Re: gnu-emacs-help news->mail gateway

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2011 10:29:56 +1100
> From: Tim Cross <theophilusx@gmail.com>
> Cc: nsivaram.net@gmail.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> 
> On Wed, Oct 12, 2011 at 9:16 AM, Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> wrote:
> >> Date: Wed, 12 Oct 2011 08:39:43 +1100
> >> From: Tim Cross <theophilusx@gmail.com>
> >> Cc: Sivaram Neelakantan <nsivaram.net@gmail.com>, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> >>
> >> Still misses the point. With mail lists, you MUST provide a legitimate
> >> email address.
> >
> > You already did, a thousand times, when you posted here.  The 1001
> > time doesn't really matter.
> 
> Irrelevant.

I don't see why.

> > And I talked about the amount of spam on GNU lists not by mistake, but
> > on purpose: the amount of spam in news groups is by far larger.  So
> > what if it doesn't get to you by a protocol other than email?
> >
> 
> There is a big difference. In the case of newgroups, I choose to go
> there and if that means having to deal with spam, it is my choice.
> With email, I do not choose to receive spam.

I don't see any big difference.  In both cases, you view the summary
lines before you decide whether to read the body.  In both cases, you
can decide not to read it if it is obviously spam.

> >> It is irrelevant whether the lists you subscribes to
> >> gets spam or whether its spam filter is good enough to filter spam
> >> out. You don't  know for certain if people subscribed to that mail
> >> list are not getting spam directly to their inbox i.e. not via the
> >> mail list, but directly to the address they used in subscribing to the
> >> list.
> >
> > Well, I post to many lists, but get very little spam.  So I think your
> > fears are greatly exaggerated.
> 
> Ah, the old 'it doesn't happen to me so you must be wrong' argument eh?

What's wrong with it?  My name and address are all over the place on
the Internet, so I think my example is very relevant.

> Even in this thread, we have one other post who states that
> subscribing to a list resulted in a significant increase in spam - so
> that would be 1 all

I would like to hear numbers that are behind the "significant
increase".  It could be that a _relatively_ large increase is actually
small in absolute numbers.

And after that, I would again compare it with the amount of spam you
see on news groups.

> >> This is the big difference between mail list based collaboration and
> >> newgroups or web forums. With the latter, you don't need to provide a
> >> mail address.
> >
> > If you still believe in the year 2011 that withholding an email
> > address will make you invisible and unreachable by spammers, then,
> > well, my sympathies.
> >
> 
> Wow, thats a pretty disappointing level or arrogance. You can keep
> your sympathies thanks, not interested.

I don't understand the reason for the hostility.