P2B: Email vs. News

I receive and respond to a steady flow of emails from users of P2B
series motherboards seeking advice on upgrades and troubleshooting.

I do not mind providing free assistance in this manner, as being able to
help is satisfying and occasionally generates business for the P2B
modification services I offer.

However, an increasing number of my replies are bounced due to anti-spam
measures taken by the recipient's ISP. Spammers are now working with
hackers, and paying them for access to 'zombie' systems they can use to
send their crap. I subscribe to a very large ISP, and it's inevitable
that some of their clients are infected with spammer trojans at any
given time - so my ISP's mail server gets blocked, and my carefully
considered replies get bounced. This is quite frustrating, but there is
little I can do aside from reporting bounces to my ISP and ensuring my
personal systems are not contributing to the problem.

I have posted to P2B related threads on this and other newsgroups for
several years, and as a result much of my subject matter expertise is
archived on google groups.

I am therefore requesting that P2B series users in need of assistance
consult my web site and google groups prior to emailing me, and consider
posting to the newsgroup as an alternative to email.

TIA

P2B

http://tipperlinne.com/p2bmod

On Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:22:52 -0400, in alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus, P2B
wrote:

Message-ID:
Date: Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:22:52 -0400
NNTP-Posting-Host: 69.158.103.46
X-Complaints-To:
Organization: Bell Sympatico

[snip]

The significance of the above will be made clear shortly.

I receive and respond to a steady flow of emails from users of P2B
series motherboards seeking advice on upgrades and troubleshooting.

I do not mind providing free assistance in this manner, as being able to
help is satisfying and occasionally generates business for the P2B
modification services I offer.

[snip]

Understood, and good for you. I do some similar things in a slightly
different context.

However, an increasing number of my replies are bounced due to anti-spam
measures taken by the recipient's ISP. Spammers are now working with
hackers, and paying them for access to 'zombie' systems they can use to
send their crap. I subscribe to a very large ISP, and it's inevitable
that some of their clients are infected with spammer trojans at any
given time - so my ISP's mail server gets blocked, and my carefully
considered replies get bounced.
[snip]

It goes quite beyond being "a very large ISP". Sympatico / Bell Canada in
particular is widely blocked primarily because they are maliciously
irresponsible about not only the monumental zombie/proxy problem they have
willfully permitted to develop on their network, but also their directly
hosting and supporting well-known spammers, proxy/zombie hijackers, DDoS
attackers, etc. -- and *most* importantly, virtually never taking ANY
corrective action against either problem. They are perhaps second only to
Comcast as *the* worst-run "consumer" ISP extant.

This isn't really the right venue for any sort of detailed discursion of this
issue; so I suggest you Google news.admin.net-abuse.email for references to
sympatico.ca OR Sympatico, to get a small inkling of the scale of your real
problem.

This is quite frustrating, but there is
little I can do aside from reporting bounces to my ISP and ensuring my
personal systems are not contributing to the problem.

[snip]

Actually, there is quite a bit more you can do. For starters, you can refuse
to accept the lies Sympatico / Bell Canada tells you about how it's really
somebody else's problem and there's nothing they can do. You can *demand*
that they act responsibly. And when even that fails (which it surely will),
you can find a competent and responsible ISP to patronize. But whatever you
do, you should do *something*; because as it stands, you are part of the
problem, as opposed to being part of the solution -- every month you continue
to pay your ISP bill to the likes of Sympatico / Bell Canada, *you* are
(indirectly, but nonetheless significantly) supporting and enabling still more
spam by telling them in the only language they know that their current
behavior and performance is acceptable to you.

--

Jay T. Blocksom
--------------------------------
Appropriate Technology, Inc.
usenet01[at]appropriate-tech.net

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Unsolicited advertising sent to this domain is expressly prohibited under
47 USC S227 and State Law. Violators are subject to prosecution.

Jay T. Blocksom wrote:
On Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:22:52 -0400, in alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus, P2B
wrote:

Message-ID:
Date: Thu, 08 Jul 2004 23:22:52 -0400
NNTP-Posting-Host: 69.158.103.46
X-Complaints-To:
Organization: Bell Sympatico

[snip]

The significance of the above will be made clear shortly.

I receive and respond to a steady flow of emails from users of P2B
series motherboards seeking advice on upgrades and troubleshooting.

I do not mind providing free assistance in this manner, as being able to
help is satisfying and occasionally generates business for the P2B
modification services I offer.

[snip]

Understood, and good for you. I do some similar things in a slightly
different context.

However, an increasing number of my replies are bounced due to anti-spam
measures taken by the recipient's ISP. Spammers are now working with
hackers, and paying them for access to 'zombie' systems they can use to
send their crap. I subscribe to a very large ISP, and it's inevitable
that some of their clients are infected with spammer trojans at any
given time - so my ISP's mail server gets blocked, and my carefully
considered replies get bounced.
[snip]

It goes quite beyond being "a very large ISP". Sympatico / Bell Canada in
particular is widely blocked primarily because they are maliciously
irresponsible about not only the monumental zombie/proxy problem they have
willfully permitted to develop on their network, but also their directly
hosting and supporting well-known spammers, proxy/zombie hijackers, DDoS
attackers, etc. -- and *most* importantly, virtually never taking ANY
corrective action against either problem. They are perhaps second only to
Comcast as *the* worst-run "consumer" ISP extant.

This isn't really the right venue for any sort of detailed discursion of this
issue; so I suggest you Google news.admin.net-abuse.email for references to
sympatico.ca OR Sympatico, to get a small inkling of the scale of your real
problem.

This is quite frustrating, but there is
little I can do aside from reporting bounces to my ISP and ensuring my
personal systems are not contributing to the problem.

[snip]

Actually, there is quite a bit more you can do. For starters, you can refuse
to accept the lies Sympatico / Bell Canada tells you about how it's really
somebody else's problem and there's nothing they can do. You can *demand*
that they act responsibly. And when even that fails (which it surely will),
you can find a competent and responsible ISP to patronize. But whatever you
do, you should do *something*; because as it stands, you are part of the
problem, as opposed to being part of the solution -- every month you continue
to pay your ISP bill to the likes of Sympatico / Bell Canada, *you* are
(indirectly, but nonetheless significantly) supporting and enabling still more
spam by telling them in the only language they know that their current
behavior and performance is acceptable to you.

My employer chose Sympatico and pays the bill every month. The service
has been very reliable aside from recent mail-blocking issues, so I have
never had reason to give much thought to their competency and
responsibility. I will do the research and present any viable
alternatives I find to my employer - it should not be difficult to make
the case if Sympatico is indeed as cavalier as you claim.

P2B