John,
unfortunately, that act of communication _is_ the adverse side
effect. it tells the spammer that yours is an active, responsive
email account.
JL> I must disagree.
JL> Iljitsch stated it precisely and well: "the fact that a message is
JL> discarded as spam" need not give any information about whether the
JL> recipient is an active email account -- least of all "responsive".
If this were a math exercise, I would have to agree with your point.
And even though it is not a math exercise, your point certainly is
relevant.
The difference is that there are practicalities of implementation and
use that we have to anticipate. This falls under the unfortunate
reality that the real-world is not conducted so carefully.
On the average, user-level Internet mechanisms need to be pretty
simple and straightforward, if they are to be successful.
d/
--
Dave Crocker <dcrocker-at-brandenburg-dot-com>
Brandenburg InternetWorking <www.brandenburg.com>
Sunnyvale, CA USA <tel:+1.408.246.8253>