Jim Wise wrote:
> 
> No, of course not.  The point, however, is that mail service is a
> tradeoff.  In order to receive mail, you put your machine(s) on an
> international distributed network, an action which has advantages and
> disadvantages.  One of the disadvantages is that your machine is
> available for incoming mail from all over the world.  One of the main
> advantages is that your machine is available for incoming mail from all
> over the world.

If I send you 100 email messages per second, will your machine keep up?
Will I not cause you a denial of service, or theft of service.  Will you
not report me to the appropriate authorities?  Will I be "spamming" you,
or harassing you?  Where is the line drawn?  How many messages to I have
to receive before it becomes actionable?  Here in the US, it is not legal
for telemarketers to phone me between the hours of 9PM and 8:00AM, so
even one call is grounds for action.  Yet the spamatics can blast email
at me any time, all the time, with zero accountability for their actions.

> I hate spam, too.  I would love to take down my procmail filters and
> know that my inbox will not be obese by day's end.  I would love to
> regain the time I spend updating my spam filters.  What I would not love
> is to see the precedent established that local governments have the
> right to regulate what content can be exchanged over an international
> distributed medium.

Your procmail filters won't mean diddly when I point several DS3 attached
spam engines at you.  Will I be "abusing" something, or "harassing" you?
Of course not, I have a legal right to send you email?

-Andrew
-- 
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Andrew Gillham                            | This space left blank
gillham@whirlpool.com                     | inadvertently.
I speak for myself, not for my employer.  | Contact the publisher.