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Wednesday, 28 May 1997
Agis rant ::
I sent a note to Agis, the Internet provider to CyberPromo, the company who took AOL to court over the right to send unsolicited commercial e-mail to AOL members. My note complained about spam from CyberPromo. I got a reply back and wrote a rather inspired flame (Rated R):
At 5:55 -0400 5/28/1997, AGIS ABUSE wrote:
Please be aware that this mailbox (abuse@agis.net) is read by our entire
company, including our senior management.
Hah, you’re not the first company I’ve ever heard of who has a bit bucket for senior management. But if you’re really listening, then, well, jeez, I’ll tell you what I think.
The fact that your message garners e-mail from an auto-responder is to insure a timely response. It should not be an indication of a lack of consideration or concern.
Such a nicely crafted lie.
It is our position that the Internet is an open marketplace, where commerce of any and all kinds may take place in accordance with public demand. We do not believe censorship is the responsibility of an Internet service provider. It is not our place to censor customers’ content or legitimate business practices. Messages originating from customer’s sites reflect the opinions of our customers and not necessarily those of AGIS.
The government considered using people’s fax machines to print advertisements illegal; spam is the exact same thing. It is, in effect, an unauthorized use of the recipient’s computer system, which is already illegal.
Also spammers take steps to disguise their identities, which is something else which was made illegal for faxes.
SUGGESTIONS
AGIS is a pro-active organization with goals of delivering the highest
quality solutions in support of the Internet’s mission critical
applications.
Yes, mission critical applications such as promoting get-rich-quick schemes, quackery, and sex services.
Since we believe in continuous improvement, we will re-evaluate our position in light of the any new regulatory developments.
Translation: We’ll let CyberPromo flood the Internet with fecal matter until the government makes us stop. But let’s hope we don’t smell too bad when that happens.
We appreciate that our position may not be agreeable to everyone. Further, we understand your interest in seeking a solution. With that in mind, may we suggest the following options: END-USERs - A variety of e-mail and filtering software packages are available on the Internet for end-users. For example, Eudora and procmail offer sufficient protection from e-mail of your undesired Internet sites.
You’re on drugs. All that Eudora will do is let me waste my life maintaining a list of the thousands of known spam domains so that it can automatically transfer spam into my trash. It’s easier to hit Delete. If I’m going to waste my time dealing with spam, I’m going to do it by writing to the idiots like you who don’t understand that with rights come responsibilities; that free speech doesn’t mean you have the right to walk in your neighbor’s front door without knocking, and start telling him about how you have a web site with naked women prepared to masturbate on camera just for his pleasure.
He’d tell you to get out of his house and to go promote your wares somewhere more appropriate.
ISPs - Your mail servers and/or router systems to can be set to reject incoming spam or filter out offensive sites at the IP level. Sendmail and ccmail are a few examples of good systems which perform these functions.
Yeah, I suppose agis.net and cyberpromo.com could be firewalled. Cool idea, thanks!
Again, we would like to thank you for your valuable input, and wish you continued success in your Internet experience.
No, you don’t, because if I have any success, you will stop harboring spammers or find yourself unable to send mail to the rest of the world.
If I don’t get a reply from a human, I’ll have the smug satisfaction of thinking that maybe someone did block off mail from your entire domain and all of your customers.
Doug
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