Bulk Email, Spam and Email Marketing

This issue focuses on the effective use of email lists and bulk email for website and business promotion. Bulk email essentially consists of sending the same message to some number of recipients at the same time.
Excerpted from PlanetLink's Enews - an email newsletter delivered for FREE to your computer. To subscribe, go to www.planetlink.com

This issue focuses on the effective use of email lists and bulk email for website and business promotion. Bulk email essentially consists of sending the same message to some number of recipients at the same time. Spam is characterized as sending bulk mail to recipients whom you have had no prior contact or permission.

The issue of whether or not to send Spam can be summed up in three words - "don't do it." While it's not currently illegal under Federal law, (although sending bulk non-approved faxes is), it is generally not permitted by Internet Service Providers under their "terms of service" agreement (PlanetLink's terms of service can be found at http://www.planetlink.com/policy.html). Most ISPs will issue a warning on the first occurrence and cancel a client's service on the second. The reason for zero tolerance is that while the responsible party can literally send millions of messages almost for free, the costs associated with sending, delivering and receiving spam are incurred by the recipient whose time is spent processing unwanted mail as well as the ISPs that transport and store email. A recent European Commission report found that the world wide cost is $9.36 billion per year.

The other reasons for not sending Spam are the impact it has on the reputation of the company and the risk of interruption or cancellation of service. The other issue of importance for ISPs whose client's repeatedly send spam is that mail sent from their network can be blocked by other ISPs trying to stop spam from reaching their clients; potentially affecting thousands of customers. Under California Bus. & Prof. Code Section 17538.45, sending spam through a mail server based in California is illegal and allows for damages of $50 per message.

So, if we can't send Spam, what can we us bulk email for?

Bulk email is great tool for keeping in touch with your clients and customers, sending newsletters, service messages, announcing special offers and more. It can also be used to keep in contact with prospects on an ongoing basis and is an effective sales tool for generating new business. Systems can be implemented that make it easy to send automated messages on a regular basis. Systems can also be implemented which make it easy for visitors to subscribe to your list. Subscriber management features also make it easy for you to add, delete, schedule and send messages as required.

PlanetLink can assist you in setting up an effective email list system for your business and can implement anything from a fully automated system to a manual system. For more information, call us at 415-884-2022 or email info@planetlink.com.

Important Tips:

Create an opt-in email list on your website.

Don't buy a database of email addresses and send them bulk email - this is Spam.

Spam can be reported to http://www.spamcop.net.

Collect email addresses on a "sign up sheet" at public events, trade shows and presentations. Let them know on the form that they will be added to your email list and give them a check box to confirm their participation.

If you send bulk email to your list, make it easy for them to unsubscribe.

In the bulk message that you send, remind them of how and/or why they are on your list.

Be sensitive to your list - people are busy and they get lots of email.

Steve Lillo author of Websites That Work! is the President of PlanetLink, a website design and consulting firm which specializes in creating websites which get results. They also provide their Web Rx Service for increasing the effectiveness of existing websites. PlanetLink can be reached at http://www.planetlink.com or by telephone at 415-884-2022.

How To Fight Spam

HOW TO FIGHT SPAM
(AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR INBOX) BY BB LEE (C)2002

(600 words)

Spammers send out thousands of emails per day. They know most of the emails will be deleted but for every thousand they know one sucker will bite.

The result, your email account will overflow with hundreds of unwanted emails from strange marketers. Consequently, legitimate business email will get lost in the junk.

What is Spam?
Spam(Junk Mail) is the mass distribution of unsolicited email across the Internet by certain unscrupulous marketers. Why do they choose this marketing tactic over others? Email is a cheap way to reach a large market.

Problems arise when these unethical spammers bombard accounts with their unsolicited sales literature. Most of their junk is blatant sales pitches for worthless garbage. In fact, most of their crappy stuff can be categorized as deceptive, fraudulent, get rich quick schemes, porno garbage, chain letters or MLM scams.

Hit And Run Tactics.
Once a spammer gets your email address on a hot list you'll get hundreds of junk emails per day. This will make it difficult for you to separate legitimate emails from the spam. Believe me, complaining does not work. Most spammers supply a fake return e-mail address. Spammers also use FREE trial ISP accounts. Like the one's offered by AOL. Once they've used up the free trial they are on the run to another ISP.

Unsubscribing Tactics.
Never click the unsubscribe link contained in their emails. Clicking the link will verify that your email address is legitimate and active. Thus, leading to even more unsolicited emails. Okay. This sounds tricky and unethical. Of course! Spammers are liars!

Who Pays For Spam.
You, the consumer. And your ISP. The average consumer spends 7 seconds reading or rejecting spam. Multiply this by hundreds per day, adding up to thousands per month. This takes a big chunk out of your Online time. And the price you pay for your ISP service. AOL complained of receiving over 1.8 million spams from one spammer per day until they filed a court injunction to stop the spam attacks. But not before causing thousands of consumer complaints.

Fight Spam.
Here are ways to fight spam.

-Close all the spammed email accounts. Set up new accounts and be very careful who you give your main email address to.

-Set up filters to direct the spam directly to the trash folder. Read your email program help files for complete instructions.

-Open Junk Mail Accounts. These are accounts specifically set up for unsolicited emails. Use these accounts when advertising at FFA's, Free Classifieds, or when an unfamiliar website ask for your email address.

-Report spammers. Spammers are tricky. Many spammers supply fake return addresses. But it is worth a try.

Report spammers.
http://www.SpamCop.net

Spam Abuse.
http://www.spam.abuse.net

Spam laws.
http://www.Cauce.org

-Use special software to fight spammers. This is a good idea. Here are popular spam fighting software.

SpamPal (freeware)
http://www.spampal.org.uk/

Mailwasher (freeware)
http://www.mailwasher.net

What Not To Do.

-Don't spam the spammer. Don't sink to their level. -Never threaten violence. This could get you in big trouble. -Don't hack into their site. Need I say more. -Don't try other illegal tactics. Stay cool.

==================================================================

BB Lee is Editor/Publisher of SmallBizBit's Free Home Biz Newsletter. Subscribers to SmallBizBit's get free ads for their business on the website. Great startup ideas, free articles, free ebooks, free tips in the newsletter. Subscribe:mailto:Smallbiz-subscribe@topica.com
Visit:http://www.angelfire.com/zine/smallbiz ====================================================================

BB Lee is editor/publisher of SmallBizBits Home Business Newsletter. And a published writer.

Spam: Hiding Your Email Address

In many instances you will want to put your email address on your
website, even if you provide a form as a contact method. This is
useful because it increases the number of ways that someone can
contact you. Why is that important? Because presumably if you have a
website you are attempting to communicate with the world - and
communication goes both ways. If you have a commercial site then the
answer should be obvious - someone may want to purchase something.

Another reason to put an email address directly on your web page is
for people to request information via autoresponder. These allow your
visitors to click a simple mailto link and get your promotional
materials or articles in their email inbox.

The problem with directly including your email addresses on your page
is spam harvesters. These a programs created by scum and run by
ignorant or unethical fools. What they do is search through the
internet, looking at web sites and pages for email addresses to add
to those million email address collections that you see advertised
(mostly in spam) all over the place.

There is really no ironclad way to prevent these bottom-feeders from
scanning your web site for email addresses. There are a number of
techniques, however, to make it a little more difficult for them.

One of these is to code your email addresses in something called
Unicode. This is a "language" for encoding special characters on web
pages. All modern browsers support Unicode as it's primary intention
is to allow languages all over the planet to be represented.

For example, the following email address:

webmaster@internet-tips.net

will be shown in Unicode as:

webmaster
@internet
-tips.net

As you can see from the table below, using Unicode characters is
simple. Just substitute the Unicode sequence in the table for the
corresponding character. Then use all of those sequences wherever you
want to put that email address.

@ @ E E M M U U c c k k s s
. . F F N N V V d d l l t t
- - G G O O W W e e m m u u
_ _ H H P P X X f f n n v v
A A I I Q Q Y Y g g o o w w
B B J J R R Z Z h h p p x x
C C K K S S a a i i q q y y
D D L L T T b b j j r r z z

I suppose it is inevitable that the scum spammers will eventually
make their spam robots smart enough to understand these codes. Until
then, however, it is a reasonably effective technique for reducing
spam in your inbox.

Richard Lowe Jr. is the webmaster of Internet Tips And Secrets at
http://www.internet-tips.net - Visit our website any time to readover
1,000 complete FREE articles about how to improve your internet profits,
enjoyment and knowledge.

Spam Hysteria

Let me start this article by stating I am vehemently opposed to spam and that it is the worst possible way to get your message out. Various groups have been trying to stop spam since it was first used on the internet. However, how can we stop or outlaw something which has never been clearly defined.

I have been unable to find a universally accepted, fits-all definition of spam. There are many ideas about spam and just what it really is. In my opinion it is receiving unsolicited email (email which you have not opted to receive). Even this definition must be applied judiciously and with a certain amount of common sense.

For example, a dear friend could forward an email which you find offensive. Should you be in a bad mood, you could report your friend for spam (and also the originator of the email your friend forwarded, even though it was not the originator's intent for you to receive this unsolicited email). In this situation the originator (who is innocent of wrongdoing) and your friend will most likely lose their ISP and web host provider simply because you are having a bad day. Is this fair?

More and more ezine publishers and article writers are being accused of spam and forced to fight their ISPs and web host providers. Many of these spam complaints are totally unfounded. In some cases it is because a person forgot they subscribed to the ezine and when they receive it they say they have been spammed. In other cases the person has written an article which was published in an ezine accused of spamming. Here all the advertisers and the article writers are accused of spam and lose their ISPs and web host providers.

These advertisers and article writers did not commit the offense of spamming. They were accused by association. Most articles written for the internet are free for publication, which means anyone can use them as long as the articles and resource boxes remain intact. Unless the writer is being paid for the article, there is no way of knowing when, how or by whom the article will be published.

The truly unfair method currently used to fight spam considers everyone accused of spam to be automatically guilty. The great majority of ISPs and web host providers shut you down without a second thought when you are accused of spam.

You are not given a chance to prove your innocence. Guilty or not, you are shut down. For most of those trying to make a profit on the internet, this is a sword hanging over their heads. Every time they write an article for publication or send out an ezine they are taking the chance of being unfairly accused of spamming.

No ezine publisher or writer in their right mind would ever consider the use of spam. Their livelihood depends on their ezines and articles, so why would they use something which would destroy that source of income?

Those who use spam as the method of getting their advertisements out should be stopped. But not by taking all the innocent people down with them.

True spam is usually fairly easy to spot. There is a bogus return address consisting of nonsensical numbers and letters, either no way is provided to remove yourself from the list or a bogus address is provided as a means of removing yourself from the list, there is a footer in the message which contains a supposed act of the United States Congress defining spam, or other such obvious items.

99.9% of the ezines I have read have a clear and easy way to unsubscribe. Should you use the link and find you have not been unsubscribed, it is possible you subscribed using another email address which is being forwarded to your current address. The ezine publisher cannot unsubscribe you without the original address from which you subscribed.

If you are really upset by spam, why not concentrate on those who are truly guilty of spamming, and not the innocents. Use your efforts to punish the guilty instead of indiscriminately crying spam every time a piece of email hits your inbox.

As an ezine publisher I get a great deal of spam in my inboxes. Rather than waste my precious time trying to track spammers down or reporting them to Spam Cop, I use my delete button. It is efficient and deadly. The spam is gone as soon as I hit delete.

One of the truly great characteristics of the internet is its use for the free exchange of information. This freedom is being seriously challenged by those who believe in the indiscriminate use of Spam Cop or other such anti-spam organizations.

I can't speak for you, but I get a great deal of information, education and entertainment from the many ezines to which I subscribe. It would be a severe loss if they all quit publishing because of the fear of false spam accusals shutting them down.

In conclusion, spam should be stopped. However, it must be stopped with common sense and discrimination, not with a vigilante mentality. Being accused of spamming is one of the rare instances in current human history where you are considered guilty until proven innocent.

Whatever happened to the concept of innocent until proven guilty?

Should anyone out there in cyberspace have a universally acceptable definition of spam and a means of fairly and judiciously enforcing it, I am extremely interested in your viewpoints.

Robert Taylor
Subscribe to the Key To Success And Wealth ezine. All new subscribers receive a fantastic ebook valued at $38.50. Subscribe by mailto:subscribe@keytosuccessandwealth.com Please place first name in body of email. Send comments to mailto:info@incomesolved.com

SPAM Laws of 2001A.T.Rendon

For a law to take effect on the U.S. federal level, both the House and the Senate must pass the bill and then the President of the United States must sign the bill into law.

Last year we almost got a SPAM law on the books when House legislators approved their version of the SPAM bill, H. R. 3113, the "The Unsolicited Commercial Electronic Mail Act of 2000", with a vote of 427-1.

However, it never came close to becoming law because the Senate never even voted on it.

This year, there are already several attempts being made to place SPAM under the law.

The most recognized is known as bill HR 95, which is a re-introduction of H. R. 3113 from last year and is named: "To protect individuals, families, and Internet service providers from unsolicited and unwanted electronic mail." http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d107:h.r.00095:

A SUMMARY AS OF:
1/3/2001--Introduced.

"Unsolicited Commercial Electronic Mail Act of 2001 - Amends the Federal criminal code to provide criminal penalties for intentionally initiating the transmission of any unsolicited commercial electronic mail message (message) to a protected computer in the United States with the knowledge that any domain name or other initiator identifying information contained in or accompanying such message is false or inaccurate.

Prohibits any person from sending such a message unless the message contains a valid e-mail address, conspicuously displayed, to which a recipient may send notice of a desire not to receive further messages.

Makes it unlawful for a person to initiate the transmission of such a message in violation of a policy regarding unsolicited commercial e-mail messages that complies with specified requirements, including requirements for notice and public availability of such policy and for an opportunity for subscribers to opt not receive such messages.

Directs the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to notify violators under this Act, to prohibit further initiation of such messages, and to require the initiator to delete the names and e-mail addresses of the recipients and providers from all mailing lists.

Provides a right of action by a recipient or provider against e-mail initiators who violate the above requirements. "

As bill HR 95 stands right now, it is not expected to pass vote in the House for two reasons, even though the language of the bill is exactly the same as that passed last year in a vote of 427-1:

First, because of the language that allows for a one-time email to be sent so long as a valid return email address is provided by the sender and the sender removes anyone the so requests to be removed from that mailing list.

Although this is the same exact language that was included in the bill that passed the House last year, many SPAM fanatics are raising objections to its' inclusion in the bill this year.

Second, is the language in the last paragraph that would allow a "right of action by a recipient or provider", the problem being that the law would allow Internet Service Providers, ISP's, to file for monetary damages against spammers to the tune of $500 per email sent or $50,000 per mailing incident.

Opponents argue that ISP's would be filing against anyone that might be accused of SPAM, guilty or not, in hopes of reaping big financial gains.

Considering how SPAM compalints are often handled these days with innocent people having their services terminated or web site shut down without even having allegations of SPAM investigated, perhaps there is reason for such fears of abuse.

A search of both the Senate, http://www.senate.gov/ and the House, http://thomas.loc.gov/ found only the following under The keyword "Spam":

Two other bills introduced in the House are:

1. Wireless Telephone Spam Protection Act - H.R.113 : http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c107:1:./temp/~c107WLOF59::

2. Anti-Spamming Act of 2001 - H.R. 1017: This Act may be cited as the `Anti-Spamming Act of 2001' http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c107:2:./temp/~c107WLOF59::

Rep. Gene Green, from the 29th District in Texas and is the sponsor of HR 95, so if you wish to make any suggestions or comments on the proposed Spam Law, he can be reached by any of the following:

HON. GENE GREEN
2335 Rayburn HOB
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-1688
Fax: (202) 225-9903

HON. GENE GREEN
256 N. Sam Houston Pkwy. E., Suite 29 Houston, TX 77060
(281) 999-5879
Fax: (281) 999-5716

If you would like to send him an email, you may do so by visiting his official web site at: http://www.house.gov/green/ and filling out the supplied form.

A.T.Rendon is an entrepreneur and published writer. Subscribe to FREE Business Classifieds Newsletter & receive FREE online access to our Password Protected "FREE Submit To Over 1 MILLION FREE Ad Sites!" mailto:subscribe_fbcn9@emailexchange.org Visit us at: http://emailexchange.org/?articles

Spam Not

"Spam not, lest ye be spammed." ~Mari Peckham

Just yesterday, I received over 40,000 emails from a person who had harvested a contact email address from one of my websites. The person may or may not have personally secured my email address, but since I use it only to receive email feedback from my website and never to send mail, I know that it was a harvested address. Because of the nature of my use of this email address, I also have a "Thank you for contacting us." autoresponder message in place there.

My server was mad at me. My entire system was mad at me. I couldn't conduct my normal business and send out email that needed to be sent out, because my computer was hard at work downloading email upon email.

How can something like this happen?

Simple enough, really. My email was picked up off of my website and added to an autoresponder. If it had been a regular email account, I would have received an unsolicited message that I would have easily deleted, no big deal. But since my email address was attached to an autoresponder, it started a vicious cycle of email autoresponse.

The person who had sent me the email - well, they ended up with 40,000 "Thank you for contacting us." emails in their box from me.

I'm sure that that wasn't very pleasant for them, either. And the fact of the matter is that they may have not even realized that they had done anything wrong.

Spam is bad. Not all spammers are bad people, though. Some of them are just misinformed or inexperienced Internet marketers.

I'm the first to admit that marketing can be frustrating. Just when you've hit the wall and can't think of another fresh marketing idea to get new people to your site, along comes a company that offers you a list of 100,000 email addresses for just $24.95 or some other unbelievable deal. Wow! What an opportunity! Affordable, even! It's hard not to jump all over an offer like that.

But beware! It's hard to say where those email addresses are coming from.

Many unscrupulous companies use "harvesting" software that spiders the Internet and lifts email address off of websites. They then compile lists of these email addresses and sell them as "opt-in safelists" for profit.

As a marketer, using these lists can get you in tons of trouble. Once labeled as a Spammer, it is hard to rid yourself of that reputation, whether you were spamming on purpose, or you were a victim of a bad "list". You can be dropped from your hosting service or ISP. Companies that you are promoting using Spam will cancel your accounts.

Bottom line: If you are not sure that it is NOT Spam, then don't do it. Develop your own list of opt-in subscribers by offering a newsletter, free information, or something else that will get people to take notice of you. Both YahooGroups (http://groups.yahoo.com/) and Topica (http://www.topica.com) offer free, easy-to-use service that will manage your subscribers for you. You can find other similar services on the Internet. This is one of the most responsive forms of advertising, because you have the opportunity to develop a relationship with your list members.

You can also use a mailing list building service, such as Free Mailer 2000 (http://www.freemailer2000.com), although you will need to advertise your mailing list builder site in order to build your mailing list.

Safelists can be another safe way to get the word out about your business, but vary in responsiveness. I recommend the services of SafeListBoys (http://www.safelistboys.com) to help you find lists and easily manage your safelist activity for a small monthly fee. You can also find new safelists by entering "safelists" in any search engine, but watch out for those "BULK" mailing list services that may fall in the unscrupulous SPAM category. Rule of thumb, if you aren't a member yourself and know for a fact that the list is opt-in, don't use it!

If you are choosing to spam, stop immediately. It may be getting you a handful of responses right now, but the painful consequences of your actions can cancel out any benefits that you may find.

If we, as an Internet marketing community, would all agree to market responsibly, the Internet would soon be a better place to work and live. What comes around goes around. Spam not, lest ye be spammed.

Mari is the author of MarketingPitbull, a truly step-by-step guide to creating exponential traffic flow and a residual income online, with or without your own product. Find out more about MarketingPitbull at: http://www.marketingpitbull.com

Don't Be A Spam Artist!

One of the hottest discussion topics going around the web these days is Spam. Spam is different things to different people, but basically it is sending email advertisements to anyone who did not request them or give permission to send them.

I do not consider an email from an acquaintance telling me something they think might interest me- spam. I do not consider people telling me about their business and asking for advice-spam. I do not consider advertisements from companies I have asked about-spam. I do not consider an invitation from a publisher to join their opt-in list-spam. However, these invitations should not be sent out in mass mailings.

There are, however, many things that I do consider to be spam. Unfortunately, when I first started on the Internet, I was guilty of spam once or twice. It does not necessarily make me a bad person, just an uninformed one. Now that I know what is considered to be spam and what is not, I would never in any way, shape or form become a Spam Artist!

These are some things to avoid doing:

* Sending your ad to any email you come across - SPAM! Do NOT send your ad to anyone unless they have asked for information, or if they have joined your opt-in list.

* Joining every discussion and announcement list you can find and sending your ad every few hours - SPAM! When you join these email lists, they will send you an email with their guidelines for posting. Please read and follow these guidelines carefully.

* Subscribing to an ezine and then replying to the ezine with your ad - SPAM! This is one way to get yourself removed from a lot of good lists. If you receive an ezine, do not reply with one of your ads.

* Buying email address lists and blasting your ad-SPAM! Most of the people on these lists probably do not even know they are on them. Therefore, you do not have their permission to send your ads.

* Adding people to your opt-in list without their permission - SPAM! Inviting people to join your list is one thing, but adding them without permission is a definite NO-NO.

* Visit every board you can, leave an ad and never come back - SPAM! Message boards have specific rules for posting and are usually for people to discuss and learn from each other, not for posting ads.

If you are unsure as to whether something is spam or not, visit some boards and ask other more experienced netpreneurs. It is better to be sure than to be accused of spam. Join some discussion lists also, to learn more about spam and what you should or should not do.

Message Boards:

http://www.free-publicity.com/cgi-bin/talk.cgi http://www.bizweb2000.com/wwwboard/ http://start-smartz.com/cgi-bin/index.cgi#post

Discussion Groups:

mailto:pubsonly-subscribe@topica.com mailto:Newbies911-subscribe@topica.com mailto:epub-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Visit these sites for more information on what spam is, what to do about it and how to avoid it:

http://w3.one.net/~banks/spam.htm http://www.arachnoid.com/lutusp/antispam.html http://www.spamfree.org/ http://stopspam.sparklist.com/

Be cautious of the way you conduct your business. Some people are tolerant of spam (if you are not a repeat or offensive spammer) and will just hit the delete button, but some will report anything they think is spam.

Do some research on spam and how not to become a Spam Artist!

Terri Seymour owns and operates MyOwnEzine.com MyOwnEzine.com is a website, ezine and service which provides the resources, tools, guidance and more to help you start, publish and promote your own ezine. You can contact Terri at mailto:ter02@newnorth.net Subscribe at mailto:subscribe@myownezine.com or visit http://www.myownezine.com for lots more info.

How DO Spammers Get Your Email Address?

How DO Spammers Get Your Email Address?

As much as I try to stem the seemingly endless flow of spam, the crap just keeps arriving my Inbox.

For example, this week I received "New affiliate programs from 2004-02-10 to 2004-02-14 :: Subscription from http://WeAreBlahBlahBlah.net".

I'd never heard of WeAreBlahBlahBlah.net, let alone subscribed to the newsletter. But the address used explained exactly how the spammer reached me.

I've set up numerous 'special' addresses for customers, affiliates, subscribers, merchant partners and others.

For example, if I join XYZ's affiliate program, I might set up XYZ@nptinfo.com and give that address to them to contact me. If I suddenly start to receive spam at that address, then I know EXACTLY who the 'leaky' culprit is.

Here are other ways spammers get your address.

Web Pages

Spammers use scavenger bots, programs that 'harvest' email addresses contained in "mailto:" HTML tags. Those are clickable email links that open your email program with the address already placed in the "To" field.

Web Forms

Some sites request various details via forms, e.g. guest books & registration forms. Spammers get email addresses from these because the form is publicly available on the web, or because the webmaster sells the list.

Paper (Offline) Forms

Some companies sell lists of addresses obtained from convention participants or contest entrants.

Whois Searches

Unless the domain registrant has paid an additional fee to make their registration private, a simple Whois lookup reveals the registrant's address.

Although most registrars have enhanced the security of their WHOIS databases, by requiring a special code be entered before information is displayed, many spammers take the time and trouble to grab addresses this way.

From Web Browsers

Some sites use various tricks to extract a surfer's email address from the web browser, sometimes without the surfer noticing it.

Chat Rooms

This is another major source of email addresses for spammers, especially as this is one of the first public activities newbies join, making it easy for spammers to harvest 'fresh' addresses.

Sending Test Messages

Have you ever sent a message to an invalid address? You get an 'undeliverable' or 'failure' notice back.

Some spammers use this to guess email addresses by sending test messages to a list of made-up or guessed addresses. They know they've got good addresses for those that did not result in failure messages.

Online Yellow Pages

What could be more alluring to a spammer than a directory of names and email addresses filed by category?

Chain Letters

These are ingenious. I tell five friends, and my friends each tell five of their friends, and so on and so forth. The email addresses all build up in the cc field and are a spammers delight.

Buying Lists

Spammers buy lists of email addresses usually passed off as those belonging to people who opted-in to to obtain information in a specific category.

Let's put spammers out of business.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Use 'throw-away' addresses whenever you're not sure of the source, and don't sign up unless there are clear 'Privacy' statements on the site.

If worse comes to worse, and you're fighting your way through a mountain of spam, install anti-spam software on your computer.

Article by Rosalind Gardner, author of the best-selling "Super Affiliate Handbook: How I Made $436,797 in One Year Selling Other People's Stuff Online". To learn how you too can suceed in Internet and affiliate marketing, go to:

http://hop.clickbank.net/?nathanoct/webvista2

Rosalind Gardner is one of the top affiliate marketers in the world. In January 1997, Rosalind Gardner received her first 'web check' and hasn't looked back since. Trading her career as an air traffic controller for full-time netpreneurship in early 2000, her various internet projects now entertain and inform millions of visitors annually. She offers this article with YOU in mind, knowing that if she can earn a good living online, YOU can too.

Anti-Spam Two Step for Webmasters

If your email address is on a website that's been online for a while you're being blasted with unsolicited email (SPAM). You can delete it or you can eliminate much of it in two simple steps.

Step 1: Scramble Your Email Address

It isn't human visitors to your site that are causing the problem. It's website spidering SPAMBOTS. These spambots go out on the web and harvest any email address they can find. These harvested email addresses are then sold by unscrupulous *spam pushers*.

Your goal is to hide your email address from the spambots, but still display it for your website visitors to see. If the spambot doesn't recogize your scrambled code as an email address it won't harvest it.

Search the web for scripts that will scramble your email address. You will find many free scripts and some that you can purchase. Some are simple and easy to install. Others can be a little more complicated.

The one that I like is called EScrambler. It is a free script developed by InnerPeace.org. You can visit their site and copy the source code (permission given on the site). Or, go to http://www.webdesignwisdom.com/escrambler.shtml.

This simple script generates a javascript that scrambles your email address. Just copy the script and paste it in your HTML instead of the normal mailto:me@mydomain.com. Your email address is displayed properly for visitors to see, and the HTML looks like anything but an email address.

An example of *me@mydomain.com* in escrambled form:

Step 2: Send Spam to Your Auto-Delete Account

Now, just because you've scrambled your email address, that doesn't keep all spammers from sending email to you. Some will just use something like *anything*@yourdomain.com because they understand that most websites have email forwarding. Anything that is emailed to your domain will be forwarded to an email address you specified.

You never have to see this email if you forward it to another email address that automatically deletes it.

You will need a free email account that offers some simple anti-spam features to use as your *dump account*.

You must be able to designate email addresses from which you will not accept any email. You may already have an account that can handle it. If not, look into Mail.com or Lycos.com.

Then make your free email dump account the default forwarding address in your website's email handler. Go to your free email account and set it to reject all mail received from YOUR domain.

Then have email that is sent to your published email addresses (those you have scrambled on your site) forwarded to your normal forwarding address. Or, set them up as individual POP accounts if your hosting service offers this feature.

Now you will receive email from your website visitors who actually read your email address on your website and all other email will be deleted.

This is a very effective way to get rid of most spam that is generated from your domain. It won't eliminate all of it. The volume of spam that I was receiving decreased by 90-95% after I made these changes.

This tactic will work for sites that have been online with an unprotected email address too. Change the email address on your site to a different scrambled address. Forward all email that is sent to your old posted address to your dump account.

If you've been using your primary email address on your site, you'll need to notify everyone that your email address has changed. This makes it more difficult, but worth the effort if you're being slammed with spam.

Thomas Benton is the owner of WebDesignWisdom.com and the publisher of Active-eBuilder, The Do-It-Yourself Web Design and Internet Marketing Ezine. Visit Tom's resource-rich website: http://www.webdesignwisdom.com

Is There A Future For Spam?

Will you always be buried underneath a mountain of spam? Is there any light at the end of the tunnel? With the current flood of spam to your inbox and ever more devious practices on the part of spammers you'd be forgiven for thinking that spam is here to stay.

The tide has turned folks. It may not seem like that right now with spam being just as abundant as ever. Spammers are getting desperate though. Their most recent move to use home computers as spam zombies demonstrates this desperation quite clearly. For spammers to want to use low speed cable and DSL connections to send their junk email means one thing - the email servers they're normally using are being blocked as quickly as they go online.

This is not to say that spam will just disappear. The volume of spam you're receiving hasn't noticeably reduced. Not yet but it will. Education is beginning to take effect. People are deleting spam instead of replying to it. Home users are hiding their PCs behind firewalls, antivirus software and spam filters. Companies are implementing enforcable Internet policies which prevent employees from sending spam, jokes or otherwise, during working hours. Even Microsoft have made a committment to fighting spam. Their recent buyout of Giant Software may see spam filtering as a default feature in the next version of Microsoft Windows perhaps?

Let's just imagine for a second what might happen if spam doesn't decrease over the next few years.

The geographical hotspots for spammers are Russia, China and the Phillipines. Could a government ,say perhaps the US Government, take a drastic step. Maybe initiate an electronic first strike on the countries which host junk email servers which are used to send out billions of pieces of spam every day? The US already have military Cyber Warfare teams fending off attacks from hackers working for foreign Governments. How hard would it be for them to initiate a cyber assault on spam servers? The US and China actively trade cyber warfare body blows every single day - although this is never discussed on the evening news.

Could data embargos be used to "choke" spammers of their online resources? The Internet itself is compromised of 13 central "pillars" and millions of nodes. A joint venture between the US, UK and the EU could theoretically shut down entire nodes to certain countries - a sort of E-embargo. No data in. No data out. In a world that relies so heavily on data this could bring any offending spam supporting country to its knees in just a few hours.

What's the likelihood of either scenario ever developing? Anywhere from non-existent to highly probable. We live in a world where absolutes mean nothing as each day passes and we surpass what was previously thought impossible.

The future of spam is a dim one. Public outrage and the drain on bandwidth and Internet resources as a whole has forged a bond of common anger between Joe Soap users and big business worldwide. The message is clear - Spam Has To Go!

What was once a very lucrative business for the spammer may soon be putting up a "Closed Due To Lack of Business" sign. Let's hope so.

Niall Roche runs Spam-Site.com which reviews and tests spam blockers and also provides tons of information on the origins of spam and how to fight it. http://www.spam-site.com

Keep Your Work From Home Newsletter From Being A Spam Filter Casualty

Its hard to get your email through to clients, friends and family with all the Spam Filtering going on these days. If you are a Home Based Business owner that sends out a newsletter regularly youll want to keep the following tips in mind to make certain your Work At Home Newsletter is getting through all the Spam Filters.

Its hard to get your email through to clients, friends and family with all the Spam Filtering going on these days. If you are a Home Based Business owner that sends out a newsletter regularly youll want to keep the following tips in mind to make certain your Work At Home Newsletter is getting through all the Spam Filters.

Spam is defiantly a problem. At one time I was receiving almost 300 per day, spending a good part an hour sifting through the mass of junk was more than I could tolerate. So I too enlisted the help of a Spam Filter Spam Arrest.

I do worry about losing out on emails that are important and interesting, but this is the price we all have to pay for those Spammers that have abused and are abusing the Internet.

Most Spam Filters use a Blacklist these are clusters of email addresses and domain names that are known for sending out a lot of Spam. Recipients of Spam generate most Blacklists. So your newsletter could fall victim to a click happy Spam identifier that clicks your email into the dreaded Blacklist vault.

Spam Assassin, Cloudmarks SpamNet and Spam Arrest all use different methods of blocking spam. Spam Assassin uses a point system to conclude whether or not an email is Spam. If your Newsletter scores high it will surely be treated as spam and blocked. SpamNet blocks Spam two ways; the first, filters email based on keywords like Free, and the second allows users to mark email and submit identified Spam to be blocked to other users of SpamNet.

My personal favorite is Spam Arrest, because it offers you total control over your inbox. You can decide who is allowed to send you email by importing your personal address book, or entering your known and approved contact addresses directly into the system.

Emails from unknown senders will receive an auto-reply message containing a "challenge" -- if or when the sender completes the challenge (the response), their email is forwarded to your inbox, and they are then added to your authorized sender list.

The challenge is easy for people, but impossible for automated systems (i.e. spambots) to complete.

The Spam Arrest challenge/response system effectively blocks all the spam while still allowing friends, family and trusted contacts to email you without the risk of being filtered out by imprecise software systems.

So How Do You Keep Your Newsletter From Being Blocked?

Here are some tips to help your Newsletter reach your subscribers:

DO NOT send your newsletter unsolicited. Be sure your customers have requested to be on your subscriber distribution list using an auto responder, like Aweber, that requires your subscribers to opt-in and confirm that then have requested your Newsletter will help keep you off the blacklists.

Use your Newsletters name in the subject line. Your subscribers should recognize your Newsletters name. Using subject lines that are full of hype and so called trigger words may get your Newsletter blocked by the Spam filters.

NEVER TYPE IN ALL CAPS. This will surely get the Spam filter red flags raised and your email forwarded to the dreaded blacklists.

Words like Free, Limited Offer, Money even home business will engage most Spam filters.

The simplest words like remove should be avoided as well. Use unsubscribe in your directions to subscribers that want to stop receiving your Newsletter.

Spammers most often use free email addresses so you should avoid using them at all costs. Send your Newsletter from a reputable domain name one that matches your own website would be best.

Never send attachments with your Newsletter. Attachments put a fear in most email recipients and will tag your email as Spam.

Your Newsletter will most likely have words within the text that trigger Spam filters these words like Free and Home Business can be easily disguised by adding a period or hyphen between two letters do not over do it though. It will not be long before this tactic will be a trigger for the top Spam filters, so keep up with all aspects of the best Spam filters so your Newsletter will reach your subscribers.

Tim Somers The Home Biz Honcho. Changing Your Life, Helping You Make Money While You Work From Home. Get Tims Top Ten Home Biz Opportunities Free Report at: http://www.Home-Based-Business-Opportunity-Honcho.comIf you are ready to start building a Residual Income Tim will build you your very own Money Generating Website for FREE! http://www.Free-Make-Money-Site.com