i've been reading a lot about hackers recently-- not crackers or samurais, but hactavists-- and how they're attempting to undermine corporate and governmental regulations imposed on the www, and then today i read several of the news articles on Bill Gates' proposal for postage stamps that one would have to purchage in order to send an email. (actually, there are several proposals, one charging only those senders whose emails get returned by the receiver.) the objective obviously is to reduce spam and increase the various means for achieving profits.

anyway, firstly, i was wondering what you all thought about it.

secondly, i was curious to know if any of you use linux or any other open-source OS, like gnu or something, and how exactly certain basic aspects work within it-- like email, browsers, adobe-like editing programs, MS word-like programs, etc... i'm thinking about switching to an open-source OS but have to admit that i'm a bit intimidated. i rely too much on my computer to go through any length of time trying to figure out just how to use it.

btw, i posted this in FGH because the email stamp is a potentially touchy subject, particularly since it's bound to be universally applied to all users prior to their sending emails, since most spammers don't have easily identifiable addresses to send an invoice to after their spam has been rejected. in other words, collecting is nearly impossible after-the-fact, but it's very easy to charge just for sending the email, since what you'd be paying for is a line of code that grants your email entrance into MSN (Hotmail), for example, to reach the receiver. as you can see, each server could decide its own fee.

They're going to cause a friggin riot. I don't think they should be allowed to even think about it. And I bet it wont get rid of the spam. After all, stamps didn't discourage the sheer amounts of crap they send through the postal service.

They've been looking for ways to make more money off of email ever since it was first concieved of. Personally, I'd sooner switch to a service that guaranteed it would not charge people money to mail me, and I'd either subscribe to them or donate profusely. I'd also quite simply quit sending email to anyone who uses an email server that charges the sender to recieve any messages. If it ceases to be a free and easy means of communication for me, then it ceases to be worth my time to communicate with people who are going to force me to accrue charges for doing so.

even though i'm not proud of this yuppie service, personally i already pay a little extra for "free" long distance on my phone. so, i'm hurt from the stamp only for group-emails (namely with jpgs/gifs/etc...) and, of course, my international friends (which phone-wise would be the big cost, and i can't afford to lose contact with them).

frankly, i'm ready to become a hactivist over this. if they do institute this "stamp," if i am forced to buy this "stamp," i will find a way around it-- if not actually find a way to fuck them up for it.

Also think of this:

How much money do you think that the email servers would collect from any business or any website that has to frequently send notifications or validations to hundreds of thousands of users per day? How much would this raise the prices of everything you buy online?

that's one of the reasons i think the fee will come from the validation of even receiving the emails, not for their being returned. if it's a flat tax on all senders to MSN or whomever, then it's a lot easier to collect. meanwhile, most remaining "free" servers will spam you to death far beyond anything we've seen thus far and meanwhile will have small free space on that address so we'll have to delete messages every three hours in order to maintain it. furthermore, it'll be at best a nominal cost or perhaps even free for user who wants to opt for a server that charges senders.

Here's the "Univeral" ISP policy idea I've heard.

Sending an email only costs if it reaches someone through an ISP. The ISP charges for passing it on. If you don't pay your email gets blocked. The problem is they will invent a junk rate like the post office did to help spam get through.

This kind of idea has died before, but good free shit never lasts.

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Sending an email only costs if it reaches someone through an ISP. The ISP charges for passing it on. If you don't pay your email gets blocked.

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Bill Gates' proposal for postage stamps that one would have to purchage in order to send an email.

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Actually, Gates' proposal was that the computer "pays" with processing time, not you paying with money.

Make no mistake, there are people out there who are attempting to make money off of this idea, though. Microsoft apparantly isn't one of the ones making noises about it at the moment.

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Actually, Gates' proposal was that the computer "pays" with processing time, not you paying with money.

Make no mistake, there are people out there who are attempting to make money off of this idea, though. Microsoft apparantly isn't one of the ones making noises about it at the moment.

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I'm kind of undecided on this. Please don't throw tomatoes.

What if the charge was based on how large the letter was, or how many graphics, or how many links are detected? Then again, you're just getting into having people read your mail again, which is a totally different controversy... anyway, I really want to reduce spam, so I can't say I'm completely against this idea.

i'm a TA, and most of my professors require us to email our papers to them, and frequently i require the same of my students, because typing notes into their papers is easier than writing them-- especially since my handwriting blows. not to mention, submitting papers and books to journals and publishers is mostly done via email now. in which case, there goes the judging-the-email-by-the-size-of-its-attachment method. and schools are becoming so cheap they won't cover work-related photocopies, so there's no way they'll pick up the tab for emails. (meanwhile, we don't get paid for publications, so it's not like "you spend money to make money.")

i am very very very against the idea. i'd rather waste 5 minutes (and, of course, it's never that long) of my day deleting spam to save the money i'd spend on emails. and even if you were to tell me that it's not going to be that much or that i can always write it off in my taxes, it's kind of like the government building a road in front of your house, making you dependent on it, and then selling the public highway to a corporation who will takeover the highway's upkeep in exchange for being allowed to put toll booths on it. pretty soon i'm going to have to pay for the air i breathe. nickled and dimed to death.

Since we're talking about activism in the age of world enveloping media conglomerates, may I direct some attention here?

Some stuff on Adbusters is entertaining, but I think they're a little extreme in a lot of ways. They basically don't want to see advertisements anywhere at all.

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A pissed-off global population can force capital to retreat by:

hacking websites
jamming broadcasts
placing organic stink bombs in bathrooms, offices and stores
plugging up toilets
crashing spy surveillance systems with spoof emails
refusing to pay fees and taxes
obstructing and sabotaging

In time we will learn to modulate our resistance — to raise it to the point where airport-type security systems are needed just to let customers into stores, until the daily pain and cost of doing business as usual becomes simply too high to bear.

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