Re: [OT] Contacting Valentin Message #5 Posted by Valentin Albillo on 10 May 2007, 4:50 a.m., in response to message #4 by Randy
Hi, Randy:
Randy posted:
"Let's see if I have this right: You *know* people are sending you messages but *you* don't want to respond because they didn't go to your website to find the secret password?"
First of all, thanks for your interest in my post. Now, I dont "*know*", I just "noticed" by sheer accident.
Second, you've read far too many novels: I don't call it "secret password" but "spam filter". My public address is that, public, so it gets tons and tons of spam, about 1000 spam e-mails for each legitimate one or more, most of which are potentially harmful even to just open, if not downright disgusting.
Thus it's not that I "don't want to respond because they didn't go to your website to find the secret password", but else that unless I filter out the spam there's no way I would ever be able to find the legitimate messages sent to me among that many garbage.
The "HP CALCS" subject does just that: any message not including it is considered spam and immediately deleted, any message including it does end up in the Inbox for me to eventually read it.
And, just in case you were thinking or implying that I want to force people to visit my website, nothing could be further from the truth: my website, in its actual status, is rather worthless to visit save for the occasional article which I make available online periodically, and which gets announced here when I upload it. I'm not interested in the least in the visitor's count or whether it's linked or not from other sites. Matter of fact, I think that there is no link to it in the appropriate Links section of this MoHP site, for instance, but whether that's the case or not, I doesn't trouble me in the least.
"Now that's appalling ;-)"
You're entitled to your opinion, of course, but I've found no better way to deal with the spam, and just by googling for the pretty obvious "albillo hp calcs" search string will immediately get you to my web page, where the "HP CALCS" subject line theme is explained at the very beginning.
Unfortunately, there's no provision in the MoHP forum posting system to include such a warning, and repeating it here periodically would be unpolite, incredibly narcissistic on my part, and quickly get on everyone's nerves: just imagine if many other people did the same, the forum would get crowded with "How to contact me!" instructions.
"Question: If I sent you a message via the MoHPC system, how would I know you have a website? "
If you're a regular, that should be known to you because I frequently include references to its existence when I put online some articles, etc. If you're a newbie, you must assume you don't know everything and a useful strategy is to google to see if that person has a website or a blog or does post in the news.
That failing, and in urgent cases, it's rather common to post a message such as "Mr. XX, I want to contact you!" or something like that, which normally gets read and answered immediately.
Also, please take into consideration that I don't get paid for answering unrequested e-mails and thus I am under no obligation whatsoever to reply to anyone or read each and every mail sent to me, let alone thread among thousands of spam just to find the few legitimate ones. I just do it out of politeness and as a contribution to the HP community, in case I can be of any help to someone or someone wants to discuss some HP- or math-related matter with me. This being the case, I stablish the appropriate rules that suit me and that's it.
Anyway, if you can think of a better mechanism, short of posting a front-page add in each and every publication in the world, I'll certainly consider it and will thank you for it.
Best regards from V.
Edited: 10 May 2007, 7:53 a.m.
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