How to handle spamtraps
27 February 2020
So, you’ve discovered that your customer has an issue with spamtraps on a mailing list. What do you do now? As a rule, spamtraps end up on a list due to problems with permission or hygiene. No, that’s not exclusive of other things, nor is it necessarily an indication that policies have been violated. But,
Spamtraps are not the problem
24 February 2020
When you go to the doctor, do you want the doctor to treat your symptoms or do you want the doctor to give you treatment for the disease that is causing the symptoms? If you’re like most people, the answer will be “I want the doctor to treat the disease.” In my line of work,
What is a spamtrap?
10 February 2020
One of the issues that I get to deal with in policy enforcement is handling complaints about customers sending messages to “spamtraps.” This invariably leads to a discussion about what, exactly, is a spamtrap? There are a lot of different answers out there. For instance, a 2019 blog post at Validity asserts that it is
Mental Health on Teams
6 February 2020
Did you know that “burnout” is coming to the ICD-11 (due to be released in June 2022)? It’s true. Burnout will be recognized as an occupational syndrome resulting from work-related stress. Burn-out is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. It is characterized by three dimensions: feelings
Enforcement is therapeutic
3 February 2020
Policies exist for a reason. For instance, most email service providers have a policy forbidding the use of non-opt-in lists. Those policies exist because of statements like this one: Microsoft prohibits the use of the service in any manner associated with the transmission, distribution, or delivery of any unsolicited bulk or unsolicited commercial e-mail (“spam”). You
Laws Still Apply to Bad Ideas
30 January 2020
On Monday, I posted that “[acp title=”Forcing Consent Is A Bad Idea” medium=”blog” url=”https://www.spamtacular.com/2020/01/27/forcing-consent-is-a-bad-idea/” year=”2020″ month=”January” day=”27″ author=”Mickey Chandler” id=”me-02″ day_access=”29″ month_access=”January” year_access=”2020″]{title}[/acp]”. The point was to tell say that, regardless of legal issues, there are very practical reasons in favor of setting a policy of not trying to force consent. But, just because there
Forcing Consent Is A Bad Idea
27 January 2020
We previously asked the question “who is your program for?” The idea behind that post was to briefly examine the idea that we make decisions for our programs that are based upon whom we have in mind to benefit. One example that I mentioned to show an incorrect focus was “We’ll require someone to register
Oklahoma does … something?
23 January 2020
On January 13, 2020, the Oklahoma House received a nonsense bill. Rep. Collin Walke, Oklahoma E-Mail Communication Content Privacy Protection Act, (2020). This bill is intended to “make it illegal for companies, like Google or Microsoft, that host email servers to glean information from users.” Collin Walke, Facebook Post, Facebook (2020), https://www.facebook.com/Walkefor87/posts/2657786940984444 (last visited Jan
Who is your program for?
21 January 2020
When designing something, one of the things which have to be done first is to consider what the purpose of the thing is. Many design decisions are based upon a consideration of whom the program is intended to benefit. Some decisions will seem to benefit both parties. “If people will give us their email addresses,
Tone Matters
13 January 2020
There is more to the story of Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis than merely learning that people will discount the possibility that they are, in fact, responsible for things that happen because they believe themselves to be above reproach. Another important part of the story is how Dr. Semmelweis responded to criticism. To put things mildly and