20 Mar
2002
20 Mar
'02
4:56 a.m.
Jay West wrote:
1) Ok, here are the two things I was considering doing
to change the mailing
list settings....
A) Reject posts to the list which contain any kind of HTML content. I think
this would be fairly unobtrusive - most people don't want HTML posts here
anyways. And - I would bet that most all SPAM contains some form of HTML, so
this might not get rid of all SPAM forever, but I think it would make the
very few that come here dwindle to even less. Comments?
Jerome Fine replies:
My only comment is that since the list seems fairly stable right now,
why not leave A) until later? I agree that SPAM is more likely
to contain HTML, but I suspect SPAM is still so rare in any case
and being able to filter it off via B) below should be more than
sufficient. Again I base this on the S/N ratio of comments on
SPAM to actual SPAM. Even these "List Changes" posts far
exceed actual SPAM - so if ever there is a SPAM that has
NO comments, then I might be prepared to agree actual
SPAM is a problem.
OR - if it is just as easy, why not add the characters [HTML] or
just [HT] to the front of those messages.
However, if you (i.e. Jay) decides to prohibit messages with HTML,
then I suggest that you do not tell the sender. An ON-list member
will quickly notice that their messages are NOT being sent and
stop using HTML.
And my final suggestion is that Jay decides - just as I have been
saying before.
B) I also like the 'self-policing' idea of
making posts to the list from
non-subscribers get a subject tag of [OL] or something like that. This one I
am not sure how to do off the top of my head, but would think it pretty
straightforward. Comments?
While I think I might have been the first to suggest [OL] be added at the
FRONT of the Subject line, I must admit that the idea came from a
list I receive which adds 9 characters at the beginning (including the []
characters). This is a yahoo based list, so they might have some special
software that is not widely available.
One aspect that will not be needed is a check to see if the message
is a reply - in theory replies will only come from list subscribers.
So, I STRONGLY support adding [OL] at the FRONT of the Subject
Line for posts that are off-list in origin. And suggest nothing else be
done for now.
Except - that Jay decides.
Sincerely yours,
Jerome Fine