From: Kee Hinckley <nazgul(_at_)somewhere(_dot_)com>
...
The occassional references to fancy content marking are entirely wrong.
Our problem is spam, and that is related to consent and volume but not
content. The contents of mail can be a problem, but we must not even
start to approach the net-nanny business. We have centuries of experience
Please don't go off on a tangent about censorship. I gave examples
of content right up front at the beginning of this conversation.
I have consented to receive email from Amazon.
I want transactional mail and promotional mail.
I don't want promotional mail on my cell phone.
And I certainly don't want my ISP blocking the transactional stuff.
Is that type of content tag useful?
No, such content tags will always be useless and wrong. Refusing to
advert to the problems related to the word "censorship" is a wise as
the person's insistence if we simply agree, then all mail will be sent
though a few trustworthy, anti-spam mail ISPs that will check certs.
Content tags are unworkable for the same reason that censorship doesn't
work. Those who cannot be trusted to not abuse your mailbox or
cellphone will not only not tag their stuff correctly but will find
ways use the wrong tags. If as has been widely alleged Amazon has
routinely violated expressed preferences to not send ads, then Amazon
will also routinely find excuses to label promotional mail as
transactional. If Amazon can be trusted to not send ads to those who
don't want them, then Amazon doesn't need to label ads as promotional,
because no one who objects would ever see the objectionable tag.
Spam is about volume not merely whether you get a message you don't
like or how messages are labeled. A retailer that violates your
instructions and sends you promotional mail should get no more attention
from the IETF/IRTF than a retailer that takes your money and fails to
deliver. It is only the "bulk" aspect of "spam" that justifies this
mailing list.
Vernon Schryver vjs(_at_)rhyolite(_dot_)com
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