AOL wary of Comcast, Road Runner mail

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: Richard Forno <rforno () infowarrior org>
Date: Mon, 14 Apr 2003 10:50:21 -0400 (EDT)
To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Cc: ip <ip () v2 listbox com>
Subject: Re: [IP] AOL wary of Comcast, Road Runner mail


There's also a thread on Slashdot that says AOL is also blocking DSL -
both residential and business - mailservers that don't resolve to a "real"
public IP addy.  This News.Com article only emphasizes the "big broadband"
lines like cable providers, but doesn't say much on the DSL ISPs.

If you look at AOL's size, they're the major dialup provider for the Net.
Suddenly taking a page out of the Bush Doctrine and saying they're going
to pre-emptively block anyone they don't agree with from sending them mail
will only further balkanize the Net.  They can afford to block large
chunks of people -- but how many ISPs (or people) can willingly block all
AOL.COM mail if they choose? AOL is exercising it's pre-emptive perogative
as the Hyperpower of the Dial-Up net. Sure, spam is a huge problem, but I
think AOL's approach is a bit heavy-handed.

It's like your phone company saying because a drug dealer uses the same
dialing prefix as you do, it's going to cancel all incoming calls to that
prefix in an effort to reduce drug demand.

Are we moving to a Net where "You're either with AOL or a 'real' ISP, or
you're with the spammers"

I hope not - I'm not sure which is the lesser of the two evils.

rick
infowarrior.org


------ End of Forwarded Message

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