Interesting People mailing list archives
California Men's Gatherings - We've been BLACKLISTED!
From: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sun, 07 Sep 2003 20:26:50 -0400
Date: Sun, 07 Sep 2003 15:33:13 -0700 From: Thomas Leavitt <thomasleavitt () hotmail com> Subject: Fw: California Men's Gatherings - We've been BLACKLISTED! X-Originating-IP: [66.58.96.51] To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com> Cc: dave () farber netHere's another example of the negative effects of anti-spam enforcement efforts.Please note that the source of these emails was manual sign ups at community events,etc. (at least mine was), and that these emails were therefore "opt-in".And, of course, as these folks note, anyone using an AOL.com address will be prevented from using most of their web based functionality if they don't set up a free email address somewhereelse.I wonder how many times this happens every week, as small organizations who've laborously gathered contact information over many years for hundreds of folks attempt to transition to a more automated and professional system, and wind up getting caught up as collatoral damage in the anti-spam wars. I know of a local organization that tried the same thing, and wound up losing contact with 80%+ of their former subscribers. The result: anytime I suggest establishing a mailing list for contact with members, the veterans of that experience immediately oppose it.The integrity of the Internet is being severely damaged by these efforts.We need smarter solutions that meet the real need of people and organizations to communicate via email, and that are capable of distinguishing between spammers and folks like the CaliforniaMen's Gatherings. Regards, Thomas Leavitt ----- Original Message ----- From: <mailto:dandylyon () sbcglobal net>dandylyon To: <mailto:Dandylyon () gocougs wsu edu>Dandylyon () gocougs wsu edu Sent: Sunday, September 07, 2003 2:55 AM Subject: California Men's Gatherings - We've been BLACKLISTED! Dear Guys, Please read this post. If you don't, it is very likely the LAST time you will hear from CMG electronically and there are no plans to start snail mailing ya'll or to organize a massive telephone tree. NO action on your part NOW means you'll have to take the initiative to go to the CMG website or call the hotlines in future to find out what's happening with CMG. I suppose word of mouth is also a possiblity. The choice is, as always, my brothers, yours. We [the webmaster and I] recently transfered our monthly Newsy Male posting list to the automated Enotify System. The CMG virtual universe has grown too large to maintain it by hand (1,750+ subscribers). Many of you will NOT KNOW this change occurred because 1/3 of our out-going mail list has been BLOCKED from coming into that third's in-boxes. What we tried to do was send out a link to the September Newsy Male at the CMG website. That issue announces the Fall Gathering, told you about CMG events all over the state and had the usual "below the line" listings for other events. The link to the September Newsy Male is<http://www.thecmg.org/V2/newsletters/0903.asp>http://www.thecmg.org/V2/newsletters/0903.asp To find out about our beingblacklisted and what YOU need to do to continue receiving our posts, ALL of you need to read on from here for a bit. Again, this is our LAST post unless YOU ASK us to continue sending them to you. We assumed everyone who had been receiving email from us would want to continue to be on our list or they would follow the instructions and simply unsubscribe themselves if they didn't want to hear from us anymore. Apparently we were wrong. Due to [perhaps as few as] 3 people complaining to AOL, the 580+ AOL users we have in the database have been blocked from RECEIVING mail from the new CMG server (thecmg.com). Email "spam" is defined as "unsolicited e-mail of any type" and since ALL of you didn't sign up, we have spammed. We are bad, Evil, WICKED! We are tried, convicted and sentenced to exile in the virtual black hole of "PERMANENT FATAL ERROR". We have exausted our appeals [there really are none, zero, zip, nada]. The all-powerful AOL has spoken, "Sorry it didn't work out." Three strikes and we're out of AOL's pool. Worse, it could spread to other servers via blacklist sharing. AOL is 1/3 of our database, [OUCH!] but this AOL decision actually affects every one of us. Prithee, read on. To prevent us from being accused of spamming by the other servers we are starting again, this time from scratch. We have UNSUBSCRIBED EVERYONE. If you WANT to receive ANY e-mail at all from us then you must visit the link below and subscribe. You will be required to confirm the subscription from your computer before it is activated [we send a post out, you reply]. Go to the link provided below to subscribe.....UNLESS you are with AOL. You, my dears, have a very DIFFERENT task ahead. Read on just a WEE bit more.Visit this link to subscribe <http://www.thecmg.org/V2/settings.asp>http://www.thecmg.org/V2/settings.aspIf you are an AOL Victim, you will NOT BE ABLE to receive email from us and so be UNABLE to re-subscribe with CMG on AOL until AOL reverses their decision. Only YOU can contact AOL and tell them that you DO want to receive mail from us. We are unable to prove to them we are good, Pure and ENLIGHTENED [okay, not yet but working hard at it, dag nabbit!]. Perhaps testemony from some...many...most...all[?] of you will convince them. We suggest you continue to write AOL until this issue is resolved. It gets worse: Other CMG on-site features MAY OR MAY NOT be available to AOL Victims either. These include online registration/payment, contact forms, surveys and any other form based services that use your e-mail address. I am truly sorry about this. It is not CMG who's deciding you can't do these things. AOL is blocking our posts to you. If we can't post to you, you can't confirm back. This is a basic security issue. They aren't deciding what YOU WANT to see in your in-box but what they are WILLING to put there. Only YOU can explain to them how dreadfully wrong-headed they are. We are being censored, plain and simple. If it only takes 3 complaints to shut us down, you might expect that it wouldn't take so many more than 3 to reverse it. NOT SO. One of our members has had experience with AOL on this very matter: a non-profit that was AOL blacklisted. It took 3 months of that group's AOL subscribers writing to AOL to complain. Perhaps they have become more responsive since [wanna bet?]. You might plan to re-send your first post each time you visit the CMG site to look something up. You might make it a regular Saturday chore. You might make it a crusade and do it each time you check your email and find no notes from your brotherhood in your inbox. [You might not do it at all.] You MIGHT get another e-mail account altogether. Be sure and TELL them this last one, especially when you are CANCELLING your AOL. For some reason, they really do SEEM to CARE when you STOP sending them money once a month, for whatever reason. Three months from today is December 6th. What do you think will happen? Ben~Andy Data Diva [Volunteer CMG Database Manager]
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- California Men's Gatherings - We've been BLACKLISTED! Dave Farber (Sep 07)