Right away, let me say that I really dislike spam, junk e-mail, popup ads, banner ads, etc. Yeah, yeah, me and virtually everyone else on the net, whatever.
But, I’m disturbed that people seem to make such a huge deal about them, and I don’t hear nearly the same amount of noise about junk snail mail and the constant barrage of advertising people willingly absorb from television, print and radio nearly every day.
With a combination of my mail client’s “Junk filter”, and disabling the display of images and embedded objects in HTML email messages, I just don’t have much of a problem with spam anymore. And if it gets worse, I wouldn’t mind enabling a filter that blocked mail from anyone not in my Address Book. Yeah, it’s annoying and it’s a pain, but there are an increasing number of tools to help fight spam. And, worse case, I’m simply deleting more messages from my Inbox.
Compare this to my experience with junk snailmail. Six days a week, about 1/4 pound to 1/2 pound each day, all of which goes straight into my recycling bin. The amount of waste is staggering, for pointless advertising flyers that 99% of the recipients just trash. Yes, I know there are “Opt Out” lists you can use in attempt to staunch the flow of junk mail, but I’ve never noticed a decrease in traffic from using them.
I’m just surprised that tangible paper trash is accepted with little or no objection, while intangible spam has the attention of the US Congress and (toothless, futile) laws are being passed to address this “critical issue”. I just don’t get it.
3 thoughts on “Not exactly pro-spam, but…”