Well, if we keep working to make SMTP mail unusable by more people,
more people might be FORCED into using Web mail, more often. I
don't think that's a very bright thing to do, in part because Web
mail (just as accessing ANY Web sites)
I realize what's wrong with this argument. In the early days of
cybercafes and Internet access at places like airports, the cafe or
airport always provided a computer since the computers of the time
were large enough and expensive enough that few people lugged their
own computers around. Furthermore, getting your computer hooked into
someone else's network was a pain and usually involved some black art
manual configuration.
But now, everyone brings his own computer. Laptops are cheap, and for
the most part network connections are self-configuring. Around here,
one of the ISPs has lots of public hotspots, all of which are no more
than a WiFi access point.
This makes the port 25 issue much less important, since if you have
your own computer, you have a lot of reasonable options. You can send
mail using port 587. You can tunnel back to your home network and use
port 25 through the tunnel. (That's what I do, using ssh to provide
the tunnel.)
How many people really send mail from public places using someone else's
computer? Not many that I've seen.
--
John R. Levine, IECC, POB 727, Trumansburg NY 14886 +1 607 330 5711
johnl(_at_)iecc(_dot_)com, Mayor, http://johnlevine.com,
Member, Provisional board, Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail
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