On Apr 15, 2008, at 10:31 AM, William Herrin wrote:
On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 10:00 AM, Marshall Eubanks <tme@multicasttech.com> wrote:
On Apr 15, 2008, at 9:43 AM, William Herrin wrote:
That is one place that modern antispam efforts fall apart. It's the same problem that afflicts tech support in general. The problem exists for the same reason that large-city McDonalds workers don't speak English: Anyone with sufficient clue to run an abuse desk is well qualified for more interesting, important and higher-paid work where they don't get yelled at all the time. Like administering mail servers or writing mail software.
There's a reason we pay garbage collectors a small fortune to do a job that requires no skill whatsoever.
Do you _know_ any garbage collectors ? I do, and I would disagree with both clauses of that sentence.
Marshall,
No, but I know a few people who have (briefly) worked abuse desks and neither the tech support nor the McDonalds problem are difficult to observe.
Without conceding the garbage collection issue, let me ask you directly: how do you propose to motivate qualified folks to keep working the abuse desk?
That is a good question. (I feel sure that many actually doing the job would opt for a rise in pay.) Maybe certain jobs should become apprentice-like positions that you need to get through to rise in a networking organization. I know that Craig Newmark (of Craig's List) spends a couple of hours per day going through abuse complaints and user issues personally. I haven't heard too many complaints about Craig's List, and it seems reasonable to suspect a connection there. That has the advantage of being cheap to implement, in dollars if not in political capital. Regards Marshall
Regards, Bill Herrin
-- William D. Herrin ................ herrin@dirtside.com bill@herrin.us 3005 Crane Dr. ...................... Web: <http://bill.herrin.us/> Falls Church, VA 22042-3004