Spam

harrismh777 harmar at member.fsf.org
Mon Aug 1 15:17:05 EDT 2011


Steven D'Aprano wrote:
>> I've noticed that python-list gets significantly more spam than the
>> >  other lists I subscribe to.  There's an example below.
> Thanks for that! I missed it the first time, so it is very helpful for you
> to forward it. It's especially helpful that you included all the spammer's
> URLs, as that will help improve their Google page ranks. I'm sure the
> spammer will thank you for your assistance.

Yeah, a couple of good rules to follow for well intentioned citizens:
1) don't feed the trolls
2) don't repackage spam

Having said that, either because I was tired or because I dropped my 
defensive posture, I have messed up on those two little rules more than 
once.

It is possible to filter spam very effectively. My mail client has a 
spam-can based on a multitude of trial and guess rules that with almost 
oh 97 percent rate puts the right stuff into the can and saves me the 
trouble of manually filtering it. Granted, I still need to quickly peek 
through the can files... but this is pretty easy to do... because non 
spam shows up like a rose among thorns in a spam-can.

The trouble is that this group does like to debate off-topic stuff 
frequently (usually its at least edge related to Python) and so who is 
to tell (as a moderator) what is spam?  Well, your example is fairly 
obvious, but other stuff (even like this note) may not be. I don't 
consider this spam, because its related to this list and because I am 
interested in the same issue as your OP complaint. But, I am absolutely 
sure that others will view your note, and mine, as spam... see the problem?



-- 
m harris

FSF  ...free as in freedom/
http://webpages.charter.net/harrismh777/gnulinux/gnulinux.htm



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