[Web4lib] anti-spam email adress

[William Denton]

On 14 September 2006, Marion Sumerianlibrarian wrote:

> won't some of the brainiacs of the list weigh in on this topic?

"Save the time of the reader."  The only way to avoid all spam is to not 
give out your e-mail address, to never send any e-mail, and to make the 
mailbox name so complicated no dictionary attack will hit it.  For good 
measure, follow that up by unplugging the computer.

Online contact forms are one way to hide from spammers, and they can help 
you force users into picking helpful subject lines.  However, nothing 
matches the ease and convenience of an easy-to-use and memorable e-mail 
address on the home page, the OPAC, library cards, bookmarks, posters, and 
elsewhere.  Besides, once you've replied to someone's mail, they'll have 
your address, and then you're going to get spammed.

It's the library's job to make their contact information as open and 
available as possible, and then to filter out all the resulting spam and 
junk mail and faxes advertising office supplies.  Don't filter the e-mail 
too harshly, though: some users have accounts at Hotmail or other free 
mail providers, and they get blackholed.  We all have to plan for wading 
through screens filled with spam every day.

Bill
-- 
William Denton : Toronto, Canada : www.miskatonic.org : www.frbr.org