Books "just work" - and if you lose it, you only have the cost of a paperback.
Guess you've never mis-placed your $160 copy of Ashcroft and Mermin, have you?
Hey, that's still a LOT cheaper than my cellphone, or pretty much any laptop. Not to mention that when I replace either of the electronic devices, I STILL have to replace the data.
Greedy spammers beating the crap of residential limited upload bandwidth may actually be an improvement to the current situation.
This is becaus it may mean that it will be more likely that an ISP detects it and that the customer will be gratefull for the favor of being shut down and happy to pay for cleanup.
I think ISPs are more likely to benefit - customer thinks his service is too slow - upgrades to next tier of service. Same as people are now junking 2-year-old computers because they're crufted out with malware.
tinyurl isn't the only way... anyone can set up the equivalent with a server and a one-line php script: <?php header: "location:http://my_spammer_ad/") ?>
By the time it gets blacklisted, the spammer already has caught their fishes/achieved theor "pump-and-dump", or whatever...
Do you really want to go on holiday carrying four novels and a guide book
I'd rather have a book and not have to worry about internet connectivity, worrying about dropping a laptop or other reader into the bathtub or a pool or a sidewalk, battery life, rain, leaving it behind at a restaurant, getting it stolen, and "sorry, you can't take that in here".
Books "just work" - and if you lose it, you only have the cost of a paperback.
And no, I don't want to read a book on my cellphone, either, even though I watch 3gp ripped episodes of The Simpsons on it when I have to kill some time.
I'm not trying to address authentication/anonymity issues here. I'm just trying to shift the resource burden to the sender. But say someone knows my IP address, my email address and that I'm online. I don't see what the big deal is.
Most email spam software/mailing lists contain a LOT of invalid addresses (expired/dead/whatever). Watch "Matchstick Men" and you'll see the real value of a "sucker list" - better yet, just google for "sucker list."
Sucker lists are worth up to several $$$$ per name, not a few hundredths of a cent. A sucker is someone who has bought, bought, and bought again. You know the type - the little old lady who keeps buying more magazine subscriptions because she's lonely, doesn't know how to say no, or is sure she's won the big prize.
And anyone who clicks on a spam link is a sucker.
This is a problem that isn't going to go away. It extends far beyond the internet, and predates it. As long as you have clueless, greedy people who think they can get something for nothing on one end, and spammers on the other, the problem will continue.
I know, its mean calling the victims "clueless, greedy" but lets face it - the Nigerian scam, the "Help us proces overseas payments" scam, etc., - they're all predicated on the luser's greed. You can't cheat an honest person.
I'd rather just collect the spam - which I do now anyways.
Spam CAN be useful -
it offers insight into the psychology of parasites and vermin (otherwise known as spammers)
its essential to train spam filters
it can track trends
These are just three off-the-top-of-the-head uses. Spam is a huge industry, just as viruses are. Look at all the companies making profit out of both - by "protectng" you; if it weren't for the anti-virus industry, nobody would have a spam problem, because nobody would be able to run Windows for more than 2 minutes without getting p0wned, so blame companies like symantec (antivirus) and microsoft (crappy os), not the spammers.
The spammers are more like the canary in the mine, alerting those with a clue that there is a problem. That lusers won't dump Microsoft, and Microsofts' "pay me for upgrades" rather than fixing the problems in existing versions, is the root of the problem.
As far as I'm concerned, the more "low-hanging fruit", the safer those of us with a clue are.
by attaching pdfs, powerpoint presentations, mp3s, mpegs, jpegs, etc, it all to make it more likely that the spam gets through. Don't be surprised if sometime in the next year, you see the 1-meg spam.
After all, the spammer is using zombied WinBoxes - they don't give a $hit how much bandwidth they soak up.
A distributed AI would be unkillable, self-healing, and darned hard to fix - after all, no two pieces of code for the AI are the same, so forget about filtering by signature, etc...
It shouldn't be too hard to figure out how to turn a couple hundred thousand zombies into a really awesome neural net (a net-neural-net). We can call it IAI (Internet AI) or AI2 for buzzowrd compliance.
Come on.... admit it... if someone offered you $10 million to write it, you would. And the new owners would make their money back the first day, just in "protection money".
Actually, you overlooked something... the body can be 20 bytes - just a link. People will click any old $hit nowadays, and using stuff like tinyurl helps obfuscate/defeat anti-spam proggies.
I'm surprised more spammers don't use tinyurl and other services to get around filters. Of course, now that the "secret" is out, we'll see an increase in tinyrurl, permalink, and pingback spam.
... actually, the Windows problem is in the process of being "solved" - now that even Internet Explorer runs properly under wine, who needs Windows, even for IE-specific sites?
Also, when you surf, its not connected to your email address - just your ip - and there can be thousands of people sitting behind that public ip address.
How would it be any less secure than visiting a web page? In addition, it would seem to be inherently safer than having a virus, trojan, or script file already downloaded on your computer waiting to be triggered.
When you surf to a web page, all they get is your ip address. This, they have both your current ip and your email address, plus the fact that you (email recipient) are currently on-line.
The originator would send a link with the title, the size, who it's from, the IP address to pull the complete message from, and a list of any attachments. It would be easy to fit all that in 128 bytes (possibly less).
... easier to just receive the message directly... or filter it on the server. This won't revent spem - just make it easier to construct sucker lists, since now you know exactly who's responding to your fudgified titles.
"SPAM-NET became self-aware at 2:14am EDT August 29, 2007.."
If you think that spam is a problem now, consider this...
... spam is motivated by the universal lubricant - money. The first AI will probably come, not from a uni lab, but from spammers. Anyone coming up with an AI spammer can make a million a week.
all those "I for one welcome our self-aware spam overlords" and "in soviet russia SPAM deletes YOU" jokes won't be so funny if that happens.
I'd settle for ten seconds of jail time and a penny fine per spam. That would (very roughly) approximate treble damages for time wasted. A million spams would yield a 4 month sentence and a $10,000 fine.
Unfortunately, $10,000 is less than the cost of keeping someone in jail for 4 months...
Also, why not go to the REAL root of the problem - Windows and the zombies that run it. Anyone connected to the net with an pwn3d box pays $100 for the first incident, doubling each time. People would learn to dual-boot really quickly.
The pattern of you buying and selling all the stocks that are involved in pump and dump scams would make you look like you were part of orchestrating it and would catch the SEC's eye
I doubt it. How many people have bitched about SCO's pump-and-dump, and nothing, nada, zip, squat, zero, rien...
f I can bring up a webpage within a second just by typing the URL, I should be able to bring up an e-mail by sending an equivalent request. By making the protocol *push* rather than *pull* you set the stage for such spam. "Store at sender" would also verify the location the email is coming from.
That really opens you up for all sorts of attacks, because now you're not even semi-anonymous - they will know both your email and exactly when you're online and connected. Great way to remote a machine.
Besides, how do you get the notification that you have email waiting on another server? Ping them every so often to see if they have some email stored for you?
And most image spam is stock-related, pump-and-dump scams which can harm investors who don't even use e-mail. About one-third of all spam is now stock spam
Until the SEC hasn't gone aggresively against one of the most blatant pump-and-dumps. nothing will change.
Slashdot Mirror
I think ISPs are more likely to benefit - customer thinks his service is too slow - upgrades to next tier of service. Same as people are now junking 2-year-old computers because they're crufted out with malware.
By the time it gets blacklisted, the spammer already has caught their fishes/achieved theor "pump-and-dump", or whatever ...
Then there's the forum and blog spam ...
Alternatives:
Project Gutenberg - 20,000 books free for downloading - listing in zip format, rss feed of latest releases
... and for other books ...
Interesting - the Kamasutra by Vatsyayana is currently the top book today, yesterday, this week, and for the last month.
From the summary:
I'd rather have a book and not have to worry about internet connectivity, worrying about dropping a laptop or other reader into the bathtub or a pool or a sidewalk, battery life, rain, leaving it behind at a restaurant, getting it stolen, and "sorry, you can't take that in here".
Books "just work" - and if you lose it, you only have the cost of a paperback.
And no, I don't want to read a book on my cellphone, either, even though I watch 3gp ripped episodes of The Simpsons on it when I have to kill some time.
Most email spam software/mailing lists contain a LOT of invalid addresses (expired/dead/whatever). Watch "Matchstick Men" and you'll see the real value of a "sucker list" - better yet, just google for "sucker list."
Sucker lists are worth up to several $$$$ per name, not a few hundredths of a cent. A sucker is someone who has bought, bought, and bought again. You know the type - the little old lady who keeps buying more magazine subscriptions because she's lonely, doesn't know how to say no, or is sure she's won the big prize.
And anyone who clicks on a spam link is a sucker.
This is a problem that isn't going to go away. It extends far beyond the internet, and predates it. As long as you have clueless, greedy people who think they can get something for nothing on one end, and spammers on the other, the problem will continue.
I know, its mean calling the victims "clueless, greedy" but lets face it - the Nigerian scam, the "Help us proces overseas payments" scam, etc., - they're all predicated on the luser's greed. You can't cheat an honest person.
I'd rather just collect the spam - which I do now anyways.
Spam CAN be useful -
These are just three off-the-top-of-the-head uses. Spam is a huge industry, just as viruses are. Look at all the companies making profit out of both - by "protectng" you; if it weren't for the anti-virus industry, nobody would have a spam problem, because nobody would be able to run Windows for more than 2 minutes without getting p0wned, so blame companies like symantec (antivirus) and microsoft (crappy os), not the spammers.
The spammers are more like the canary in the mine, alerting those with a clue that there is a problem. That lusers won't dump Microsoft, and Microsofts' "pay me for upgrades" rather than fixing the problems in existing versions, is the root of the problem.
As far as I'm concerned, the more "low-hanging fruit", the safer those of us with a clue are.
by attaching pdfs, powerpoint presentations, mp3s, mpegs, jpegs, etc, it all to make it more likely that the spam gets through. Don't be surprised if sometime in the next year, you see the 1-meg spam.
After all, the spammer is using zombied WinBoxes - they don't give a $hit how much bandwidth they soak up.
A distributed AI would be unkillable, self-healing, and darned hard to fix - after all, no two pieces of code for the AI are the same, so forget about filtering by signature, etc ...
It shouldn't be too hard to figure out how to turn a couple hundred thousand zombies into a really awesome neural net (a net-neural-net). We can call it IAI (Internet AI) or AI2 for buzzowrd compliance.
Come on .... admit it ... if someone offered you $10 million to write it, you would. And the new owners would make their money back the first day, just in "protection money".
Actually, you overlooked something ... the body can be 20 bytes - just a link. People will click any old $hit nowadays, and using stuff like tinyurl helps obfuscate/defeat anti-spam proggies.
I'm surprised more spammers don't use tinyurl and other services to get around filters. Of course, now that the "secret" is out, we'll see an increase in tinyrurl, permalink, and pingback spam.
Vista? It'll be the Zune of operating systems ...
Not necessarily. Ever hear of a caching proxy?
Also, when you surf, its not connected to your email address - just your ip - and there can be thousands of people sitting behind that public ip address.
The idea of fines and jail time is to serve as a deterrent, and protection of society, not as "compensation".
When you surf to a web page, all they get is your ip address. This, they have both your current ip and your email address, plus the fact that you (email recipient) are currently on-line.
"That's like snail-mail, but being forced to collect the letters at the sender's house..."
And if its spam, we can all wget the same message a couple thousand times ... that'll teach them!
That's what google or a good book are for. Even (bleh!) design patterns.
Or programs that convert from one source language to another ...
"SPAM-NET became self-aware at 2:14am EDT August 29, 2007 .."
If you think that spam is a problem now, consider this ...
all those "I for one welcome our self-aware spam overlords" and "in soviet russia SPAM deletes YOU" jokes won't be so funny if that happens.
Unfortunately, $10,000 is less than the cost of keeping someone in jail for 4 months ...
Also, why not go to the REAL root of the problem - Windows and the zombies that run it. Anyone connected to the net with an pwn3d box pays $100 for the first incident, doubling each time. People would learn to dual-boot really quickly.
I doubt it. How many people have bitched about SCO's pump-and-dump, and nothing, nada, zip, squat, zero, rien ...
Besides, how do you get the notification that you have email waiting on another server? Ping them every so often to see if they have some email stored for you?
Until the SEC hasn't gone aggresively against one of the most blatant pump-and-dumps. nothing will change.
Geez - didn't you see the sarcasm when the gp poster said it wasn't compatible because it lacked BLOAT?
Anonymous cowards don't have pets. No SSN either.
And of course, being an AC, you have no way of refuting this.
And anyne who posts claiming to be the AC can't prove it was really them, so too bad ...