A personal response to your email to sixdegrees

[Declan McCullagh]

Mark, trust me on this: remove all five cypherpunks addresses from your
lists.

Really.

-Declan


On Wed, 16 Sep 1998, Mark Salamon wrote:

> (I was not sure which email address to send this to, as the return
> address was:  nobody at replay.com.  I also do not know who to address this
> email to.)
> 
> I am the WHOIS contact at sixdegrees you sent this email to, and since
> this is a peronal reply to your email, it is certainly NOT spam and I
> would appreciate it if you would take the time to read it and respond.
> 
> I am very confused by your email.  I understand that you do not wish to
> receive emails from sixdegrees, but it is very easy to solve this
> problem.  If anyone ever sponsors you for sixdegrees, simply reply to
> the email and put the word "remove" in the header.  (This is pretty
> standard stuff across the Internet, as I am sure you are aware.)  If
> that occurs, in the future we will not send emails to the email address
> that received the original email from us.
> 
> Unfortunately, if you have many email addresses (as it appears, from the
> bottom of your email), the only way for us to remove each is to have a
> sixdegrees email go to each of these email address accounts and then
> received a "remove" reply to each of these emails.  (We have in our
> records references to 5 different cypherpunks email addresses: 
> @toad.com, @cypherpunks.net, @cypherpunks.org, @algebra.com, and
> @ssz.com.  If you wish for us not to contact you again at any of these
> addresses, we will need to confirm that you in fact control these email
> addresses.  The best way for you to do this is to send an email to
> cancel at sixdegrees.com, and ask to have these email addresses removed. 
> We will then send a reply to each email address you listed, asking you
> to confirm that you in fact control those email addresses and wish to
> have them removed.  Once we receive your confirmation, we will adjust
> our records so you receive no further emails from us to those email
> addresses.  For example, if I receive an email from you to this email, I
> will assume that you control the @toad.com email address and I will have
> that removed.)
> 
> What is confusing to me is that the email you received from sixdegrees
> (with the subject:  Harald Fragner) is one that would be sent ONLY to a
> CONFIRMED sixdegrees user.  That means that once upon a time, whether
> you remember or not, you joined sixdegrees (as have over 1,000,000
> people to date).  It also appears that you listed Harald Fragner as a
> contact, and he recently denied his sixdegrees relationship with you. 
> Thus, it is not surprising that you would receive emails from
> sixdegrees, as you had registered for our service at one time.  (I
> assume that the email address you used to register with sixdegrees was
> the @toad.com one.)
> 
> sixdegrees is purely a voluntary service, and if you do not want to
> participate in it, then we are happy to accommodate you.  We do not send
> out spam and take great efforts to ensure that no one receives unwanted
> email from us.
> 
> I look forward to receiving your reply to this email.
> 
> Mark Salamon
> General Counsel
> MacroView Communications Corp.
> 
> 
> 
> Anonymous wrote:
> > 
> > On Tue, 15 Sep 1998, the shitheads at sixdegrees spammed the Cypherpunks
> > list with:
> > 
> > > Just a quick update from sixdegrees(tm). Unfortunately Harald
> > > Fragner (harald at fragner.net) asked not to be listed as your
> > > contact with sixdegrees.
> > >
> > > We also wanted to make sure you were aware that you currently
> > > have no other confirmed contacts, so it will be hard for you to
> > > have a productive sixdegrees experience. As you probably know,
> > > without any confirmed contacts, you won't get any results from our
> > > networking searches.
> > >
> > > So, we just wanted to recommend that you head over to
> > > http://www.sixdegrees.com , log-in, and go to MY CONTACTS
> > > to list additional relationships.
> > >
> > >
> > > ====================================================================
> > > PLEASE NOTE: All replies to this address are processed by a computer.
> > > If you have any problems, questions or requests send an e-mail to
> > > issues at sixdegrees.com and someone will get back to you as soon as
> > > possible.
> > > ====================================================================
> > >
> > >
> > > E.DB.BRESP.3
> > >
> > >
> > 
> > Just a quick update from the Cypherpunks(tm). Fortunately, we don't want
> > anything to do with your worthless, pathetic, spamming selves. We don't
> > want to be your friends and, in fact, we'd prefer it if you would crawl
> > under a rock and die because that seems to be the only way you'll stop
> > spamming our mailing list.
> > 
> > We also wanted to make sure that you were aware that you currently have no
> > confirmed redeeming qualities, so it will be hard for you to be taken
> > seriously by those of us who do have a clue. As you probably know, without
> > any redeeming qualities, you will get lots of results every time you send
> > out a batch of spam.
> > 
> > So, we just wanted to recommend that you head on over to your bathtub with
> > the rest of your coworkers, fill it up, jump in together, and then drop in
> > a large, plugged-in, turned-on electric heater into the water and remain
> > in until you stop twitching and cardiac activity ceases.
> > 
> > C.LU.EFULS.2000
> > 
> > You people don't give a fuck how much excrement you shoot all over the
> > net, so long as you let people know of your pathetic, worthless,
> > disgusting service. If you can get somebody's mailing list to relay your
> > shit for you, so much the better, because then you don't have to
> > personally send it.
> > 
> > Sorry, but I've had it with Sixdegrees. I've personally told you idiots
> > very nicely what the Cypherpunks list is, and asked you nicely to stop
> > spamming it. I've personally told you a method to keep people from
> > submitting these addresses to your worthless spam haven. Other people have
> > done the same thing. You haven't fixed it, indicating that you don't care.
> > I'm no longer asking nicely.
> > 
> > A copy is being sent to your technical contact, on the assumption that
> > maybe he is a little more responsible, though I doubt it.
> > 
> > -- The Cypherpunks List <cypherpunks at toad.com,
> > cypherpunks@*.cyberpass.net, cypherpunks@*.ssz.com,
> > cypherpunks at algebra.com, and others>
> 
> 
> 
>