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General discussion

The problem with pay per e-mail

Feb 7, 2006 9:35AM PST

Isn't a huge amount of spam these days generated by zombie computers? So who gets charged then if your computer has become a major Spam e-mailer?

Granted, I half don't care if people who let their machines GET infected by such things have to pay money for their laziness/stupidity but it hardly seems fair if it's somebody's mom who probably doesn't know any better.

-Kevin S

Discussion is locked

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Pay for email
Feb 7, 2006 9:45AM PST

Didn't the United States Postal Service try this years ago?

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Spam = junk mail
Feb 7, 2006 10:13AM PST

I wasn't sure if you were being facetious, Andy but that's actually a good question. I still get a ton of junk mail every day from people and it's got to cost several cents per item to mail, not to mention paper and printing cost.

I guess the fishing type of spam might go bankrupt with pay per letter (i.e. they don't know enough real addresses so it has a name generator) but if they have actual addresses, I just see 1000 times as many companies sending junk e-mail even though the amount per company becomes a thousand times less.

It just seems impossible to kill, even with legislation and money.

-Kevin S.

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Implementation
Feb 7, 2006 10:28AM PST

I really don't understand how in the ____ they are going to implement it. It kind of urks me that they are going to do this. Spammers will find a way to get around it, or they'll just pay for it since it is such a low price.

I know the cost isn't a whole lot, but still, if I wanted to run my own dedicated server for a community, I'd wind up having to pay for those emails because more than likely I would want to keep the community free.

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USPS Payment Scam
Feb 7, 2006 10:30AM PST

According to several websites (I just googled the topic) that was apparantly a hoax.

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Hmmm...
Feb 7, 2006 2:28PM PST

Funny how what started out as a hoax is now turning into a reality, even if it IS by a different business ..

Hmmmmm .. Perhaps all those hoaxes are not hoaxes after all??

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CNET = SPAM
Feb 7, 2006 10:35AM PST

I was just going through my Gmail and Google usually always winds up putting my CNET newsletters into the SPAM folder (even though I have a filter!) I guess its probably because I get so many of them! lol