Subject: Spam, spam, spam,... (was RFC 2434 term...)

From: Bruce Lilly <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 2005 17:22:06 -0400

>  Date: 2005-06-28 20:37
>  From: "Thomas J. Hruska" <[email-masked]>

> > John C Klensin wrote:
> >     [..]
> <snip>
> > 
> >> But the notion that the IETF can prevent something from happening or 
> >> being deployed by declining to register it,[...]

> So...why hasn't the IETF labeled SMTP and POP3, not just a bad idea, but
> a terrible one and scrapped (obsoleted, terminated, or whatever you want
> to call it) both protocols and come up with something completely new
> without a migration path (i.e. the terminated SMTP and POP3 protocols
> can't talk to the new protocol and vice versa)?

First, that has nothing to do with the topic of John's message or the
discussion which was taking place.

Second, SMTP and related protocols are core application protocols
used for mission-critical purposes.  Backward compatibility is a
key feature so as to avoid disrupting those purposes.  So a simple
"light-switch" change -- even if there were something to change to --
would probably be impractical.
 
> While that is some lovely writing, I have yet to see the IETF do
> anything constructive in lieu of the spam that plagues the Internet.  In
> my book, the IETF is to blame for spam, both its existence and its
> continuation.

Third, along the lines of your suggestion to scrap SMTP et al, if
you wish to stop receiving spam via email, simply stop receiving
email.  Who's preventing you from doing that?

> Also, from what I can tell over the past few years of 
> watching this list, no one in the IETF has the guts nor the spinal
> column needed to do anything about it.

Fourth, the IETF is a loose group of volunteers with an indistinct
membership.  Anybody can contribute to IETF work; what have you
done lately? (That's a rhetorical question)

> It is your job to make new protocols and fix
> broken protocols,

"job" and "volunteer" may be incompatible.

> and it is the implementor's responsibility to follow 
> changes without complaint.  If you terminate SMTP and POP3 or simply
> re-write the core Internet protocols from the ground-up, every
> implementation out there MUST follow.

Fifth, compliance with IETF specifications, including full Standards,
is voluntary.  There is no IETF police force.  There are plenty of
non-conforming implementations.

> If the IETF thinks it can do 
> nothing about spam, then it is already delusional [...]

Spam is a difficult problem.  Like "obscene art", nobody wants it,
everybody thinks he knows it when he sees it, few people can agree
whether or not something is it, and nobody has an objective
definition that is practical.  As you seem to think it's a simple
problem, please present your Internet-Draft of the solution.

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