I, as most of long time Internet citizens, do get a lot of spam. Usually I just ignore it, quite often without even noticing it thanks to filters, but sometimes something gets through and then you sometimes see things. On 2nd of April, 2002 I got a nice lengthy mail in (erm, was it Portuguese or Spanish?). Some Brazilian actualities it seems. Mind you ... I don't speak neither Portuguese nor Spanish, so why would anyone send anything like that to me? Or even ... why would I subscribe to anything like that?
But that's not the best part. The best part was the end of the message. First there were some mail addresses. Of the kind you send a complaint or unsubscription request to and you get a new flood of spam, since now they know there IS someone sitting at the other end.
ATEN=C7=C3O: Para receber o artigo completo do embaixador Valladares, em portugu=EAs, = clique em: mailto:info9224@yahoo.com?Subject=3DArtigoValladares-Port
Para receber o artigo completo do embaixador Valladares, em espanhol, = clique em: mailto:info9224@yahoo.com?Subject=3DArt=EDculoValladaresEsp
OUTROS AVISOS:
Para subscrever amigos, com o consentimento destes, clique em: mailto:info9224@yahoo.com?Subject=3DInscreverAmigos acrescentando no corpo da mensagem seus e-mails.
Para ser retirado de meu Address Book, clique em: mailto:info9224@yahoo.com?Subject=3DDesubscrever acrescentando no corpo da mensagem o e-mail a ser retirado.
(Yes, with all that quoted printable stuff. The MIME-Version: header was missing.) And now comes the best part:
WARNING:
We practice responsible mailing by honoring all remove requests, following all Latin American & U.S. & UE laws, and oppose spamming. If = you complain and have the remove address closed you are doing a disservice to other receivers of this message since they will have no mechanism to be removed from future mailings. In addition, this message is in strict compliance with U.S. law so if you flame the "remove mailbox" we will report you to your ISP as a SPAMMER, which will result in your account being closed.
--
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment I, The US Constitution
So according to this "responsible" person, it's OK to post some nonsense to thousands of completely uninterested people, but it's "SPAMing" if they dare to complain. Sweeeeet.
P.S.: To all the spamers abusing the 1st amendment: The freedom of speech doesn't mean you can break
into someone's house and start shouting.
If you send anything to more than ten people that did NOT subscribe, you are spaming. FULLSTOP.
P.P.S.: If anyone feels like being a bad guy, here are the headers:
Received: from spooler by amber.zine.cz (Mercury/32 v3.21c); 2 Apr 02 21:35:57 +0200 Return-path: <AtualidadeeBrasileira@post.com> Received: from mail.hotmail.com (210.227.151.130) by amber.zine.cz (Mercury/32 v3.21c) ID MG00108D; 2 Apr 02 21:35:47 +0200 X-Server: (freedom-server.se [2211.10.25.32]) Message-ID: <001401c1da3a$34b7bea0$0600a8c0@se> From: "Genebra: porque o..." <AtualidadeeBrasileira@post.com> To: jenda@krynicky.cz Subject: =?iso-8859-1?Q?..._Itamaraty_se_abst=E9m_de_condenar_Cuba_e_China=3F?= Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2002 08:33:26 -0300 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4133.2400 X-PMFLAGS: 571474304 0 1 P36E40.CNM Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
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