MadMode

If I had a rocket launcher...

I spent the better part of last week fighting Sobig.F (well, looking over the virtual shoulder of the W3C systems guys as they fought it.) Forged mail interacts very badly with the first law of SMTP: thou shalt deliver mail or bounce it. Let's get SMTP+SPF or RMX or something like that out there... soon!

But here's what really pissed me off: after several long days and nights switching MTAs from sendmail to postfix to get the Sobig garbage blocked before it entered the queue, when the stormcloud/queues on our mail hub and list hub were finally clearing, the load on the end-user mail server spiked because it had to filter out all the rest of the filthy spam that was still coming in. ARGH!

Saying thanks in the gift culture

Hmm... Affero... i.e. if you like the help I gave you, you donate to the causes I support (in my name; i.e. I get the tax credit, not you, if I understand correctly). Nifty idea... I've offered money to people who gave me support in #debian and the like, and they refused; it's just not part of the culture. And I wrote a friggin check to SPI, and they haven't cashed it 8 months later. But I could see how this would work.