Send a blank email to ideas-subscribe@spamconference.org to subscribe. (To receive more information about how to use the mailing list, send a blank email to ideas-help@spamconference.org.)

The purpose of the list is, as the name implies, to give people a place to discuss ideas for stopping spam, anything from refinements to filtering algorithms to full-blown utopian schemes ("it would be easy to stop spam if everyone just...").

Another purpose of the list is to prevent further patents in the area of spam filtering. Patents are alarming because they could lead to what Bill Yerazunis called a "monoculture"; if one filter dominated, it would be easier for spammers to tune around it. No previously published idea can be patented, so anything you send to this list is safe, unless there is already a pending application.

Just try to be polite and don't start flamewars. This list is not the place for usenet-level rudeness. We'll kick you off if you become a nuisance.

Also, please note we don't have any server level filtering installed on the list. Eventually harvesters will find the address. Many spammers filter out addresses with spam as a substring, but to the extent they don't there may be spam on the list.