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June 26, 2003
Mail Bag
In response to my spam post, Ryan pointed me to this article by Joel Spolsky. Ryan then had this to say about it:
Unfortunately it requires a "boil the ocean" approach. You'd have to say, I'm not going to accept email from anyone outside this new system.
And I'd raise the cost: if it's a legit email, the cost will be returned anyway. And if you're not a spammer & the receiver keeps your dime, then chances are you won't be emailing them much anymore.
I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with Ryan (and Joel) here. Let's use telemarketers as an example. They have to pay for the phone calls, not to mention people to do the phoning. And despite legislature, call display, and other dubious technologies, people still get calls from telemarketers (I used to get two calls a week from AT&T while at my temporary apartment in Redmond. It didn't matter to them that I was only a temporary tenant and couldn't give permission to switch long distance providers. It also didn't concern them that I requested to be put on their "Do-Not-Call List" every time they called, since whenever they called back, they told me they had no record of such a request).