[In the message entitled "Black Hole Vixie/RBL" on Jun 21, 22:11, Bob Allisat writes:]

+ we got. Because blackholing NSI would be of operational concern to a + lot of you, I've decided to ponder this question out loud: + + >Technically, this is an opt-out customer-relationship spam. + > + > I think it is a special case, because _there is no where else to go_. + > + > 208.226.58.70 should be RBL'ed, IMHO. Help me.

I've taken the liberty of upgrading Bob's comments from the VIC-20 40 column standard. People taking a position on these comments should read http://www.fcn.net, and http://maps.vix.com/rbl before assesing his (or my) views.

Mr. Vixie and his cohorts increasingly imagine themselves to be the final and ultimate arbiters in matters of Network integrity. Having them sit in judgement over the Black Holing of successive and alleged perpetrators violates numerous protections and freedoms all citizens

Citizens implies affiliation with some political area. The Internet isn't affiliated with any one polical area, as far as I can see. With any freedom, comes responsibilty. If there is no responsibility or accountability, freedom quickly turns to disaster. Anyone with children quickly recognizies that. If not Paul sitting in judgement, then who? No one else has stepped forward. No tribunal in Sri Lanka will get any attention of ISPs in Seattle. No commitee-of-5 in Boise will get the attention of a spam farm in Israel. The RBL has a narrow focus. Stopping email spammers. It doesn't care about what kind of spam. It doesn't blackhole "people that Paul doesn't like". It doesn't blackhole competitors of networks that use the RBL. It doesn't blackhole ISP's that don't express distaste for the RBL. And it doesn't blackhole the "Anti-RBL" web pages. It blackholes spammers, and spam support services. And before it does this, it attempts to engage in meaningful dialog with these firms. The RBL is effective _precisely_ due to these facts. If it were not so, it would not be in such wide use. People can _easily_ test this, and do, on a regular basis. If it started blackholing sites based on other criteria, it would quickly be dropped by networks and sites using it, and would lose its effectiveness. And there is _no doubt_ as to its effectiveness. It has caused a policy change _towards people that spam_ on a large number of networks. It has raised the level of awareness about open relays. It has helped people to secure their sites. It has protected networks from large volumes of spam. And _it is painful to be on the RBL_. Which is why everyone involved in the RBL project is very careful about researching sites, and demanding sufficient documentation prior to recommending a site to be RBLed. Some cases are obvious. Some are borderline. Some are just too hard for anyone to figure out, which is why, for the first time ever, Paul went to the public for opinions of everyone.

It is my opinion that these activities have reached their zenith and something should be done to finally Black Hole Vixie/RBL should they continue on their renegade mission of uncontrolled and arbitrary censorship.

Renegade? Perhaps. Uncontrolled an arbitrary censorship? I don't think so. No site is ever listed on the RBL unless it is participating in UCE/SPAM. No network is forced - ever - to use the RBL. They use it _because it works_.

Maybe it is time to pull the plug on the ultimate plug pullers, black hole the black holers!

Too late. A few months ago, Paul listed maps.vix.com on the RBL himself :-) Took about 18 hours for us to notice, and remove the listing :-) -- Dave Rand dlr@bungi.com http://www.bungi.com