Interesting People mailing list archives
IP: Results of SPAM Survey and Other Comments
From: David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 1995 10:26:16 -0400
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 1995 08:04:10 -0600 To: David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu> From: dhenson () 1eagle1 com (Don Henson)
Can I get your spam survey results
Here 'ya go. Results of SPAM Survey and Other Comments The word SPAM appears to me to be a word that is rather loosely bandied about. In some cases, it is applied to any message posted to a large number of newsgroups. In other cases, it is applied to a single article posted to a single newsgroup. Since spamming appears to be poorly defined, I decided to initiate a survey in an attempt to determine the common definition of a spam and the attitudes about spamming. As an interesting sidelight, three respondents told me in somewhat indignant terms that there was a definition of SPAM and proceeded to tell me what it was. All three definitions were different. I have been posting periodic ads (for a Munition (Perl/RSA) T-shirt) to several USENET newsgroups. One person got quite upset and articulate about 'unrepentent spammers'. Other than that one person, I received surprisingly few 'flames', requests to desist, or complaints to my internet service provider. Of the complaints received, none seemed to use the same definition of 'SPAM' although that was the term normally used in the complaints. I therefore decided to see if I could determine what most people meant when they used the term 'SPAM'. I selected eight of the newsgroups that I had been posting ads to and posted several questions for anyone interested to answer. I have listed the questions below for reference and have analyzed the results of this admittedly unscientific survey after the questions. If you have any comments about the survey or its results, you will have to let me know by email since I don't normally participate in this newsgroup. THE QUESTIONS 1. Do you consider this article to be a spam? (Notice that it is posted to eight newsgroups.) 1a. If yes, why and if no, why not? 2. If this article had been posted to 7000 newsgroups, would you have considered it to be a spam? 2a. How would you have known how many newsgroups it was posted to? 3. If this article contained an offer to sell you, say, a book on the Art of Motorcycle Repair, would you have considered it to be a spam? 3a. If yes, why and if no, why not? 4. If an article offering to sell a book on the Art of Motorcycle Repair was posted only to the newsgroup alt.motorcycle.repair, would you consider it to be a spam? 4a. If yes, why and if no, why not? 5. Do you consider it a reasonable action to 'mail bomb' a spammer's email address? 6. Do you consider it a reasonable action to complain to a spammer's internet service provider? 6a. If yes, what action would you expect the internet service provider to take? 7. Considering your own definition of spam, what is it about a spam that bothers you? COMMENTS: Use this space to make any comments you wish about spamming or spammers. Thank you for participating in this survey. THE NUMBERS Total Number Responding: 54 Question Nbr Yes No No Response & Yes ------------ --- --- ----------- ----- 1 19 32 3 35 2 52 0 2 96 3 8 42 4 15 4 2 49 3 4 5 15 37 2 28 6 51 0 3 94 RESULTS CONSIDERING SURVEY NUMBERS & COMMENTS ONLY Q1: Approximately 35% of respondents considered cross-posting to eight newsgroups a SPAM. This indicates that there is wide disagreement on what is and what is not a SPAM. The comments associated with this question indicates that most of the Yes responses consider a SPAM to be anything off-topic and a somewhat smaller number consider a SPAM to be any kind of 'commercial' posting whether it was relevent to the topic or not. One respondent indicated that a commercial posting to a SINGLE NEWSGROUP is a SPAM. Q2: There was almost universal agreement (96%) that posting to 7000 newsgroups constitutes a SPAM. However, there was considerable disagreement in the comments about _why_ this would be a SPAM. Most simply stated that the large number of postings made it a SPAM. Some went to great lengths to explain that it would be a SPAM only because it would be impossible to come up with a topic that was relevent to that many newsgroups, indicating to me at least that the number of newsgroups posted to is irrelevent according to their definition. A few indicated that while posting to 7000 newsgroups would be a SPAM under any conditions, it would be much worse if the posting was 'commercial'. Q3: Relatively few resondents (15%) seemed to think that posting a commercial ad to eight newsgroups constitutes a SPAM. However, many of the No responses went on to explain that while this would not be a SPAM, it would be objectionable either because it was off-topic or because it was 'commercial'. Q4: Only 4% thought that posting a single on-topic ad to a single newsgroup would be a SPAM. A few mentioned that it might be objectionable depending on the charter of the specific newsgroup. Q5: Sadly, over a quarter (28%) of the respondents thought it would be appropriate to 'mail-bomb' a spammer. Many of these people were the same ones who stated the reason they didn't like spams is that spams waste bandwidth. I did notice a strong correlation between No responses and those who seemed to be a systems adminstrator, postmaster, etc. (I would guess that these people have seen that mail-bombs hurt the system more than the object of the mail-bomb.) Q6: Again, there was almost universal agreement (94%) that complaining to a spammer's system adminstrator, postmaster, service provider, etc was an appropriate response to a spammer. Although not tabulated, comments indicated that most expect a system admin to warn once and then terminate the account of anyone accused of spamming. It also appeared from the comments, although not specifically stated, that a system adminstrator should accept the complaint without question and discipline the user immediately using what I would consider to be rather draconian measures. This could reflect the strong feelings about spamming or it could reflect an attitude of trying to force USENET to be what the complainer wants it to be regardless of what others want it to be. ANALYSIS OF COMMENTS NOT AMENABLE TO TABULATION (These are answers to 'free-ranging' questions where responses from different people would not necessarily address the same subject and thus would be difficult to tabulate.) I received an approximately equal number of requests to post the results to the survey and NOT to post the results. Many of the comments about why spam was bad revolved around spams costing the reader money, i.e., it costs me money to download the spam, wastes my time reading it, and wastes bandwidth of the system. The words 'crap' and 'junk' appeared frequently in these comments. It should be noted that what is or is not 'crap' or 'junk' will depend on individual personalities. Therefore, it would be very difficult to set up a system whereby you only receive what is going to be important to or will interest the individual subscriber. Some respondents indicated that actions such as mail-bombing and complaining to system admins would be appropriate because it would 'teach' the spammers that they couldn't 'profit' from the spam. Unfortunately, this is mostly counterproductive since most real spammers, as opposed to those unjustly accused of it, use fake return addresses or even other users return addresses so mail-bombing usually doesn't teach the spammer anything. DATA NOT CONSIDERED ABOVE (NOT FROM SURVEY) As I mentioned earlier, I have been placing ads on USENET for a Munition T-shirt. These ads were placed in newsgroups that I considered appropriate for the topic. There were a large number of these newsgroups. My technique was to post the ad to three newsgroups (using cross-posting) per day until I got thru the entire list. The daily postings would most definitely NOT be spam but the entire process over a period of several weeks would, technically, be spam since identical messages were posted to a large number of newsgroups. This information is appropriate to this survey analysis as follows. I advertised these t-shirts over a four month period. Except for several flames from a single individual (who sells similar t-shirts), I received fewer than a dozen complaints, notices of inappropriate topic, requests to stop, etc. In contrast to the complaints, I sold over 1500 t-shirts. Of course, not all of these sales were as a result of newsgroup advertising but let's assume that half were and to make the math simple, let's set the number of complaints at ten. This means that there were 75 times more positive responses to the ads than negative responses. I also advertised a different product to a different set of newsgroups. Similar results were obtained with one exception. I apparently misinterpreted the topic of one of the newsgroups. Within 48 hours of posting my ad, I had over a dozen messages from readers of that newsgroup that the topic was not appropriate. Since I was motivated by profit, it appeared obvious that continued posting to this newsgroup would not be profitable so I stopped posting my ad to that newsgroup. This would seem to indicate that the profit motive is a pretty good discriminator of what is or is not acceptable behaviour on the net. MY CONCLUSIONS The large number of positive responses to what I was doing with the t- shirt ads, described above, is a strong indicator that this is acceptable behaviour on the net. This stands in stark contrast to the conclusions that could be drawn from the survey data alone, i.e., that anything on the net that posts to a large number of newsgroups (large being a variable quantity) or anything that smacks of 'commericial advertising' is a big no-no on the net and likely to be met with serious countermeasures such as mail-bombing or complaints to system adminstrators. In contrast to what the reader is probably thinking right now, I am not presenting this survey analysis in an attempt to justify my actions. Rather, I am trying to point out that the culture of the USENET is changing. USENET is no longer a large semi-private computer bulletin board system with restricted access. (Access used to be restricted to those lucky enough to be in a job where USENET was available.) USENET is now an integral part of the overall internet and is easily accessible to people who have limited knowledge of computers and computer networks in general and USENET in particular. To them, seeing commercial advertising on USENET is a natural extension of what they are used to, namely, print and TV advertising. Don Henson, Managing Director (PGP Key ID = 0X03002DC9) West El Paso Information Network (WEPIN) email: wepinsto () colossus net Check out The WEPIN Store at URL: http://colossus.net/wepinsto/wshome.html
Current thread:
- IP: Results of SPAM Survey and Other Comments David Farber (Oct 23)