[conspire] Google's notion of an abuse <at> mailbox

[Any Random Schmo]

Rick Moen <rick <at> linuxmafia.com> writes:

> 
> Quoted below is the autoresponder that cheekily rejects any problem
> reports you send to the RFC-mandated mailboxes, abuse <at> gmail.com or
> abuse <at> google.com.  
> 
> Anyway, I _did_ fill out their time-wasting CGI-form -- and typed this
> into the minuscule "Additional information" field:
> 
>   Shame on you for requiring victims of UCE to fill out a bunch of
>   little Web CGI fields, instead of accepting mail to abuse <at> , as very
>   clearly required by RFC 2142.  That's a really scummy policy on your
>   part, and is getting you a bad name among knowledgeable members of
>   the sysadmin community.
> 
>   One day, you'll need our good will, and it'll all have been squandered
>   through chump moves like this one.
> 
> (And yes, turns out that http://www.rfc-ignorant.org/ already lists
> Gmail and Google as RFC-violator domains.)
> 
> [snip]

Someone really needs to file a new RFC rescinding 2142's requirements of usable
addresses abuse@, postmaster@, hostmaster@, etc. They are about as useful in
this day and age as the Finger protocol over TCP. You may consider Google's
policy to be "a really scummy" one, but I doubt you'll find a less scummy one
that doesn't cost an arm and a leg as the RFC would require. Currently, all
mails to such addresses at my domain go to a box that you'll be lucky if I check
even once during the remainder of this year. I think that somewhat satisfies the
RFC requiremnt, but is definitely more scummy IMHO.

If, despite my best efforts, the letter E is missing anywhere in this message,
there's a long list of people who are as much to blame as I am, and I intend for
the mechanism of any such missing E's to be on display on Saturday.

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