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Then there is email spam. When the Internet began to explode in 1994, so did the volume of unsolicited commercial email...endless pitches for MLMs (Multi Level Marketing, a variation of the classic pyramid scam), get-rich-quick-while-working-out-of-your-home "businesses," and porn sites to fit every taste known to mammalian science. Soon there was an outcry from the wired public to somehow rein-in this mostly (but not entirely) unwanted traffic. The main effort, led by ISPs who bore the brunt of handling all this traffic, was to attempt to shift the cost of distributing spam to the spammers themselves, rather than being borne by the ISPs...lowering costs being a natural desire for any business. A recent Infoworld article shows that, by advocating the use of spam for political purposes, we are swimming against a serious tide. No fewer than 60% of Netizens feel that "something has got to be done" about spam.

The purpose of this column is not to go into detail about the many schemes that have been proposed to deal with spam, as we have covered them in other columns (Punishing the victims!, Punishing the victims! - II, Spam, The Thought Gestapo Is At It Again!). There is one, however, that continues to dog us...namely, the Black Hole List, a blacklist of "notorious spammers" which is used by cooperating ISPs to block or impede email traffic from the domains hosting the spammers.

Recently, in an effort to increase the exposure of this column, we sent out a total of 1600 sample columns to a carefully targeted audience whose email addresses were obtained from mailto's (those popup forms for sending feedback on Web sites) on Web sites returned from a Lycos search on the keywords "libertarian," "liberty" and "freedom." Indeed, many of you who are reading this very column got your first exposure to our writing in this way! We reasoned that those who published their email addresses in sites keyworded with these terms MIGHT like what we have to say. Or, at any rate, they would not object to our choosing this method to try to get their attention.

It seems, however, that the "definition" of spam used by these morons has expanded to include "any unwanted email"...a far cry from the "unsolicited commercial email" definition accepted by most anti-spammers. This means that ANYONE, having decided EX POST FACTO, that he or she did not like something you sent, can "report you" to the "authorities"...in this case, these self-selected guardians of the Internet.

Nor did our efforts fail to arouse the weasels. Since the Black Hole people consider themselves "Freedom Fighters"...in the grand tradition of all groups resorting to terrorist tactics...many of these noble warriors were included in the search for compatible readers. So, they snitched us off...or, at least a few of them did. Like all terrorist organizations, the Black Hole List people NEED informants. Otherwise, how would they know who the enemy is? Since Biblical times, when Judas Iscariot set the standard for treachery, to the Sonderkommandos who pointed out the homes of Jews to Nazi Storm Troopers during WW II in occupied Poland, to street informers catching light sentences or eliminating drug-dealing competition by turning in their "colleagues"...informing has a long, if not glorious, tradition.

The long and short of it is that some ISPs around the world are blocking access to both our email and our Web site. While this has barely affected our traffic, it has produced an annoying situation. Vivian Rose, the second Teen Movie Critic is unable to directly email her reviews to us or to view the results on the Web, because her email host...IPA in Arkansas...is a "cooperating" techno-thug. This means she has to send her writing via a third...unblocked...party.

Now, as we have pointed out, the central justification for this blockage is that ISPs OWN the Internet and can do whatever they choose to traffic on "the last mile"...that is, to those accounts within their domain. Now, if nothing else, this assertion proves that these people are dumb as rocks, no matter how sophisticated they may be technically. For, as anyone can plainly see, the policy of ANY ISP being able to block ANY other ISP for ANY reason at ANY time, would completely destroy the Net were it to become an accepted principle. Also, if the Big Boys, like AOL or Microsoft were to adopt this tactic, they could quickly bring these fellows into line. But, why should they? "Let's you and him fight" is a perfect strategy for the elimination of small ISPs on the Net!

Meanwhile, the spam that these bozos CLAIM they are trying to eliminate continues unabated. While we were sending protests to various news organization of the action taken against us...by the way, none of whom picked up on it...we had occasion to visit the New York Times Web site. We did NOT send our protest to them, because we couldn't find an appropriate mailto. What did happen, however, was that within four hours, we had received TWO spams from the New York Times! And, this was without our knowledge or consent...only our visit to their Web site was enough to start their spam engine running.

So, even though we are currently bucking trends by calling for legal protection of email...ALL email...we feel that this issue is a HUGE potential problem for the Internet and important enough to speak of it even in the absence of much public support. We...all of us...have to decide whether...or rather, HOW LONG...to tolerate vigilante "justice" on the Net.

As the Net internationalizes...it will have a majority of non-US members within a year or two...we Yankees, with our tradition of absolute freedom of speech, are going to have to face up to the fact that MOST nations do not share this obsession. Countries like China, Korea, Iraq and Iran are already making huge investments in trying to block unwanted Net traffic from their citizens. We think that the United States...and probably the world...has a vitally important task of seeing that they do not succeed.

Why not start, with legal protection of U.S. law, an international registry of email addresses along with the spam "preferences" of the owner of the address? Make it a serious crime, punishable by fines, both to send unsolicited email of a particular type to anyone who has indicated, in advance, that they do not want it...AND for anyone who attempts to block or otherwise impede delivery of ANY email.

This solution should satisfy both the spammers and the spammees. Those that wish NO unsolicited email could say so and receive none, since their preference would have been published. Spammers would have absolutely no incentive to violate this law, since what is the point of sending email to those who will be made angry by it and will neither read it nor respond to its message?

Finally, what if we do not set up such a system? Here is our greatest fear. Historically, one of the favorite strategies of new political formations has been to leaflet people on the street laying out their...usually radical...political proposals. Ever since the invention of the printing press, this technique has been successfully used to instigate much needed political reform all over the world. Without it, the Protestant reformation would probably never have happened, and, with Tom Paine, et al, silenced by any effective ban on leafleting, we might still be a British colony!

Political spam, especially spam targeted to possibly sympathetic people, is the "leafleting" of the Internet. If spam is blocked by arbitrary actions of pissants like the Black Hole people...or worse, by general acceptance of their "principles"...then this truly amazing and revolutionary tool of political action will have been silenced. This could NOT be good news to any libertarian, even the Black Hole dumdums.

Being optimists, we think that the Internet, especially the American segment of it, will eventually wake up to this and take steps to spread the American "way" rather than impede it. Furthermore, as citizens of other nations begin to feel the positive effects of freedom of speech, they will assist to spread the word. In the meantime, we urge you to spam this column. That is, send a copy of it to everyone on YOUR mailing list.

What's that you say? That wouldn't really be spam, since these are your friends and family! Depends who you talk to...

Talk to you later...

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