Tony  wrote:
>
>Had Ian just turned down spam checking on the single usenet.org.uk e-mail
>address there WOULD BE NO ISSUE.

To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we should
expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is considered a
problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.

-- 
eleanor@the-blairs.co.uk                          http://lnr.livejournal.com/

Eleanor Blair  said:

> Tony  wrote:
>>
>> Had Ian just turned down spam checking on the single usenet.org.uk
>> e-mail address there WOULD BE NO ISSUE.
>
> To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we
> should expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is
> considered a problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.

They could try using another sort of filtering, perhaps.


-- 
kat
   >^..^<

In uk.net.news.management, Eleanor Blair  wrote:

>Tony  wrote:
>>
>>Had Ian just turned down spam checking on the single usenet.org.uk e-mail
>>address there WOULD BE NO ISSUE.
>
>To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we should
>expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is considered a
>problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.

Isn't the moderation software able to tell what is and isn't a valid usenet
posting?  It can dump all non-usenet post e-mails which would account for,
I'm guessing, 99.9% of the spam to that address.

The e-mail address used to contact the moderators is more difficult, and
there will be an issue with spam on that, but it's *even more* important
that, that e-mail address is inclusive and allows non-technical people to
get in touch.

-- 
Tony Evans
Saving trees and wasting electrons since 1993
blog -> http://perceptionistruth.com/
olmr -> http://www.onelinemoviereviews.co.uk/
[ anything below this line wasn't written by me ]

On 04 Nov 2009 Eleanor Blair  wrote in
news:JGq*YSgVs@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk: 

> Tony  wrote:
>>
>>Had Ian just turned down spam checking on the single usenet.org.uk
>>e-mail address there WOULD BE NO ISSUE.
> 
> To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we
> should expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is
> considered a problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.

If individual moderators were choosing to apply filtering that would be 
less of an issue. The chances of all moderators using filters that all 
gave the same false positives are very low.

-- 
Graham Drabble
"Usenet is mostly just a geek entertainment system that far too many 
people try to pretend as some type of "real" value to society."
   Curt Welch - news.software.nntp

In article , kat wrote:
>Eleanor Blair  said:
>>
>> To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we
>> should expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is
>> considered a problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.
>
>They could try using another sort of filtering, perhaps.

If there turns out to be a problem with the current sort, perhaps.
I don't see that one complaint, since denounced as a forgery, represents
a problem that justifies changing the current setup, which is (AFAIK)
as described during the discussion period for the vote.

On 04 Nov 2009 Tony <tony@darkstorm.invalid> wrote in
news:hcsepd$aa6$1@news.eternal-september.org: 

> Isn't the moderation software able to tell what is and isn't a
> valid usenet posting?  It can dump all non-usenet post e-mails
> which would account for, I'm guessing, 99.9% of the spam to that
> address. 
> 

AIUI there is already no filtering on the submission address. All of 
this debate is regarding the contact address.

-- 
Graham Drabble
"Usenet is mostly just a geek entertainment system that far too many 
people try to pretend as some type of "real" value to society."
   Curt Welch - news.software.nntp

In uk.net.news.management, Graham Drabble  wrote:

>On 04 Nov 2009 Tony <tony@darkstorm.invalid> wrote in
>news:hcsepd$aa6$1@news.eternal-september.org: 
>
>> Isn't the moderation software able to tell what is and isn't a
>> valid usenet posting?  It can dump all non-usenet post e-mails
>> which would account for, I'm guessing, 99.9% of the spam to that
>> address. 
>> 
>
>AIUI there is already no filtering on the submission address. All of 
>this debate is regarding the contact address.

My mistake then, if that's the case.

-- 
Tony Evans
Saving trees and wasting electrons since 1993
blog -> http://perceptionistruth.com/
olmr -> http://www.onelinemoviereviews.co.uk/
[ anything below this line wasn't written by me ]

On 04 Nov 2009 16:33:15 +0000 (GMT), Eleanor Blair put finger to
keyboard and typed:

>Tony  wrote:
>>
>>Had Ian just turned down spam checking on the single usenet.org.uk e-mail
>>address there WOULD BE NO ISSUE.
>
>To be honest I agree with this.  But I do wonder how much spam we should
>expect the moderators to have to deal with before it is considered a
>problem and *some* sort of filtering is required.

I think it's perfectly reasonable to apply the same sort of spam
checking and filtering that any typical email user would (often by
default, as it's applied by their ISP or mail provider). It can even
be set a bit stricter than usual, since there's no reason why, for
example, anyone would have a legitimate reason to mail the contact
address with large attachments or embedded images. 

But that's all the more reason why Ian's position is indefensible.
He's insisting on using an outdated and ineffective form of
spam-blocking that is known to generate large numbers of false
positives while being easy for actual spammers to circumvent.
Obviously, if he wants to use an anti-spam system for his own personal
email that simply doesn't do a very good job of stopping spam and gets
his server blacklisted that's entirely his choice, perverse though it
may be. But the issue here is that he is insisting on applying it to
an email address that is provided for a functional purpose and where a
significant false-postive rate significantly diminishes the value of
that address to its users. In particular, among the many false
positives it generates are known to be emails from people who have a
genuine reason to want to be able to use it to contact the moderators.

It would be interesting to know how other members of the urcm
moderation team feel about this issue. They are, ultimately,
responsible for making the decision abut how their email is handled,
and I would hope that they're prepared to be use their collective
common sense and simply instruct Ian to switch it off.

Mark
-- 
Blog: http://mark.goodge.co.uk
Stuff: http://www.good-stuff.co.uk