Re: stag-digests, Krusty Problems

["Glenn A. Merrell" <gmerrel@domain.elided>]

PGAHOWELLS wrote:

> Having seen the letter from krusty, and failed to understand it, does it mean
> that this list is going to disappear?
> Does anyone know what his letter means to the non tech punter like me. I don't
> to write to him if he has 481 unreads to deal with.

Hello Peter and All,
SPAM, or unwanted e-mail postings, are a growing problem on the
internet.  SPAMMERS will bounce their junk e-mail across many e-mail
relay sites in order to disguise where the e-mail comes from.  This
makes blocking the unwanted e-mail almost impossible.

Let's look at what Richard has posted:

Richard Welty Wrote, in part:
>we will be upgrading the Mail Transport Agent on krusty sometime over the
>next several weeks

This is the e-mail handler for the digests, redirecting mail to Digest
subscribers,

>MAPS stands for Mail Abuse Protection System; RBL
>stands for Realtime  Blackhole List. sites which generate substantial spam
>and which don't appear to be making any genunine effort shut it down get
>added to the RBL

This is the database created of the "problem" accounts and internet
providers.
	What Richards e-mail means is that people who use an Internet Service
Provider (ISP) (yours Peter is America On-Line or AOL) or E-mail service
that he has been having SPAM junk e-mail complaints from for the mailing
list, will be effectively removed from the mailing list, because the web
postmaster fails to adequately police the junk e-mail to/from their
subscribers.  That includes...my account as my e-mail and ISP is Netcom,
and that is one of the ISP's that apparently Richard has had problems
with.  I also find it curious that Richard just anounced offering his
own ISP, e-mail and web hosting services a few months back, odd
coincidence?  Actually, I am also curious of what the list of "problem
sites" are, and how many are on the Stag digest list, or other auto
e-mail list members will be affected, forcing car digest e-mail users
off the digest lists.  	
	In defence of Richard, understandably, the lists are provided by solely
on Richard's good will, free of charge for now, but I seriously suspect
that there is a monitary motivation here in the long run.  That is, if
you want the e-mail digest service, pay for it!  This is rightly so,
because I am sure that Richard spends an inordinate amount of time
maintaining the lists for free.  So for now, since I am also an account
holder on AOL, I guess I'll need to resubscribe to the list via my AOL
account, for now.  Shame, AOL's Internet browser sucks.  If AOL is also
one of the problem sites, I'll need to download the daily postings from
directly from the Stag Digest, but I and others using ISP'S on Richards
list will not be able to contribute freely to the ongoing discussions
about Stags.
	If you recall back about 6 months, Richard was having some financial
woes with the transition to the new server computer, whereby some list
members sent contributions.  Another ongoing problem has been "problem
e-mails" going to people not wanting to receive the postings, and some
threatened to sue Richard
if he could not stop the posts to their e-mail.  Richard maintains many
car marque digest archives, and I am sure it is wearing on him,
evidenced by the 480+ e-mails waiting when he returned from holiday. 
I'd bet that many of them were from undeliverable accounts and web site
postmasters.
	So, end result is that if contributing members have ISP accounts that
are on Richards new "problem site list", they will be effectively
removed from the lists when Richard installs his new filtering
software.  End result is that the lists will eventually deminish to a
few contributors, because most all the major ISP suppliers have problems
with SPAM junk e-mail.

	Recommendations:
1- Richard, start a fee based e-mail for the service;
or,
2- All Stag list members, start an address book of every stag list
person you have corresponded with, make a new address "group" called
"staglist" or the like, and send all your Stag postings to the new
address group.  Problem here is that there is no central location for
new subscribers to join.
so,
3- maybe there is a Triumph Site...VTR, The Triumph Page, or the like
that will allow a database to be created with owners e-mail addresses
(or #4 below) that can be modified and downloaded by the user adding
information.  To slightly let the cat-out-of-the-bag and force my hand
at an early moment, I have been working with John Rammerman on
developing a Stag Demographic (being about 99% effort by John's effort,
1% management effort, mine) which will be a starting point to have a
Stag e-mail listing database, and lots of other car information and
links.  If VTR likes John's efforts, it will most likely reside on the
VTR site, and if not, possibly The Triumph Page by Thomas Jell.  I will
update Stag owners when this thing is completed testing, and has a home;
or
4- another web site takes over the Triumph and Stag Digests from
Richard, if he wishes to relinquish it.  Any takers??

In the end evaluation, thank you Richard, for maintaining the Stag
Digest over the years, and the 1 year plus that I have been a Stag
Digest Subscriber and active contriburor.  I think you have done a great
job maintaining the lists, and greatly appreciate your work.

One month...and counting...
Regards to all, and a Happy New Year!
Glenn Merrell