> > That's not to say that legislation could not be a useful part of a > > solution, just that I don't think that legislation by itself would > > significantly reduce the volume of email spam. > > Of course it wouldn't. Neither would anything else. The key point here is > that the root problem is a social issue. Spammers just don't CARE that > there are costs incurred by recipients, and that property rights are being > violated. Civil and criminal penalties are there to MAKE violators care > about these issues. well, it would make them care about civil and criminal penalties, if not about the social issues. (but you're dead on about spammers not caring - the ones I've talked to seem sincerely convinced that they have a right to steal from others, and the only justification they need is that they can make money from doing so.) at least in the US we're extremely unlikely to get legislation that imposes substantial civil and criminal penalties, because the DMA wants to make spam legitimate, and they have more money (thus influence) than geeks do. > The root problem is social. depending on how you look at it, the problem is social, economic, political, technical, or some combination of these. I don't find such generalizations very useful. Keith