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Table of Contents
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Spam, Unloved & Unwanted
A Helping Hand
Favorite Freeware
Featured Download

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Spam, Unloved & Unwanted

A big thanks goes to all of you who responded to our first newsletter. Your feedback has been very helpful and encouraging to me since starting and continuing an e-mail newsletter is not an easy task. While on the subject of feedback, if there is a topic you would be interested in hearing more about, please let me know, and I will see if I can address that topic in a future issue. The topic of security and privacy has been on my mind quite a bit recently, and an issue that is related to your privacy is the issue of spam. No, I am not talking about the "meat" product that comes in the can, rather, I am referring to uninvited junk e-mail. First, let's talk about what spam is not. Many people believe that any e-mail messages sent out in bulk to a mailing list (such as this newsletter) constitues itself as spam. That view is a misconception. For instance, this newsletter is being sent to opt-in subscribers. Basically, opt-in means that you make a conscious decision to give your permission to the company to send an e-mail to your e-mail address. When you signed up for this newsletter, you checked a box on one of our order forms. Those kind of permission based e-mails are not spam. The second kind of non-spam e-mail is the opt-out e-mail. Opt-out means that you choose not to receive e-mails from the company. However, gathering e-mail addresses by using the opt-out method is not good business practice, although it is not spam. Spam e-mail, to put it simply, is e-mail sent to you by a company or person to whom you never gave permission. I am sure all of you could report at least one instance of when you have been spammed, and no dobut, some of you receive spam everyday. I receive spam at my work e-mail addresses and my personal e-mail addresses everyday without fail. Unfortunately, spam will not go away anytime soon, however, you can take some steps to prevent your e-mail inbox from being cluttered by junk. See the Helping Hand for these tips.

John Saddler
info@setsystems.com

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A Helping Hand

• Be careful about giving out your e-mail address, especially on a website. For instance, if the website makes you opt-out of giving your e-mail address, you should probably not give your e-mail address to them. Someone who collects your e-mail address using the opt-out method probably is not overly concerned about your privacy.
• Find out the company's privacy policy when it concerns your data, like your e-mail address. Make sure the website tells you that they will not give out or sell your information to any third party. Some companies have no scruples about selling e-mail lists to third parties. That is one reason why spam has propogated. Do not give your e-mail address out to such a company.
• Use filters that come with your e-mail client. Many web-based e-mail clients such as Yahoo or Hotmail allow you to use filters to automatically block or delete unwanted e-mail. You can also use filters with e-mail programs such as Outlook, Outlook Express, and Eudora to automatically delete unwanted e-mail. Take advantage of those filters.

Following the three tips above should help you immensely in your battle against the unwanted "meat." If you have a tip that you have found useful in battling spam, please let me know.

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Favorite Freeware - Spam Buster, 1.3 mb - by Contact Plus

http://www.contactplus.com
Download Program
Specs - Win 95/98/ME/NT/2000 - Ad supported free program

Spam Buster is a powerful utility that will help you wage the war against spam. Spam Buster comes with a pre-loaded list of over 15,000 e-mail addresses that are known to be spammer e-mail addresses. The program also gives you control with multiple filtering options. Spam Buster can be configured with up to twelve e-mail accounts at one time.

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Featured Download - Outlook Express Mail Manager, 565 kb - Ethereal Innovations

http://www.ofori-boateng.clara.co.uk/ethereal
Download Program
Specs - Win 95/98/ME/2000, Outlook Express - Shareware - $25.00

Although this program is not necessarily used for getting rid of spam, it does assist you in managing multiple e-mail accounts with ease. If you are like me, you probably have at least 2 e-mail accounts to manage if not more. I currently manage about 7 to 8 different accounts, both personal and work-related accounts. If you use Outlook Express to manage your e-mail accounts, you will find this manager very useful as you tackle those multiple e-mail accounts. Note: this program is only compatible with Outlook Express.

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