organizations have e-mail administrators who spend much of their working day responding to spam complaints, tuning filters, whitelisting domains, blacklisting others, trying to figure out whether blacklist X has become unreliable, dealing with tens of thousands of bounces when they discover that a spammer has joe-jobbed their domain, and so forth.
You talk about the less-privileged, yet they are the ones who are most hurt by spam. The cost of spam, both in policing the internal network as well as trying to erect and maintain walls to stop its inflow, drives up the cost of Internet service. That $1-$5 extra per month may not be a big deal for you and me, but it's a major deal for some would-be users in developing nations.
At any rate, good luck with what you are doing, if it helps it helps, even if I don't like the methods (and won't participate in them myself).
Thank you. This will probably surprise you, but I don't use SPEWS or contribute to it. Although I support its goals and methods, the risks of losing important e-mail are too great to me. Does that make me a hypocrite? I don't know. I see it as being analogous to those people who root for protesters but don't take the day off of work to participate in the protest.
I see you're still winning friends and influencing people as always.
I tried to break the ice with a good-natured comment about us agreeing and you replied with a snide, humorless, insulting post. You have only yourself to blame for turning yet another thread in something ugly.
you were the one posting your lurid fantasies of physical altercations
You're stooping to the level of fabrication now -- which is why you couldn't dig up a quote of me describing the supposed "lurid fantasies of physical altercations."
There are people who can select EXACTLY ONE ISP. if you don't believe that then that is testamony[sic] to the fact that you obviously never ever left the well provided for area that you live in now. No, they cannot goto dialup, they ARE ON THE ONE AND ONLY dial up provider available to them.
You need to recognize that we're talking about Internet access, not food, clothing, shelter, or water. It's not so important that it justifies giving money to people who are doing evil things.
Yes, this is in fact a realistic possibility in more then half of the world. If you cannot understand such simple things then you are simply too stupid to have an argument with alltogether[sic].
I understand, but I really don't care. If they are so self-centered that they must have Internet access, even if it means supporting spam, then they can use Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, or some other free e-mail provider. Or are you going to tell me that the sole ISP in Botswana can only access 38 web sites?
If you are going to call someone "stupid," then I suggest that you improve your grammar and spelling, stop writing run-on sentences, and try using commas where they belong.
No way to know for those people without having net access to get information on this, not to mention that as already mentioned, this is no option in more then half of the world, stop thinking that your particular situation applies to everyone, chances are almost 100% that it doesn't.
So half of the world is just blindly signing up for Internet access without ever having been exposed to the Internet? That's right, people in Darfur living in straw huts without electricity, much less a computer, are jumping on the Internet bandwagon. You keep telling yourself that.
You know what, you keep playing the angry clueless teenager,
I'm 44 years old and have been a computer professional since 1980. I own the domain anti-spam.org. I have consulted with a company that produces a high-end spam-blocking appliance and with another company that produces a commercial e-mail (POP/SMTP/IMAP/HTTPMAIL/web-mail) server. I seriously doubt that you have nearly as much understanding about this subject as I do.
and I'll continue using some ani[sic] spam measures that are hugely more effective without the needless damage that SPEWS brings with it.
With no damage, rogue ISPs will have little incentive to refuse service to spammers. That "damage" is what pressures ISPs into not writing pink contracts with spammers. It's what takes away the monetary incentive to be a spam haven. So it's far from needless.
Your "hugely more effective" methods are doing nothing to reduce the quantity of spam worldwide. They just shield you from it.
As with regards to your Nike example, nicely thought up but completely flawed for the simple reason that Nike has a responsivility for what they sell to others and how they obtained that, while as a customer of an ISP you are not selling to others and do not have that same kind of responsibility.
As a customer of an ISP, you are supporting that ISP with your money. Again, if NAMBLA is the local broadband provider, I'm going with dial-up.
(read carefully, I DO agree with you that people have an obligation to not support things they think are bad, ie spammers or spam supporting ISPs, but they do not have the same kind of responsibility as Nike has simply because they do not have customers themselves. This is LEGAL as well as moral responsibility)
If you support a spam-friendly ISP with your monthly subscription, you are part of the problem. So don't play innocent bystander when your e-mail bounces.
Not to mention...
If people are going to pick an ISP to connect to the Internet, how exactly are they going to find that information on the net you keep talking about before they got their connection?
Don't you think that you are being slightly silly here?
No, I think that you're being silly. The vast majority of people have Internet connectivity through their school, work, local library, mall, internet cafe, or other source before they choose an ISP for their home.
This is quite different from SPEWS which had the technology at their disposal to distinguish IPs, but chose not use it because the pain cause would put pressure on ISPs.
That's only part of their goal.
The other part is to provide a means by which system administrators can take a proactive, rather than reactive, approach to spam blocking. Let's contrast Spamhaus's approach to that of SPEWS. Spamhaus's approach is like the Whack-A-Mole game: A spammer pops up and they try to quickly list the address. SPEWS, on the other hand, acts like a quarantine: ISP X is infected with spammers, so we will isolate ISP X.
If a spammer is hopping from one address to another within ISP X's IP space for his twice-weekly spam run, the SPEWS listing will have a much better success rate at stopping that spam. If your user's e-mail addresses are the first on the spammer's list, then the Spamhaus listings will always be too late to protect your users.
It's just different approaches, each with their pluses and minuses.
I figured that out about you quite some time ago, sunshine.
It makes me laugh when I picture someone who looks like you pretending to be a tough guy on the Internet. I know that I shouldn't laugh at someone with your emotional problems, but I just can't help it.
I voted for Gore and Kerry, why should I be blamed for Bush? That would be like punishing Earthlink users because you got spam from MSN.
they pay tax, thereby they actively support the system that creates their government, and thereby also their government.
Translation: They obey the law. There's no law requiring you to use a spam-friendly ISP. The analogy still fails.
A customer of some ISP usually has no clue whatsoever that that ISP allows spammers, and as such did not have a choice to begin with.
That they didn't do any homework before choosing an ISP is their own fault. It's not like information about spam can't be found on the net.
Never did I claim it to be illegal, I claimed, and still claim, that the reasoning you and other supporters of SPEWS are using with regards to 'collatoral damage' is flawed.
Let's examine the reasoning:
1. Barring externalities (like SPEWS), selling services to spammers can be profitable.
2. You have a choice as to which ISP you use.
3. Information about ISPs and their spam-tolerance level is readily available on the net.
4. You have a moral obligation to choose an ISP that does not support spammers.
5. SPEWS, partially through "collateral damage", makes spamming less financially attractive to ISPs.
Here's an analogy that works:
Me: I'm boycotting Nike because they use child labor in sweatshops overseas.
You: That's wrong because it will inflict collateral damage on stores and salespeople who sell Nike shoes.
Me: So what? They are helping to support a company that exploits children.
You: But maybe they didn't know about it. You should keep buying Nike shoes because it's important to avoid hurting ignorant people who also do business with Nike. In fact, we should never do anything to harm a crooked or immoral business because it might cause harm to their honest customers.
SPEWS stated goal is a political one, to create some thus-far nonexistant grassroots movement made of former customers of certain ISPs, that are suing for breech of contract because their email service was "incomplete" because they couldn't send mail to SPEWS-using hosts.
That's not what I see in the SPEWS FAQ:
You maybe part of the rare "inadvertent blocking" that can occur when a spam friendly provider is listed in spews. Your best option is to try and educate your provider or switch to one who is not listed in SPEWS as spam friendly....
Q23: As an ISP/Host/Network, what is the best way to keep our IP address ranges out of the SPEWS list? A23: It's quite simple, steer clear of spammers, spammer hosts, and sellers of spamware. If one does appear on your system, terminate immediately before the complaint level rises. Search out, and copy for your own, the best Acceptable Use Policies (AUPs) and stick to the letter of their wording. And the most obvious way; pay attention to and act upon email in your "abuse@" mailbox!
I'm not saying that you're wrong, but that's not among the state goals that I saw on their FAQ.
When a client runs afoul of our spam filter - with or without SPEWS enabled - it is not the client who apologizes to us because we blocked their email. We apologize to them and whitelist them. I assure you none of them have been embarassed.
If your clients would not be embarassed by the revelation that they help finance a spammer-friendly ISP, then I probably don't want to know what kind of business you are in.
Hey, guess what - there are laws against spamming.
CAN-SPAM? That's a law that permits spamming. But SPEWS is not trying to enforce laws or take the law into their own hands. They are trying to economically punish undesirable behavior, just as someone who boycotts Nike, Walmart, or McDonalds does.
But my main point is that punitive DNS blacklists like SPEWS are ineffective. The people that need to communicate with the blacklisted ISP customer will simply whitelist that customer, even if they use SPEWS.
Headache, delays, and hassle. And embarassment for the sender. It's like sending a letter with your return address in a prison. That leads the senders to say 'I'm out of here!'.
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The science missions were rapidly becoming useless anyway. Search for life my ass, they should have been exploring how exploitable the mineral resources were.
It's time to dump the stupid navel gazing telescopes and put some money into actually doing things in space instead of just looking at them.
It's morons like you who have made the U.S. fall behind in science. You see the spectacular pictures coming back from the Hubble Space Telescope and the only wonder you are filled with is wondering if there's a way to strip-mine the galaxy. Instead of having any wonder about how life began, how the universe evolved, and whether there is life on other planets, all you care about is turning NASA into an absurdly expensive mining company.
If you don't like science, then please don't post. You are just dragging down the level of the conversation and reinforcing the global belief that Americans are ignorant, greedy, and crass.
Bush's "mission to Mars" is just his attempt to neuter NASA, long-despised by the GOP because of its ties to the Democrats (e.g., Kennedy Space Center).
He will convince people (like you) that it's okay to kill off the Shuttle, the International Space Station, probes like the one being discussed here, and unmanned planetary missions -- because we're going to Mars. Then he'll use the fiscally irresponsible federal deficit spending (that he encouraged and approved) as a reason why NASA can't have enough budget for a manned Mars mission.
Adjusted for inflation, NASA's annual budget is half of what it was in 1966. How will we put men on Mars for half of what it cost to put men on the moon?
I just got a 1GB Sandisk Micro Cruzer for $49 after rebate. 512MB flash drives can be had for well under $30 while the 256MB versions are down under $20. Unless you work at McDonalds, your time is worth more than $30.
If, on the other hand, you have lots of time and want to express yourself artistically, I'd recommend that you look into fancy hardwoods from which to construct the case. You could even laminate thin strips of contrasting hardwoods like Babinga, Maple, Cherry, and Bloodwood.
> ...And yet approximately half of them still voted for him.
From The Onion:
Nation's Poor Win Election For Nation's Rich
November 10, 2004 | Issue 4045
WASHINGTON, DC--The economically disadvantaged segment of the U.S. population provided the decisive factor in another presidential election last Tuesday, handing control of the government to the rich and powerful once again.
"The Republican party--the party of industrial mega-capitalists, corporate financiers, power brokers, and the moneyed elite--would like to thank the undereducated rural poor, the struggling blue-collar workers in Middle America, and the God-fearing underpriviledged minorities who voted George W. Bush back into office," Karl Rove, senior advisor to Bush, told reporters at a press conference Monday. "You have selflessly sacrificed your well-being and voted against your own economic interest. For this, we humbly thank you."
Added Rove: "You have acted beyond the call of duty--or, for that matter, good sense."
According to Rove, the Republicans found strong support in non-urban areas populated by the people who would have benefited most from the lower-income tax cuts and social-service programs championed by Kerry. Regardless of their own interests, these citizens turned out in record numbers to elect conservatives into office at all levels of the government.
"My family's been suffering ever since I lost my job at the screen-door factory, and I haven't seen a doctor for well on four years now," said father of four Buddy Kaldrin of Eerie, CO. "Shit, I don't even remember what a dentist's chair looks like... Basically, I'd give up if it weren't for God's grace. So it's good to know we have a president who cares about religion, too."
Kaldrin added: "That's why I always vote straight-ticket Republican, just like my daddy did, before he lost the farm and shot himself in the head, and just like his daddy did, before he died of black-lung disease in the company coal mines."
Kaldrin was one of many who listed moral issues among their primary reasons for voting Republican.
"Our society is falling apart--our treasured values are under attack by terrorists," said Ellen Blaine of Givens, OH, a tiny rural farming community as likely to be attacked by terrorists as it is to be hit by a meteor. "We need someone with old-time morals in the White House. I may not have much of anything in this world, but at least I have my family."
"John Kerry is a flip-flopper," she continued. "I saw it on TV. Who knows what terrible things might've happened to my sons overseas if he'd been put in charge?"
Kerry supporters also turned out in large numbers this year, but they were outnumbered by those citizens who voted for Bush.
"The alliance between the tiny fraction at the top of the pyramid and the teeming masses of mouth-breathers at its enormous base has never been stronger," a triumphant Bush said. "We have an understanding, them and us. They help us stay rich, and in return, we help them stay poor. See? No matter what naysayers may think, the system works."
Added Bush: "God bless America's backwards hicks, lunchpail-toting blockheads, doddering elderly, and bumpity-car-driving Spanish-speakers."
CD's are still around, with the relative ease of maintaining software compatibility (rather than hardware which requires material support) I'd guess that AAC will be around for a while longer.
Okay, then please write an application which can play the DRM-encumbered AAC files sold through iTunes. For mainstream users, only the iPod, Apple's iTunes, and Quicktime-based apps allow playing of these DRM-encumbered AACs.
According to Apple, up to three computers (at one time) can be authorized to play purchased AAC's. But what happens when/if Apple decides to shut down the authorization service? What happens if they decide to move to a new format in the future and want you to have to repurchase all of your music?
Red Book CDs, on the other hand, have no DRM and are designed to be moved freely from player to player. Your computer doesn't need to contact Philips for permission to play the CDs.
Red Book audio has been around for 20+ years, why not AAC?
Again, you're confusing AAC and DRM. Sure, AAC may still be around in 20 years, but will you still be able to play the DRM-encumbered songs you bought from iTunes today?
Actually no- it can't be. FoxNews, again, tells the whole story.
Fox News is a joke. It would actually be funny if there were not right-wing nuts who believed that it was "fair and balanced."
Face it: Fox News was created to put out "news" with a right-wing slant because they saw a market there. They watched that drugged blowhard Rush Limbaugh pull in the ratings with his distortions, fabrications, and lies -- and realized that they could target that market, too. That people actually fall for it is really sad.
You are such a coward that you disgust me. You will destroy everything that made this country great, the very Constitution that men fought and died for, because you're so scared of Osama Bin Laden. Read the words of a true American and a patriot in an editorial he wrote for the Miami Herald. Then maybe you can understand what it is to be an American:
AFTER 9/11
Fear destroys what bin Laden could not
ROBERT STEINBACK
One wonders if Osama bin Laden didn't win after all. He ruined the America that existed on 9/11. But he had help.
If, back in 2001, anyone had told me that four years after bin Laden's attack our president would admit that he broke U.S. law against domestic spying and ignored the Constitution -- and then expect the American people to congratulate him for it -- I would have presumed the girders of our very Republic had crumbled.
Had anyone said our president would invade a country and kill 30,000 of its people claiming a threat that never, in fact, existed, then admit he would have invaded even if he had known there was no threat - - and expect America to be pleased by this -- I would have thought our nation's sensibilities and honor had been eviscerated.
If I had been informed that our nation's leaders would embrace torture as a legitimate tool of warfare, hold prisoners for years without charges and operate secret prisons overseas -- and call such procedures necessary for the nation's security -- I would have laughed at the folly of protecting human rights by destroying them.
If someone had predicted the president's staff would out a CIA agent as revenge against a critic, defy a law against domestic propaganda by bankrolling supposedly independent journalists and commentators, and ridicule a 37-year Marie Corps veteran for questioning U.S. military policy -- and that the populace would be more interested in whether Angelina is about to make Brad a daddy -- I would have called the prediction an absurd fantasy.
That's no America I know, I would have argued. We're too strong, and we've been through too much, to be led down such a twisted path.
What is there to say now?
All of these things have happened. And yet a large portion of this country appears more concerned that saying "Happy Holidays' could be a disguised attack on Christianity.
I evidently have a lot poorer insight regarding America's character than I once believed, because I would have expected such actions to provoke -- speaking metaphorically now -- mobs with pitchforks and torches at the White House gate. I would have expected proud defiance of anyone who would suggest that a mere terrorist threat could send this country into spasms of despair and fright so profound that we'd follow a leader who considers the law a nuisance and perfidy a privilege.
Never would I have expected this nation -- which emerged stronger from a civil war and a civil rights movement, won two world wars, endured the Depression, recovered from a disastrous campaign in Southeast Asia and still managed to lead the world in the principles of liberty -- would cower behind anyone just for promising to "protect us."
President Bush recently confirmed that he has authorized wiretaps against U.S. citizens on at least 30 occasions and said he'll continue doing it. His justification? He, as president -- or is that king? -- has a right to disregard any law, constitutional tenet or congressional mandate to protect the American people.
Is that America's highest goal -- preventing another terrorist attack? Are there no principles of law and liberty more important than this? Who would have remembered Patrick Henry had he written, "What's wrong with giving up a little liberty if it protects me from death?"
Bush would have us excuse his administration's excesses in deference to the "war on terror" -- a war, it should be pointed out, that can never end. Terrorism is a tactic, an eventuality, not an opposition army or rogue nation. If we caught every person guilty of a terrorist act, we st
seriously, unless you commmunicate with terrorists, dont worry about your email.
So we're supposed to believe Bush when he tells us that the e-mail snooping done without judicial oversight was solely targeting communications with terrorists? If it was all so appropriate and justifiable, why did he circumvent the FISC, which is the court which is supposed to approve domestic spying?
OK, so you're drawing a line between "newborn spammer" and "SpamFriendlyISP" in order to make your point.
That is the point of SPEWS: Identify spam-friendly ISPs so that e-mail from those ISPs, much of which will be spam, can be blocked.
If SPEWS had been invented in 1988, it would still have had to wait until spam became a problem before it could do squat.
Agreed.
Peace and thanks for the interesting dialog.
Why you do or don't understand them is another issue alltogether, but by not addressing them and repeating your own argument over and over you did rather give the impression that I already mentioned, that of an agry teenager who doesn't get his way. I'm sorry if you feel insulted by that, but you have your own behavior to blame there.
I've addressed your points over and over. I have not ignored them.
But let's be fair: You have not always addressed my points (e.g., the increased ISP costs due to spam and how that affects the poor). And you keep repeating your argument that a substantial percentage of the world's population has a choice of only one ISP and that the ISP that they have available to them is a spam-haven listed on SPEWS. I find this difficult to believe, especially with no data to support that claim. Basically, you're doing exactly what you have accused me of doing.
To witness, my girlfriend lives in Berlin, Germany (which is not exactly a 3rd world location). She has a choice between 2-online DSL and t-online dialup, or spendign a fortune on per-minute connection costs.
And are those services listed on SPEWS? I don't think so. To be listed on SPEWS, an ISP must repeatedly provide service to spammers and not take reasonable steps to shut off spam when they are made aware of it. That describes a few rogue ISPs, not a significant number of ISPs.
You are right that so few peopel use it that it is not a real problem.
The reason why it's not a big problem is that the vast majority of ISPs have no blocks listed in SPEWS.
It will be when enough people use it to make SPEWS effective however. I intend to have this argument with as many peopel as needed in order to keep things that way.
I wish you no success. If the majority of domains in the world used SPEWS, spam would basically end. No ISP would dare risk getting on the SPEWS list because their service would be reduced in value to the point that they could not attract or keep customers. If they were the only ISP in town, another ISP would spring up to take advantage of their weakness. The ISPs would actively try to prevent spam. They would block port 25 for dynamic IP users. They would monitor mail volume through their servers and port 25 traffic from customers with static IP addresses to detect excessive volumes. They would employ e-mail filtering to stop the spread of trojan horse "zombie" software with which spammers turn home computers into spam servers. They would institute fines for spamming into their contracts (something that Earthlink does now). When informed of spam coming from their network or spamvertised web pages hosted on their network, they would act promptly rather than putting it at the bottom of a week-long queue as is done now.
The 'use a 3rd party' argument somewhat works, but still puts the damage (tho limited) onto people who are not directly involved (eventho you believe otherwise, I think that is where our real issue lies also).
That is a main difference that we have. If you give money to an ISP that supports SPAM, your hands are dirty as far as I am concerned. On that point, we will have to disagree. But limited damage for limited involvement seems pretty fair to me.
And yes, having to inform everyone about email address change can be costly in time, and it is very easy to miss a few people.
Agreed. But remember that SPEWS doesn't prevent you from receiving mail if your ISP is a spamhaus. It just causes you problems in sending. So even if you miss some people, they can still deliver mail to you.
I have been running smtp servers for the last 14 years, I am aware of all those problems, have been dealing with them for over a decade and for as far as my own domains go, pay for this from my own pocket.
It's when you run an SMTP server which supports a medium to large scale organization that it gets to be expensive.
Yes, it is annoying, yes, it even costs some money, bu
The point is, SPEWS cannot stop a newborn spammer; only one who has spammed in the past.
No, they can, and do, stop day-one spammers because many of those spammers end up in IP blocks that SPEWS has tagged as being spam sources. If SpamFriendlyISP has a history of selling services to spammers, then SPEWS can list SpamFriendlyISP's IP blocks. When a new spammer buys services from SpamFriendlyISP, they find that sites that use SPEWS refuse their spam from day-one.
I understand the idea behind the policy of SPEWS, I understand the logic of their reasoning, and I understand why people believe it should work. The ones who lack understanding of arguments here are people like you, who are so fanatic in their fight against spam that they forget that spam is a big and somewhat costly annoyance, but not the devil itself, and hence are blinded for any reasonable argumentation. That my friend is why I said you behave like an angry teenager.
You seem to believe that your lack of ability to convince me with your arguments means that I don't understand them. Well, I do. Insulting me in a public forum is not going to convince me that you are right (a fact that I would have expected someone so accomplished in "social dynamics" to recognize).
Your arguments focus on the tiny fringes -- like people in developing countries who have only one choice of ISP and the ISP is one that is a willing partner to spammers to the point that they are listed on SPEWS. I don't think that's a very common scenario.
Your arguments exagerate the harm caused by the so-called "collateral damage." You act as if bounced e-mail from the relatively small number of domains which use SPEWS is a disaster for the senders. It is, at most, a minor inconvenience. Senders who find themselves in this predicament can complain to their ISP, change ISPs (in most cases), or turn to reputable e-mail providers like GMail, Yahoo!, and Hotmail. Those who run a server can usually make relaying arrangements with a third party.
I see spam as a major problem economically. It puts a drain on economies throughout the world. It costs businesses and governments huge sums of money that would be much better spent on other things. Organizations have e-mail administrators who spend much of their working day responding to spam complaints, tuning filters, whitelisting domains, blacklisting others, trying to figure out whether blacklist X has become unreliable, dealing with tens of thousands of bounces when they discover that a spammer has joe-jobbed their domain, and so forth.
You talk about the less-privileged, yet they are the ones who are most hurt by spam. The cost of spam, both in policing the internal network as well as trying to erect and maintain walls to stop its inflow, drives up the cost of Internet service. That $1-$5 extra per month may not be a big deal for you and me, but it's a major deal for some would-be users in developing nations.
At any rate, good luck with what you are doing, if it helps it helps, even if I don't like the methods (and won't participate in them myself).
Thank you. This will probably surprise you, but I don't use SPEWS or contribute to it. Although I support its goals and methods, the risks of losing important e-mail are too great to me. Does that make me a hypocrite? I don't know. I see it as being analogous to those people who root for protesters but don't take the day off of work to participate in the protest.
I see you're still winning friends and influencing people as always.
I tried to break the ice with a good-natured comment about us agreeing and you replied with a snide, humorless, insulting post. You have only yourself to blame for turning yet another thread in something ugly.
you were the one posting your lurid fantasies of physical altercations
You're stooping to the level of fabrication now -- which is why you couldn't dig up a quote of me describing the supposed "lurid fantasies of physical altercations."
There are people who can select EXACTLY ONE ISP. if you don't believe that then that is testamony[sic] to the fact that you obviously never ever left the well provided for area that you live in now. No, they cannot goto dialup, they ARE ON THE ONE AND ONLY dial up provider available to them.
You need to recognize that we're talking about Internet access, not food, clothing, shelter, or water. It's not so important that it justifies giving money to people who are doing evil things.
Yes, this is in fact a realistic possibility in more then half of the world. If you cannot understand such simple things then you are simply too stupid to have an argument with alltogether[sic].
I understand, but I really don't care. If they are so self-centered that they must have Internet access, even if it means supporting spam, then they can use Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, or some other free e-mail provider. Or are you going to tell me that the sole ISP in Botswana can only access 38 web sites?
If you are going to call someone "stupid," then I suggest that you improve your grammar and spelling, stop writing run-on sentences, and try using commas where they belong.
No way to know for those people without having net access to get information on this, not to mention that as already mentioned, this is no option in more then half of the world, stop thinking that your particular situation applies to everyone, chances are almost 100% that it doesn't.
So half of the world is just blindly signing up for Internet access without ever having been exposed to the Internet? That's right, people in Darfur living in straw huts without electricity, much less a computer, are jumping on the Internet bandwagon. You keep telling yourself that.
You know what, you keep playing the angry clueless teenager,
I'm 44 years old and have been a computer professional since 1980. I own the domain anti-spam.org. I have consulted with a company that produces a high-end spam-blocking appliance and with another company that produces a commercial e-mail (POP/SMTP/IMAP/HTTPMAIL/web-mail) server. I seriously doubt that you have nearly as much understanding about this subject as I do.
and I'll continue using some ani[sic] spam measures that are hugely more effective without the needless damage that SPEWS brings with it.
With no damage, rogue ISPs will have little incentive to refuse service to spammers. That "damage" is what pressures ISPs into not writing pink contracts with spammers. It's what takes away the monetary incentive to be a spam haven. So it's far from needless.
Your "hugely more effective" methods are doing nothing to reduce the quantity of spam worldwide. They just shield you from it.
As with regards to your Nike example, nicely thought up but completely flawed for the simple reason that Nike has a responsivility for what they sell to others and how they obtained that, while as a customer of an ISP you are not selling to others and do not have that same kind of responsibility.
As a customer of an ISP, you are supporting that ISP with your money. Again, if NAMBLA is the local broadband provider, I'm going with dial-up.
(read carefully, I DO agree with you that people have an obligation to not support things they think are bad, ie spammers or spam supporting ISPs, but they do not have the same kind of responsibility as Nike has simply because they do not have customers themselves. This is LEGAL as well as moral responsibility)
If you support a spam-friendly ISP with your monthly subscription, you are part of the problem. So don't play innocent bystander when your e-mail bounces.
Not to mention...
If people are going to pick an ISP to connect to the Internet, how exactly are they going to find that information on the net you keep talking about before they got their connection?
Don't you think that you are being slightly silly here?
No, I think that you're being silly. The vast majority of people have Internet connectivity through their school, work, local library, mall, internet cafe, or other source before they choose an ISP for their home.
This is quite different from SPEWS which had the technology at their disposal to distinguish IPs, but chose not use it because the pain cause would put pressure on ISPs.
That's only part of their goal.
The other part is to provide a means by which system administrators can take a proactive, rather than reactive, approach to spam blocking. Let's contrast Spamhaus's approach to that of SPEWS. Spamhaus's approach is like the Whack-A-Mole game: A spammer pops up and they try to quickly list the address. SPEWS, on the other hand, acts like a quarantine: ISP X is infected with spammers, so we will isolate ISP X.
If a spammer is hopping from one address to another within ISP X's IP space for his twice-weekly spam run, the SPEWS listing will have a much better success rate at stopping that spam. If your user's e-mail addresses are the first on the spammer's list, then the Spamhaus listings will always be too late to protect your users.
It's just different approaches, each with their pluses and minuses.
I figured that out about you quite some time ago, sunshine.
It makes me laugh when I picture someone who looks like you pretending to be a tough guy on the Internet. I know that I shouldn't laugh at someone with your emotional problems, but I just can't help it.
I try to jovially extend an olive branch and you still act like an asshole. There's no hope for some people.
They voted,
I voted for Gore and Kerry, why should I be blamed for Bush? That would be like punishing Earthlink users because you got spam from MSN.
they pay tax, thereby they actively support the system that creates their government, and thereby also their government.
Translation: They obey the law. There's no law requiring you to use a spam-friendly ISP. The analogy still fails.
A customer of some ISP usually has no clue whatsoever that that ISP allows spammers, and as such did not have a choice to begin with.
That they didn't do any homework before choosing an ISP is their own fault. It's not like information about spam can't be found on the net.
Never did I claim it to be illegal, I claimed, and still claim, that the reasoning you and other supporters of SPEWS are using with regards to 'collatoral damage' is flawed.
Let's examine the reasoning:
1. Barring externalities (like SPEWS), selling services to spammers can be profitable.
2. You have a choice as to which ISP you use.
3. Information about ISPs and their spam-tolerance level is readily available on the net.
4. You have a moral obligation to choose an ISP that does not support spammers.
5. SPEWS, partially through "collateral damage", makes spamming less financially attractive to ISPs.
Here's an analogy that works:
Me: I'm boycotting Nike because they use child labor in sweatshops overseas.
You: That's wrong because it will inflict collateral damage on stores and salespeople who sell Nike shoes.
Me: So what? They are helping to support a company that exploits children.
You: But maybe they didn't know about it. You should keep buying Nike shoes because it's important to avoid hurting ignorant people who also do business with Nike. In fact, we should never do anything to harm a crooked or immoral business because it might cause harm to their honest customers.
SPEWS stated goal is a political one, to create some thus-far nonexistant grassroots movement made of former customers of certain ISPs, that are suing for breech of contract because their email service was "incomplete" because they couldn't send mail to SPEWS-using hosts.
...
That's not what I see in the SPEWS FAQ:
You maybe part of the rare "inadvertent blocking" that can occur when a spam friendly provider is listed in spews. Your best option is to try and educate your provider or switch to one who is not listed in SPEWS as spam friendly.
Q23: As an ISP/Host/Network, what is the best way to keep our IP address ranges out of the SPEWS list?
A23: It's quite simple, steer clear of spammers, spammer hosts, and sellers of spamware. If one does appear on your system, terminate immediately before the complaint level rises. Search out, and copy for your own, the best Acceptable Use Policies (AUPs) and stick to the letter of their wording. And the most obvious way; pay attention to and act upon email in your "abuse@" mailbox!
I'm not saying that you're wrong, but that's not among the state goals that I saw on their FAQ.
When a client runs afoul of our spam filter - with or without SPEWS enabled - it is not the client who apologizes to us because we blocked their email. We apologize to them and whitelist them. I assure you none of them have been embarassed.
If your clients would not be embarassed by the revelation that they help finance a spammer-friendly ISP, then I probably don't want to know what kind of business you are in.
A distributed computing project (ala SETI) which relied on Linux could run this way.
eCondom or not, if you use IE, you're still fscked.
Hey, guess what - there are laws against spamming.
CAN-SPAM? That's a law that permits spamming. But SPEWS is not trying to enforce laws or take the law into their own hands. They are trying to economically punish undesirable behavior, just as someone who boycotts Nike, Walmart, or McDonalds does.
But my main point is that punitive DNS blacklists like SPEWS are ineffective. The people that need to communicate with the blacklisted ISP customer will simply whitelist that customer, even if they use SPEWS.
Headache, delays, and hassle. And embarassment for the sender. It's like sending a letter with your return address in a prison. That leads the senders to say 'I'm out of here!'.