----- Original Message ----- From: "Barry Shein" <bzs@world.std.com> To: <stefan@csudsu.com> Cc: "Suresh Ramasubramanian" <ops.lists@gmail.com>; "Micheal Patterson" <micheal@spmedicalgroup.com>; <nanog@nanog.org> Sent: Wednesday, February 25, 2009 11:58 AM Subject: Re: Yahoo and their mail filters..
On February 25, 2009 at 04:26 stefan@csudsu.com (Stefan Molnar) wrote:
For our userbase with yahoo/hotmail/aol accouts they hit the spam button more often than delete. Then complain they do not get emails anymore from us, then want discounts on a bill of sale they missed. It is a never ending story.
I realize this is easier in theory than practice but I wonder how much better the whole AOL (et al) spam button would get if they ignored the spam button unless two (to pick a number) different customers clicked the same sender (I know, forged sender etc but something like that) as spam in a reasonably short amount of time like an hour or a day at most.
I know of the 99.99% false positives I get I am pretty sure if the threshold were two related complaints it'd get rid of, well, probably 99.99% of them (percentages not scientifically accurate!)
Ok, that's not an algorithm but I hope you see my point.
My point is that what makes spam "spam" is not that some one clicks a spam button, it's that more than one person, and just two might be a sufficient threshold in practice, believes it's spam. At least from the POV of a network operator trying to id spam sources from spam button clicks.
If they ever get it down to fretting about spams really sent to only one AOL (et al) customer then one could revisit this idea.
Barry, there's also the honest accidental emailings that are being clicked as spam as well. In the days of old, spam was unsolicited bulk email. The problem that I see currently is what is Sally in Florida is sending mail to joe@thisdomain.com, hosted by yahoo, when they should have sent it to jjoe@thisdomain.com or joel@thisdomain.com and the recipient clicks it as spam. Bam, Sally's now a spammer in the eyes of yahoo. This is not much different in practice than what Spews used to do. Blow out an entire /16 to stop what they "percieved" as spam from someone deep in the trenches, without very little recourse to remove yourself from the axe path unless you switched providers. -- Micheal Patterson