[Gllug] Whitelist-only spam filtering

[Rev Simon Rumble]

On Thu 12 Sep, Tom Gilbert bloviated thus:

> This is going to involve you reading a lot of spam for a long time. (As
> you "maintain" the whitelist). This kindof defeats the point :(

I don't see why.  The main reason to keep it is to improve the
whitelist but most spam is easily recognisable as such and can be
deleted with one keypress.  The main thing is I don't wanna be
bothered by this shit during my working hours.

> Ugh. This is highly offensive to people sending you mail. Frankly when I
> get messages bounced from people saying "send the message again with
> this SECRIT PASSWORD so I can add you to my whitelist", I never send
> them another mail.

Well that's okay, I don't want to talk to you anyway :P  Seriously,
if someone really does want to talk to me, they'll follow the (simple)
instructions.  Failing that, I'll get around to checking the junk box
and add them to the whitelist.

> Yes, blacklists don't work:
> http://www.paulgraham.com/falsepositives.html

My biggest problem with the blacklists is they don't give the end user
enough detail to solve the problem.  Most bounces are incomprehensive
to the average user and a short line buried in it saying "blocked due
to <blah>" is easily missed.

> Sensible ideas for filtering spam:
> http://www.paulgraham.com/spam.html

The problem with heuristic filters is that once they gain widespread
use, spammers will test their spam on them.  So it's an arms race.
This is why I find the whitelist idea elegant.

-- 
Rev Simon Rumble <simon at rumble.net>
www.rumble.net
Send email with subject "send key pub" for public key.

I've found Jesus.  He was behind the sofa the whole time.
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