Interesting People mailing list archives
IP: AOL Terms and Conditions -- Revealed!
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 14:49:31 -0400
Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 08:49:57 -0700 From: Rodney Joffe <rjoffe () centergate com> To: Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>, declan () well com Subject: [Fwd: AOL Terms and Conditions -- Revealed!] Hello Dave, and Declan, Alan Clegg, the "vitim", gave me permission to forward his email to you two.... This was posted to the public NANOG list yesterday evening. It provides an interesting insight into the way that AOL has evolved, and is evolving. Roughly speaking, AOL is setting rules for accepting and delivering email to subscribers, under the apparent guise of attempting to control spam. The mailing list company, at mailinglists.org, has a system in place to make sure that only legitimate subscriptions can be accepted. The system has no history of spamming or abuse at all. What is interesting here to me, is that were I an AOL subscriber (I am not), paying my normal subscription fee, I would still not be able to receive mail that I specifically wanted, requested, and authorised. Which really does lead one to believe that this could be seen as pretty real censorship. Of course, AOL has the right to do this, because AOL is not classified as a common carrier, and owns the network it runs. But it also apparently owns its users' mailboxes ;-). H'mmmmm. -- Rodney Joffe CenterGate Research Group, LLC. http://www.centergate.com "Technology so advanced, even we don't understand it!"
Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 21:57:43 -0400 From: Alan Clegg <alan () clegg com> To: nanog () merit edu Subject: AOL Terms and Conditions -- Revealed! Several people on this list responded to my prior queries about dealing with AOL and their black-hole "anti-spam" policy. I've been around and around with AOL, and have finally decided that I'm *NOT* going to agree to their 'terms'. With the agreement of my laywer, I've posted the terms to which I was being asked to agree. http://www.mailinglists.org/aol.html Have a nice weekend! AlanC -- Alan Clegg I do UNIX and Networks alan () clegg com I don't have any certification I have experience
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