Educause Security Discussion mailing list archives
Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification
From: "Dennis Meharchand, CEO Valt.x" <dennis () VALTX COM>
Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2005 12:52:57 -0400
I am a vendor. Most every vendor understands the #1 rule of the forum - do not try to sell on the forum itself. The question is whether targeting a prospective sale by knowing of the need via the forum is acceptable or not. This is up to the members to decide and then modify the policy if necessary. Our company needs to know what the problems are so that we can go out and make the stuff to solve the problems. Not having access to the forum would be a significant drawback to our product development process. P.S. The person that started the barracuda spam discussion should get an award. -----Original Message----- From: Tom Bossie [mailto:tbossie () CITADEL COM] Sent: Friday, July 29, 2005 8:53 AM To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Let's face it; given the human factor you're always going to have those that honor the rules and those that take advantage of the situation. To be honest, this list-serv feels a little invasive in general. To anomalously listen to the various issues and problems, ignoring our nature to sell, is a daily temptation. And given the general business environment these days there is a strong tendency to exploit the available venues in competing for the available funds!(revenue) Like the song says: sales is a "sorry substitution for a spiritual life". I can appreciate the need to have a private (education only) forum, for all the obvious reasons. It sounds like these forums already exist from a previous posting. Your (Edu) comments are valuable to us (Vendor). Maybe Educause could publish the contents of the discussion strings sans the individual identities on a daily basis and allow a separate facility for response by vendors. Then you could decide to call the vendor directly at your discretion. Or create a vendor list-serv where your members could ask questions to the vendor community when and if they wish, using some sort of common alias to avoid the marketing backlash. I'm sure there is way to make it work, that's why we go to school! Tom Bossie Citadel Security Software -----Original Message----- From: Dave Koontz [mailto:dkoontz () MBC EDU] Sent: Thursday, July 28, 2005 6:29 PM To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification IMO this issue seems to be a little broader that than just a simple "List-Serve" issue. Shortly after I responded to an email on this list regarding our various problems with Cisco's Acquitition of Perfigo, I have been swamped with calls from various vendors. Since I did not post my direct phone number in my posting, these calls have all came through our main campus phone line, asking for me. As this is the only forum in which I've mentioned anything about this issue, it's pretty clear where these vendors got my contact information. While I agree that vendor input on issues and questions can be very valuable here, this list should not be used as a sales / marketing "Hit List". Jamie @ CBSI did the correct thing, Identified himself as a Vendor, attempted to answer our questions. It seems that there are many other vendors out there that are using this list soley as a marketing / sales lead tool. -----Original Message----- From: Information Security [mailto:infosecurity () UTPA EDU] Sent: Thursday, July 28, 2005 9:26 AM To: SECURITY () LISTSERV EDUCAUSE EDU Subject: Re: [SECURITY] Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Parker, Ron wrote:
Before we all bounce down this road about vendors on the list, remember
that EDUCAUSE's policies do allow it. I think it can be valuable in many cases.
Seconded. Let's save that argument until the day someone abuses the list. Jamie Stapleton's posts are generally helpful and worth reading, and it's clear from his email address he is a vendor. Not a problem to me. Let's return to the discussion of spam appliances... I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Brightmail yet - that's usually the one I hear when a company is programming-phobic and wants a managed solution. As far as I understand it, their approach is primarily spamtrap-based and they mark only mails that they've seen elsewhere in spamtraps. They have a good reputation but I worry that betting the farm on one technique is a long-term risk, as polymorphic and customised spams become more prevalent. I've already started receiving spams where some of the 'whitening' text was taken from my own web site, in order to get past my Bayesian filters. That's pretty sophisticated, and I have to wonder why the spammers bother, because if someone goes to the effort of installing a spam filter you might imagine that they'd never respond to spam even if it did slip through. Graham
Current thread:
- Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Parker, Ron (Jul 28)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Information Security (Jul 28)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Dave Koontz (Jul 28)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Sarah Stevens (Jul 28)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Tom Bossie (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Dennis Meharchand, CEO Valt.x (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Theresa M Rowe (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Jimmy L. Fikes (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification John Nunnally (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Jason Richardson (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Harry A'Hole (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Jason Richardson (Jul 29)
- Re: Vendor Participation on List and Proper Identification Parker, Ron (Aug 02)