Subject: [Asrg] 0. General - ASRG Direction - PLEASE READ

From: Yakov Shafranovich <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Sep 2003 19:55:37 -0400

To ASRG Group Members,

We need volunteers urgently and they have not been forthcoming. Do you 
want the ASRG to just wither away until the IRTF shuts it down? Are you 
happy seeing spammers laugh all the way to the bank? Do you want to be 
there when our children will turn to us in the future and ask: "Mommy 
and Daddy, where were you when spam killed email on the Internet?" Where 
are all of the group members? We have over 600 subscribers with only a 
small amount participating, where are the others?!?!?!

The purpose of the ASRG is to find solutions to spam. The group has been 
active for about six months since March 2003. In this duration of time 
the most useful anti-spam tool produced by the group has been our 
mailing list archive containing more messages than most IETF/IRTF groups 
produce in their entire lifetimes (6,200 to date). While talking on the 
mailing list in some way leads to that goal and the archive does touch 
on every aspect of spam, results are what counts not the chatter. RFC 
2014 states that "the measure of success is the quality and impact of 
the research results."

In the last few weeks the chatter on the list has definitely been 
reduced, some form of organizational structure is being setup for some 
area, and posting guidelines are more or less being followed, causing 
the mailing list to be more readable than before. More is needed - we 
need volunteers, people who are willing to give of their time to get 
down, get dirty and produce results. Volunteers and RGs/WGs are like 
water and trees - without volunteers the RGs/WGs wither and die.

It is very sad to see that the two foundational documents for the group, 
the requirements document and the technical considerations document, got 
three and one response respectively. The spam bibliography guidelines 
had zero response. This is considering that the mailing list has over 
600 subscribers ((plus uncounted numbers who read the web and gmane 
archives) but at any given time at most only 30 are active! That 
constitutes less than 10% of the entire membership! What about the other 
90%?!?!?!?

We need to move the group forward. While jumping straight to proposals 
may seem very good to many, we cannot do that. We seek to understand and 
analyze the spam problem, before we can hope to objectively evaluate 
proposals. That is why we need to focus on the foundation of the group 
which includes inventory of problems, requirements, evaluation model, 
consent framework, technical considerations document, analysis, 
bibliography, survey of solutions, identification of standardization 
requirements, etc. All of these things either do not have volunteers or 
are not getting very little feedback from the group members. Without a 
solid foundation for the group we cannot hope to be able to evaluate any 
proposals objectively and consider its impact on the Internet.

There are many things that can be done but without volunteers we cannot 
do them. These include:
o Volunteering to lead or participate an area
o Editing and reviewing documents
o Simply participating in the list discussions on foundational documents
o Proposing suggestions to improve the group
o Volunteering to write up or do something

At this point we want to focus on working toward the next drafts of the 
requirements document, technical considerations document and inventory 
of problems, as well as other foundational documents. Please step up and 
help! We need help with almost every single item and area, we also need 
suggestions and comments for improvement. We need YOU to make the 
anti-spam work possible and to bring a solution to reality.

Sincerely,
Yakov Shafranovich
Co-Chair, ASRG

_______________________________________________
Asrg mailing list
[email-masked]
https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/asrg

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From: Thomas Juntunen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 07:50:00 -0500

> small amount participating, where are the others?!?!?!
Hello,

I'd like to help but frankly I have no idea what or how. I'm a student just
finishing up an undergraduate degree in computer science and a LAN
administrator in charge of a solitary mail server that handles a few
thousand messages per day. As much as I enjoy reading the posts to this
list, I also find them a bit intimidating. The people here seem to be in
charge of large networks and handle vast volumes of mail, or in key
positions at companies. Many signatures indicate people who operate their
own firms.

Some of the discussions revolve around technologies I haven't even heard of
before. I found the thread on spam metrics in more than one dimension quite
interesting but lack the statistical background to understand all of it. I
don't have a guru-level understanding of SMTP, MTA/MUA's and so forth that
many here seem to. I've looked at the work list and don't understand what's
actually required for the projects. In short, I have no idea what I could
actually do. I tried writing to two different people directly, but go no
response. I thought I'd wait until I graduated in December to try again, but
your plea moved me to write now.

I'm still trying to understand all the issues, and don't want to see the
spammers win, so I'll offer to help -- but I'd like some guidance as to how.

Thomas Juntunen

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From: Kee Hinckley <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 10:31:46 -0400

>positions at companies. Many signatures indicate people who operate their

$15 gets you your own domain and a title :-).

>actually do. I tried writing to two different people directly, but go no

I'm sure Yakov has more specific ideas.  But I suspect that what is 
really needed is simply to have people in charge of updating 
documents and beating up other people to get their contributions and 
comments in.  Think of it as practice for becoming a post-grad TA.
-- 
Kee Hinckley
http://www.messagefire.com/         Next Generation Spam Defense
http://commons.somewhere.com/buzz/  Writings on Technology and Society

I'm not sure which upsets me more: that people are so unwilling to accept
responsibility for their own actions, or that they are so eager to regulate
everyone else's.

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From: Jonathan Morton <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 19:04:19 +0100

> thousand messages per day.

That's more than mine does - but then, my mail server only handles mail 
for *me*.

> As much as I enjoy reading the posts to this

It doesn't matter who you are, it's what you can do.  There are a lot 
of smaller mail systems around, and collectively they probably add up 
to a large percentage of Internet mail handling.  You would do well to 
help represent that group.

> many here seem to.

Some of the discussions here do get very technical.  As a mail 
administrator, you'd probably not need to understand the technologies 
anywhere near as deeply as these discussions go, if you were eventually 
to deploy them.  Also, you don't need to be Einstein (or even Feynman) 
to be a scientist.

> spammers win, so I'll offer to help -- but I'd like some guidance as 

OK, here's something you might be interested in helping with:  a 
glossary.

When a term you don't understand pops up, ask what it means 
(backchannel if appropriate), and add it to a document you maintain.  
Ask Yakov (or whoever handles these things) to link the document when 
it seems big enough to be useful.  You might be able to pick up several 
useful definitions from existing ASRG documents, Google searches, or 
ESR's Jargon File, as a starting point.

--------------------------------------------------------------
from:     Jonathan "Chromatix" Morton
mail:     [email-masked]
website:  http://www.chromatix.uklinux.net/
tagline:  The key to knowledge is not to rely on people to teach you it.

---

From: Yakov Shafranovich <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 19:51:21 -0400

Kee Hinckley wrote:

> really needed is simply to have people in charge of updating documents 
> and beating up other people to get their contributions and comments in.  
> Think of it as practice for becoming a post-grad TA.

Thomas, I will contact you off-list about this. But now thinking about 
it, maybe we should create an ASRG police unit :)

---

From: Yakov Shafranovich <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 25 Sep 2003 21:00:40 -0400

> spammers win, so I'll offer to help -- but I'd like some guidance as to how.
There are many things you can do. First of all help with documents and 
general comments are always welcome. Second, as someone else pointed 
out, you are something - you do run a server. That means that you have 
can contribute to the group at least on the policy level (best 
practices) from the angle of an administrator of a small mail server. 
And of course, as you participate there will be many other things as 
well that will interest you. Feel free to email me off-list about 
anything that you have a question about or something that interests you, 
and I will get you in touch with the proper people.

Keep up the good work,
Yakov