Re: Worsening google service reputation and abuse

[Michael Thomas via NANOG <nanog () lists nanog org>]

On 8/17/25 7:18 PM, Suresh Ramasubramanian wrote:
> It isn’t just cops it is all the various people and orgs in the 
> ecosystem who are all convinced they aren’t the internet police.

Yeah, so? It's just a cost of doing business. That's what's a joke about 
the people who think we can "defeat" this. We can't. It's cats and 
mouses all the way down.

Mike

> --srs
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* Michael Thomas via NANOG <nanog () lists nanog org>
> *Sent:* Monday, August 18, 2025 7:46:01 AM
> *To:* nanog () lists nanog org <nanog () lists nanog org>
> *Cc:* Michael Thomas <mike () mtcc com>
> *Subject:* Re: Worsening google service reputation and abuse
>
> On 8/17/25 5:15 PM, Suresh Ramasubramanian via NANOG wrote:
> > Real economics as a factor has been studied quite a lot - check for 
> papers by Vern Paxson, Stefan Savage etc and you’ll find some going 
> back 20+ years.
> >
> > A lot of the real economic impact just doesn’t lie in technical 
> solutions though.
>
>
> There is a lot of damage done for tons of things. Yet, Visa still
> exists. Fraud exists. It's a cost of doing business. It's just petty
> crime. Nothing is going to stop it. That is what the joke is. The cops
> don't give a flying fuck about this, and never will. They don't care
> about anything if it doesn't involve donuts.
>
> Mike
>
> >
> > From: Marc Binderberger via NANOG <nanog () lists nanog org>
> > Date: Sunday, 17 August 2025 at 5:37 PM
> > To: North American Network Operators Group <nanog () lists nanog org>
> > Cc: Marc Binderberger <marc+lists () sniff es>
> > Subject: Re: Worsening google service reputation and abuse
> >
> >
> > On Sat, 16 Aug 2025 17:24:04 -0700, Michael Thomas via NANOG wrote:
> >
> >> Barry has been going on about this idea for decades, I think. It 
> wouldn't
> >> work then, it won't work now.
> > Until some idea suddenly works. Or an old idea becomes feasible.
> >
> > Frankly, many things we take for granted today would not exist with that
> > "won't work" attitude. The better question (imho) to Barry is: how 
> is your
> > idea different from the already existing proposals?
> >
> > Barry has a reasonable theory - that the economics of spamming is 
> brittle -
> > but it is just that: a theory.
> >
> > And most of the (failed) proposals seem academic and avoid actual 
> "costs" in
> > terms of money. Or raise the real-world costs for everyone, if you 
> need CPU
> > cycles to participate in the email system. So Barry stepping out of 
> this box
> > and suggesting real economics as a factor is not unreasonable. I am 
> not sure
> > if there are more concrete details though (?).
> >
> >
> >> Nobody can put up a coherent argument for why
> >> the current cat and mouse situation isn't the acceptable balance,
> > I guess "acceptable" can be defined as: Hey, I can always get a free 
> personal
> > account with gmail. And as a company I pay Google or Microsoft, save 
> money on
> > my IT staff. And good luck blocking "me" (i.e. Google, Microsoft).
> >
> > Maybe a problem if you are in the email business, fine with me, my 
> domain is
> > a private hobby. In fact, for all their "flaws", seeing the insanity 
> of the
> > know-it-all experts (some here on the list) I think I prefer Google
> > requesting some reputation steps and a webpage explaining it. The
> > alternative: being blocked for "Excessive Spam - Come back when you have
> > fixed it". No further details. Sure, private domain, private VPS, no 
> BL/score
> > listing that I can find ... fortunately that blocking was just a Cc: 
> to one
> > of my posts, so I could not care less. The acceptable state of the mail
> > system today!
> >
> > So there you may have an argument: that the increasing number of 
> mechanisms,
> > lists, tricks make the mail system less work-able and more broken. 
> But I have
> > no crystal ball, if email will finally break or will keep going - I 
> don't
> > know. Would be just sad if it breaks (but I have a gmail account as 
> a backup
> > ;-)
> >
> > Marc
> >
> >
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