My Windows program is very sensitive to spam because it uses a different method I find more effective than the leading statistical method to stop spam. It works for me, an individual who was fed up with spam and malware and wanted to get rid of both of them for good.
My program lets you decide what kinds of email you want.
Fear not, the program can be configured to 'save spam' in order to avoid deleting important email. The best thing to do is to set my software up on a 'wide open' public POP3 email address and direct correspondents to private 'wide open' email addresses as needed for the ones that get past the filtering.
All I can say is that proper usage of it will make receiving spam and malware 'almost impossible'.
P.S. No lewd/derisive comments please. My software may not be a perfect fit for you but it is for me.
To put it bluntly, I pity spammers/scammers/computer crackers now. Their email is worthless to me--i'll never see it. Should I see it on rare occasions, it will be in a harmless, inert state or contain absolutely no content at all.
You listed 21 college majors that employers look down on. Because all those majors 'as is' won't make immediate money for the employer! Therefore, 'why hire deadweight?' would seem to be the employer's knee-jerk response.
I'm surprised you listed Math. How can Computer Science be possible without Math? Look at Wal-Mart--I heard some time ago their computer setup rivaled/was better than the one in use at The Pentagon! With their computer setup, Wal-Mart is able to control expenses and maximize profits through computerization.
No, this isn't an endorsement of Wal-Mart or their business practices--I'm just pointing out how perhaps the Math major should have a minor in Computer Science (or vise versa) and be useful to employers.
But keep in mind, as was said in the first Spiderman movie, 'with great power comes great responsibility'. That is, in a perfect world, the use of computing must be done in a legal and ethical fashion. Since this is reality and 'MONEY TALKS! NOTHING ELSE MATTERS!' we have all sorts of financial scandals in big business such as the Enron bankruptcy several years ago.
In closing, I feel the relentless pursuit of money will be the ruin of advanced, First World societies without the counterbalance of other knowledge-increasing, culture-enhancing pursuits like history, linguistics, music, and art.
Money and commerce make the world go 'round but other college level disciplines make a world worth living in....
But, you can still improve yourself and get a REAL JOB...
REAL JOBs cost REAL MONEY (quite a bit) to get the necessary training/education for.
Where will the money come from in the form of grants and/or loans?
1) The government? 2) A rich friend/relative/stranger? 3) Going to work at some 'sh!t job' for 'sh!t pay' while using said 'sh!t pay' to fund your training/education for the REAL JOB!
4) Or you can just say 'FVCK THIS SH!T!' and become a criminal or entrepreneur: take/provide what you want and fvck the rat race!
The choice is yours....
Parent poster said 'menial jobs don't rate more than menial pay'. Haven't they seen Fight Club and the scene where Tyler Durden and his Project Mayhem crew terrorize that one guy in the bathroom. Tyler tells him, in essence: 'DONT FVCK WITH THE MENIAL HELP!!!'
Becase they can either 'go postal' on a killing spree or sabotage the goods and services you obtain from them as a way of retribution for being treated no better than a serf in Europe in the Middle Ages....
PS: The obscenities above are deliberately misspelled in order to 'avoid problems' yet convey (somehow) just how strongly some people feel about these things....
Ammo could be stolen from stores by smart thieves/corrupt store owners/employees that left NO forensic evidence (for the CSI guys) and sold on the 'underground' at a premium....
In the end, the homocide is just one more entry in the police cold case files.... =/
What are you going to do--hold the gunstore chain/owner responsible (who might be blameless) for an otherwise unsolved murder?
Then the John Doe could have been shot by a bullet manufactured by a foreign ammo maker who REFUSES to put the RIFD tags in the ammo.
So murdering spammers is your solution to spam? What good will that do? the dead spammer's computing/spamming assets will likely find their way to individuals who can act as suppliers for spammers. It's like the illegal drug trade, the 'mules' are patsies that get busted, procecuted, and jailed while the drug kingpins remain at large ready and willing to entice another 'mule-to-be' with a wad of quick cash for risking their life and their freedom.
Your homicidal approach will only make the smart spammers become spammer suppliers and the dumb spammers doing the actual spamming potential targets for murder.
Ok, how do you go about killing notorious megaspammers who do not live in the USA where most the megaspammers live? By your rationale they deserve to die as well.
Going after spammers is a whack-a-mole proposition.
The best thing to do is to ignore them with effective email filtering. Mounting counterattacks like DoSing the spamvertised sites or filling webforms with mountains of digital garbage is, in the end, a waste of time and resources.
Only email provider based filters really work at stopping spam because people who use individual filters wouldn't buy stuff anyway.
If you seriously want spam relief, visit my site. I did which is why I use the freeware email checker I wrote to check my POP3 email accounts. The shareware email mailserver I wrote there will reduce and/or keep spam out of your domains and computer networks while making the propagation of malware 'almost impossible'.
If you do not have anything constructive to say about this post, please do not reply to it. The advantages and disadvantages of my approach to spam filtering are spelled out in excrutiating detail there so that you can decide for yourself if my approach is right for you.
1) Configure all e-commerce sites you do business with to send you ONLY PLAINTEXT EMAIL--NO HTML!
2) Filter out ALL HTML email sent to your e-commerce contact point email address. I use my own program to do this automatically for me.
Without the cover of HTML, phishers CANNOT use it to fascilitate their desception.
I used to enter bogus info at the phish sites but I gave up as they seemed to be keeping records and I cannot use a particulare (presumably) 'bogus' credit card number against them. Now I just delete all HTML email (phishing included) that is sent to my e-commerce contact email address.
1. Keep the code as simple as possible. 2. Use the UNIX model of software development: One function, one task. 3. Write as much code as possible with rules 1. and 2. in mind.
Even then, subtle bugs may crop up due to subtle errors in program design, error checking, processing instructions, etc. For example, I had some code that was using 0 as input in error. Debugging the code led me to conclude that my data structures were not large enough. Changing a single symbolic constant fixed that problem. I re-ran the code with the 'fix' and had no further problems.
These are program bugs worth finding and fixing--not more obvious stuff like division by zero errors, or errors in user input validation.
If it is a computerized 'chain store', simply do not put sales information for these 'pre-release' goods into the system until the day of release -- '12:01AM' style if need be.
There are two known drawbacks to this approach.
1) Non-computerized store chains and single store 'Mom-n-Pop' outlets.
2) Time zone issues and a single distribution point of computerized sales information.
Although I'm ashamed to admit it, I watched Titanic 8 fucking times in the theatre. All because I saw it was an awesome movie in MPEG-1...
I saw Titaniconce and only once on the big screen back in early 1998. Even after several months in the theaters, people were still lining up like gangbusters to see it!
It is probably the ultimate 'date movie' which is why it was so successful.
However, to me, Terminator 2: Judgement Day is eminantly rewatchable in spite of the fact I've seen the movie several times before. I still vaguely remember seeing it in a theater back in 1991 and hearing a fellow moviegoer 'talk back' at the screen--he couldn't believe what he was seeing!
Even 13+ years later, the movie is still a touchstone achievement in visual effects by ILM.
Definitely $100+ million well spent for a movie....
These spammers are unrepentant, they don't care who's bandwidth and resources they abuse, they don't care who they might be hurting by their actions. All they care about is scamming money out of people who don't understand the issues of spam in the first place.
Alas, as long as their are clueless/ignorant people out there who might buy something from the spammers, spamming will continue. The CAN-SPAM Act is just that--a license to spam by certain rules. In light of this, all that one can really do nowadays if you need email is to use effective filtering and perhaps spreading the word about The Boulder Pledge:
The Boulder Pledge
Under no circumstances will I ever purchase anything offered to me as the result of an unsolicited e-mail message. Nor will I forward chain letters, petitions, mass mailings, or virus warnings to large numbers of others. This is my contribution to the survival of the online community. -Roger Ebert
Before I coded my antispam solution, I was almost gnashing my teeth in frustration at all the spam I got at a webmail address that I had posted as a image file at an old website I had. It got spammed thanks to 'manual spammers' or (possibly) 'dictionary blasters'. Because of this I didn't give out a POP3 address at the time because I didn't want to deal with all that spam (and malware) inside Outlook Express.
Since July, 2004 by using my own software to check my POP3 email addresses my stress level over spam and malware effectively dropped to zero.
Nowadays I only get spam on two occasions.
1) Whenever I temporarily disable my software to get an important, one-time email.
2) The spammers send an email with absolutely no content in the email body in order to send a 'subject line' spam. Ho hum...pathetic.
Since 'No doesn't mean NO' to the spammers, filtering appears to be the only viable option left as legal based approaches are not working effectively.
Another option would be to send and receive encrypted mail only and 'autodelete' ALL unencrypted email. The only problems with this approach would be the extra time and resources devoted to encryption, as well as national security concerns for using encryption exclusively for all email traffic to and from your domain.
Killing spammers would be illegal and immoral in spite of the drain on resources they cause. Effective, content filtering and, to a lesser extent, legal enforcement of existing antispam laws appear to be the only viable solutions to the spam and malware problem....
The ultimate alternative would be to declare email dead and use phone, fax, postal mail, and in-person contact in order to facilitate communications with other parties.
Too bad about the wife. Her husband was murdered and she became a widow.
The 'Counterstrike' angle was just used by the killer(s) as a disguise.
Some people cannot or will not separate reality from virtual reality in video games.
Yeah, such games can be (great) stress relievers but when you start feeling compulsion to do deadly stuff from the games in 'real life', you should think about stopping playing that particular game and play something more abstract like the (in)famous game TETRIS where nothing is killed or hurt in the game. Other alternatives would be non-violent sports games like golf, or board games. I would suggest pinball games but most of those have violent content or themes in them--however small.
Again, it is all left up to individual and what they want to do in such situations--I am only making non-violent suggestions.
PS: I am surprised the court case is still ongoing nearly nearly 3 years after crime.
That also doesn't account for the 50+ a day that still get through, which do get reported via Spamcop.
Tired of even 50 spams a day getting through? This post of mine can drop that number to essentially zero. It takes a ridiculed, unpopular, 'scorched earth' approach to spam that I've found to be more effective than the statistically based approaches that are not as effective as they used to be.
Use an aggressive antispam solution to filter spam out. I wrote one and use it regularly to check my email on my terms and not that of other solutions that use more complicated rule-based or statistical methods to fight spam.
Please keep this in mind should my approach be ridiculed (it has been in the past) by people enarmored by statistical approaches that are not as effective as they used to be.
There is sensitive material on the HDDs as well as 'stored' in the RAM chips and BIOS CMOS on the motherboard and 'burnt into' the phosphorous coating on the CRT. If the computer motherboard, HDDs, and CRT are destroyed, whatever is left could be conceivably recycled into a new system or used as spare parts for existing systems.
Toss the HDDs into an operational foundary. That oughta destroy them!
If you don't have one or can't do that, the next best thing would be to remove the HDDs, take them apart, and blowtorch the platter assemblies thoroughly for awhile and then recycle everyting if possible.
would it be so difficult to set the file attribute on the hosts file to read only. ugh.
The C library function _chmod can be used to un-read protect a file so protecting the hosts file that way is useless.
So I primarily use my software to filter out such HTML-based exploits in additon to certain system configurations to make such attacks 'almost impossible'.
If they cracked down on spam, they would lose all the hard currency they get from spammers in the West. This currency helps defray the cost of the powers that be to remain in power while the rest of China remains in various states of oppression and suppression.
Pink contracts are pink contracts no matter where in the world they are agreed to.
I suggest that for an icon to represent the topic of China, we create an almagamation of subjects.
Lack of freedom of speech Lack of freedom of assembly Lack of freedom of thought Lack of freedom of movement...etc... In general, create a hodge-podge of images that convey the impression of a dreary hell-hole of existence.
That is the CAPTCHA method of doing things which help to an extent.
The thing is, the spammers, in league with pornographers have circumvented this approach. I don't have the Slashdot link handy for this but I remember reading about that process here. Basically an elaborate software 'network' is set up so that all the following can occur all in real time.
1) Spammer signs up for a throwaway email account and encounter's a CAPTCHA image during the account creation process. 2) The image is delivered in real time to a visitor of a porn site ala 'DECODE THIS PIC TO GET YOUR FREE 1-DAY PASS TO HOT XXX ACTION NOW!!!!' 3) The image is decoded, the porn site visitor gets access to their porn and the decode results are fed back to the email account signup site. 4) If correct, the spammer has a new throwaway account to spam from.
I should add that steps 3 and 4 are simplified for clarity. In real life, I'd expect the pornospammers to give the CAPTCHA response back to the email site first and if successful THEN give access to the pornosurfer as a reward for decoding the image.
Since the spammers can't decode these CAPTCHA images in bulk in a reasonable amount of time, why not distribute the workload like they do for SETI@home, Folding@home, and the GIMPS project?
At the way things are going, the day may come where you have to do just about everything account-related online now in an offline fashion via mail, phone, fax, or in person somewhere just to cut down on all the spam and whatnot.
Slashdot Mirror
My Windows program is very sensitive to spam because it uses a different method I find more effective than the leading statistical method to stop spam. It works for me, an individual who was fed up with spam and malware and wanted to get rid of both of them for good.
My program lets you decide what kinds of email you want.
Fear not, the program can be configured to 'save spam' in order to avoid deleting important email. The best thing to do is to set my software up on a 'wide open' public POP3 email address and direct correspondents to private 'wide open' email addresses as needed for the ones that get past the filtering.
All I can say is that proper usage of it will make receiving spam and malware 'almost impossible'.
P.S. No lewd/derisive comments please. My software may not be a perfect fit for you but it is for me.
To put it bluntly, I pity spammers/scammers/computer crackers now. Their email is worthless to me--i'll never see it. Should I see it on rare occasions, it will be in a harmless, inert state or contain absolutely no content at all.
Oh, and I won't stand in line to scan my own groceries.
So you'd rather stand in the longer, full-service line?
Not me, I'd rather get out of the store with my purchases as soon as possible after paying for them.
Unless you are making BIG BUCK$ and can afford it, prompt, full-service attention is an illusion to the masses....
Well said, cubicledrone!
The employer's position is summed up as follows:
MONEY TALKS! NOTHING ELSE MATTERS!
You listed 21 college majors that employers look down on. Because all those majors 'as is' won't make immediate money for the employer! Therefore, 'why hire deadweight?' would seem to be the employer's knee-jerk response.
I'm surprised you listed Math. How can Computer Science be possible without Math? Look at Wal-Mart--I heard some time ago their computer setup rivaled/was better than the one in use at The Pentagon! With their computer setup, Wal-Mart is able to control expenses and maximize profits through computerization.
No, this isn't an endorsement of Wal-Mart or their business practices--I'm just pointing out how perhaps the Math major should have a minor in Computer Science (or vise versa) and be useful to employers.
But keep in mind, as was said in the first Spiderman movie, 'with great power comes great responsibility'. That is, in a perfect world, the use of computing must be done in a legal and ethical fashion. Since this is reality and 'MONEY TALKS! NOTHING ELSE MATTERS!' we have all sorts of financial scandals in big business such as the Enron bankruptcy several years ago.
In closing, I feel the relentless pursuit of money will be the ruin of advanced, First World societies without the counterbalance of other knowledge-increasing, culture-enhancing pursuits like history, linguistics, music, and art.
Money and commerce make the world go 'round but other college level disciplines make a world worth living in....
But, you can still improve yourself and get a REAL JOB...
REAL JOBs cost REAL MONEY (quite a bit) to get the necessary training/education for.
Where will the money come from in the form of grants and/or loans?
1) The government?
2) A rich friend/relative/stranger?
3) Going to work at some 'sh!t job' for 'sh!t pay' while using said 'sh!t pay' to fund your training/education for the REAL JOB!
4) Or you can just say 'FVCK THIS SH!T!' and become a criminal or entrepreneur: take/provide what you want and fvck the rat race!
The choice is yours....
Parent poster said 'menial jobs don't rate more than menial pay'. Haven't they seen Fight Club and the scene where Tyler Durden and his Project Mayhem crew terrorize that one guy in the bathroom. Tyler tells him, in essence: 'DONT FVCK WITH THE MENIAL HELP!!!'
Becase they can either 'go postal' on a killing spree or sabotage the goods and services you obtain from them as a way of retribution for being treated no better than a serf in Europe in the Middle Ages....
PS: The obscenities above are deliberately misspelled in order to 'avoid problems' yet convey (somehow) just how strongly some people feel about these things....
Do what I do: Keep phone unplugged when not used.
:)
Stops phonespam dead in its tracks.
The ultimate 'Do Not Call List.'
I only use the phone to call others or go online.
Me calling others is not phonespam to me.
If I am online, I can't get phonespam from others.
If the phone is unplugged (but nearby), I can't get phonespam from others.
See how easy it is....
Ammo could be stolen from stores by smart thieves/corrupt store owners/employees that left NO forensic evidence (for the CSI guys) and sold on the 'underground' at a premium....
In the end, the homocide is just one more entry in the police cold case files.... =/
What are you going to do--hold the gunstore chain/owner responsible (who might be blameless) for an otherwise unsolved murder?
Then the John Doe could have been shot by a bullet manufactured by a foreign ammo maker who REFUSES to put the RIFD tags in the ammo.
So murdering spammers is your solution to spam? What good will that do? the dead spammer's computing/spamming assets will likely find their way to individuals who can act as suppliers for spammers. It's like the illegal drug trade, the 'mules' are patsies that get busted, procecuted, and jailed while the drug kingpins remain at large ready and willing to entice another 'mule-to-be' with a wad of quick cash for risking their life and their freedom.
Your homicidal approach will only make the smart spammers become spammer suppliers and the dumb spammers doing the actual spamming potential targets for murder.
Ok, how do you go about killing notorious megaspammers who do not live in the USA where most the megaspammers live? By your rationale they deserve to die as well.
Going after spammers is a whack-a-mole proposition.
The best thing to do is to ignore them with effective email filtering. Mounting counterattacks like DoSing the spamvertised sites or filling webforms with mountains of digital garbage is, in the end, a waste of time and resources.
Just filter 'em out!
Only email provider based filters really work at stopping spam because people who use individual filters wouldn't buy stuff anyway.
If you seriously want spam relief, visit my site.
I did which is why I use the freeware email checker I wrote to check my POP3 email accounts.
The shareware email mailserver I wrote there will reduce and/or keep spam out of your domains and computer networks while making the propagation of malware 'almost impossible'.
If you do not have anything constructive to say about this post, please do not reply to it. The advantages and disadvantages of my approach to spam filtering are spelled out in excrutiating detail there so that you can decide for yourself if my approach is right for you.
1) Configure all e-commerce sites you do business with to send you ONLY PLAINTEXT EMAIL--NO HTML!
2) Filter out ALL HTML email sent to your e-commerce contact point email address. I use my own program to do this automatically for me.
Without the cover of HTML, phishers CANNOT use it to fascilitate their desception.
I used to enter bogus info at the phish sites but I gave up as they seemed to be keeping records and I cannot use a particulare (presumably) 'bogus' credit card number against them. Now I just delete all HTML email (phishing included) that is sent to my e-commerce contact email address.
1. Keep the code as simple as possible.
2. Use the UNIX model of software development: One function, one task.
3. Write as much code as possible with rules 1. and 2. in mind.
Even then, subtle bugs may crop up due to subtle errors in program design, error checking, processing instructions, etc. For example, I had some code that was using 0 as input in error. Debugging the code led me to conclude that my data structures were not large enough. Changing a single symbolic constant fixed that problem. I re-ran the code with the 'fix' and had no further problems.
These are program bugs worth finding and fixing--not more obvious stuff like division by zero errors, or errors in user input validation.
I heard Meijer already shedded a fair number of management positions some time ago in order to 'remain competitive' with Wal-Mart.
How can any store chain compete with the nvt-squeezing, penny-pinching tactics employed by Wal-Mart?
If it is a computerized 'chain store', simply do not put sales information for these 'pre-release' goods into the system until the day of release -- '12:01AM' style if need be.
There are two known drawbacks to this approach.
1) Non-computerized store chains and single store 'Mom-n-Pop' outlets.
2) Time zone issues and a single distribution point of computerized sales information.
Although I'm ashamed to admit it, I watched Titanic 8 fucking times in the theatre. All because I saw it was an awesome movie in MPEG-1...
I saw Titanic once and only once on the big screen back in early 1998. Even after several months in the theaters, people were still lining up like gangbusters to see it!
It is probably the ultimate 'date movie' which is why it was so successful.
However, to me, Terminator 2: Judgement Day is eminantly rewatchable in spite of the fact I've seen the movie several times before. I still vaguely remember seeing it in a theater back in 1991 and hearing a fellow moviegoer 'talk back' at the screen--he couldn't believe what he was seeing!
Even 13+ years later, the movie is still a touchstone achievement in visual effects by ILM.
Definitely $100+ million well spent for a movie....
Alas, as long as their are clueless/ignorant people out there who might buy something from the spammers, spamming will continue. The CAN-SPAM Act is just that--a license to spam by certain rules. In light of this, all that one can really do nowadays if you need email is to use effective filtering and perhaps spreading the word about The Boulder Pledge:
Before I coded my antispam solution, I was almost gnashing my teeth in frustration at all the spam I got at a webmail address that I had posted as a image file at an old website I had. It got spammed thanks to 'manual spammers' or (possibly) 'dictionary blasters'. Because of this I didn't give out a POP3 address at the time because I didn't want to deal with all that spam (and malware) inside Outlook Express.
Since July, 2004 by using my own software to check my POP3 email addresses my stress level over spam and malware effectively dropped to zero.
Nowadays I only get spam on two occasions.
1) Whenever I temporarily disable my software to get an important, one-time email.
2) The spammers send an email with absolutely no content in the email body in order to send a 'subject line' spam. Ho hum...pathetic.
Since 'No doesn't mean NO' to the spammers, filtering appears to be the only viable option left as legal based approaches are not working effectively.
Another option would be to send and receive encrypted mail only and 'autodelete' ALL unencrypted email. The only problems with this approach would be the extra time and resources devoted to encryption, as well as national security concerns for using encryption exclusively for all email traffic to and from your domain.
Killing spammers would be illegal and immoral in spite of the drain on resources they cause. Effective, content filtering and, to a lesser extent, legal enforcement of existing antispam laws appear to be the only viable solutions to the spam and malware problem....
The ultimate alternative would be to declare email dead and use phone, fax, postal mail, and in-person contact in order to facilitate communications with other parties.
Looks like a plain case of open murder.
Too bad about the wife. Her husband was murdered and she became a widow.
The 'Counterstrike' angle was just used by the killer(s) as a disguise.
Some people cannot or will not separate reality from virtual reality in video games.
Yeah, such games can be (great) stress relievers but when you start feeling compulsion to do deadly stuff from the games in 'real life', you should think about stopping playing that particular game and play something more abstract like the (in)famous game TETRIS where nothing is killed or hurt in the game. Other alternatives would be non-violent sports games like golf, or board games. I would suggest pinball games but most of those have violent content or themes in them--however small.
Again, it is all left up to individual and what they want to do in such situations--I am only making non-violent suggestions.
PS: I am surprised the court case is still ongoing nearly nearly 3 years after crime.
That also doesn't account for the 50+ a day that still get through, which do get reported via Spamcop.
Tired of even 50 spams a day getting through? This post of mine can drop that number to essentially zero. It takes a ridiculed, unpopular, 'scorched earth' approach to spam that I've found to be more effective than the statistically based approaches that are not as effective as they used to be.
They steal bandwidth. They steal disk space. They steal our time, and time costs dearly. You can't replace it.
Stop spam and spammers at the TCP/IP connection level.
Directory of IP Based Blacklists
Geographic IP lists
Use an aggressive antispam solution to filter spam out. I wrote one and use it regularly to check my email on my terms and not that of other solutions that use more complicated rule-based or statistical methods to fight spam.
Please keep this in mind should my approach be ridiculed (it has been in the past) by people enarmored by statistical approaches that are not as effective as they used to be.
I heard a lady say on the news she used some kinda voting device to vote for Kerry and the machine registered her vote for Bush.
Computer glitch or election fraud?
You decide.
Sad to say, parent is correct.
There is sensitive material on the HDDs as well as 'stored' in the RAM chips and BIOS CMOS on the motherboard and 'burnt into' the phosphorous coating on the CRT. If the computer motherboard, HDDs, and CRT are destroyed, whatever is left could be conceivably recycled into a new system or used as spare parts for existing systems.
Toss the HDDs into an operational foundary. That oughta destroy them!
If you don't have one or can't do that, the next best thing would be to remove the HDDs, take them apart, and blowtorch the platter assemblies thoroughly for awhile and then recycle everyting if possible.
would it be so difficult to set the file attribute on the hosts file to read only. ugh.
The C library function _chmod can be used to un-read protect a file so protecting the hosts file that way is useless.
So I primarily use my software to filter out such HTML-based exploits in additon to certain system configurations to make such attacks 'almost impossible'.
If they cracked down on spam, they would lose all the hard currency they get from spammers in the West. This currency helps defray the cost of the powers that be to remain in power while the rest of China remains in various states of oppression and suppression.
Pink contracts are pink contracts no matter where in the world they are agreed to.
I'll just continue to delete my spam automatically with my own software as I have been since July, 2004.
The Unknown Protestor and other images related to those fateful days back in 1989....
"Why should I spend 18 dollars to get the soundtrack to a movie, when I can buy the DVD of the movie itself for 15?"
You might not want that soundtrack clobbered by dialogue and sound effects when you listen to it to apreciate its artistry divorced from the movie.
Only a 'handfull' of scores are good enough to stand alone as 'serious music' without the movie.
Here are some of them.
John Williams - E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, Jurrasic Park, Superman
Jerry Goldsmith - Patton, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Total Recall, Supergirl
James Horner - Battle Beyond The Stars, Brainstorm, Krull, Glory, Titanic
Trevor Jones - The Dark Crystal
Vangelis - Chariots Of Fire, Blade Runner
Howard Shore - The 3 Lord Of The Ring scores.
Wendy Carlos - TRON
Elmer Bernstein - The Ten Commandments, Heavy Metal
Lee Holdridge - Splash, The Mists Of Avalon
Alex North - Spartacus, Cleopatra, Dragonslayer
Hanz Zimmer - The Lion King
Enjoy!
That is the CAPTCHA method of doing things which help to an extent.
The thing is, the spammers, in league with pornographers have circumvented this approach. I don't have the Slashdot link handy for this but I remember reading about that process here. Basically an elaborate software 'network' is set up so that all the following can occur all in real time.
1) Spammer signs up for a throwaway email account and encounter's a CAPTCHA image during the account creation process.
2) The image is delivered in real time to a visitor of a porn site ala 'DECODE THIS PIC TO GET YOUR FREE 1-DAY PASS TO HOT XXX ACTION NOW!!!!'
3) The image is decoded, the porn site visitor gets access to their porn and the decode results are fed back to the email account signup site.
4) If correct, the spammer has a new throwaway account to spam from.
I should add that steps 3 and 4 are simplified for clarity. In real life, I'd expect the pornospammers to give the CAPTCHA response back to the email site first and if successful THEN give access to the pornosurfer as a reward for decoding the image.
Since the spammers can't decode these CAPTCHA images in bulk in a reasonable amount of time, why not distribute the workload like they do for SETI@home, Folding@home, and the GIMPS project?
At the way things are going, the day may come where you have to do just about everything account-related online now in an offline fashion via mail, phone, fax, or in person somewhere just to cut down on all the spam and whatnot.