On Wed, 2006-03-08 at 16:05 -0800, jdow wrote: > You have an "ignored_mailbox" and I have "/dev/null". It's the same > thing, really. And that is the canonical way to handle stupidity that > is willfull and repetitive. There is no way on this silly planet in > this silly planetary system in this silly galaxy in this silly > universe that I will answer one of those challenges. It may be a > "silly principle"; but, it is no sillier than your "ignored_mailbox", > is it? I don't disagree with not paying attention to spam, so long as it's done with care. That's why I do what I've done, and haven't argued against some things in this thread. My ignored mailbox will be full, and anybody paying attention to returned mail will find out why it's being returned. Or else, yahoo will have suspended the account and they should find that out, too. I have no desire for private mail from a public list (typically such things are by mistake, or because someone wants to behave in a manner that wouldn't be tolerated in public), and anybody reading my messages on here can read the signature line explaining it, but if they really need a private message they can ask me to e-mail them (i.e. I am not uncontactable). I treat this mailing list rather like a news group. I do agree with the sentiment that handling this *ought* to be done properly at an SMTP server, though. By properly, that means rejected with an appropriate error. This is not responding to the message, this isn't even throwing it back, it's not accepting it and saying why (with an error message that ought to put an end to it if the culprit is running a properly set up SMTP server). And doing so, that way, does it before it gets into your inbox, and clogs it up. Two big problems with bouncing back spam, and even rejecting mail from a entire domain, are: 1. You can end up spamming, yourself, because your system responds in an inappropriate way to forged headers. 2. You reject legitimate mail. While, now, you might think there'd never be a day that you'll receive a message from that place, you don't really know. I liken this to the lunacy that some people reject all hotmail messages. Like it, or not, some friends will use it, and are not going to change their address for you. However, it appears, by discussions in this thread, that this particular problem responds in a manner that is specific to their anti-spam system. So it would be possible to (personally) allow through messages from that ISP, in general, and be able to automatically reject notices from their anti-spam service. i.e. A suitable "not accepted" SMTP error code along with a human understandable explanation saying that idiotically flawed anti-spam techniques will not pass through your system. -- Don't send private replies to my address, the mailbox is ignored. I read messages from the public lists.
