It occurs to me that these free email companies are potentially disorienting their customer base. Imagine if every newsletter sign up says, "We're sorry but we cannot deliver newsletters to your hotmail/yahoo/aol email account." I have to imagine they will start losing their customers pretty quickly to smaller companies that have no such problem with actually delivering peoples email. Besides, don't we already know that these companies are selling out the email addresses before you even have a chance to poorly distribute it? As I recall the last time I made a hotmail account I was receiving spam before I even told anyone the address. Ben Liyanage ben at smartankgroup.com 410.336.2464 -----Original Message----- From: hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net [mailto:hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net] On Behalf Of Jonathan Dill Sent: Friday, February 17, 2006 1:23 PM To: hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net Subject: [Hidden-tech] Goodmail spells doom for mailing lists? ** Be a Good Dobee and help the group, you must be counted to post . ** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area. Has everyone heard about the changes planned by AOL, Yahoo! etc. to require "certification" via Goodmail or just be blocked? There will be a fraction of a cent fee to send "bulk" e-mail messages. http://www.clickz.com/news/article.php/3581301 http://www.goodmailsystems.com/ What will happen to a mailing list such as this one? Will AOL and Yahoo! users just be out of luck or have to get an e-mail account with another provider in order to receive mailing lists? Maybe this mailing list is small enough that the fees could be manageable, but I manage one mailing list for a small business that has about 45,000 subscribers. On the surface, I guess the certification sounded like a good idea, but for a lot of organizations, like this one or any of numerous all-volunteer developer projects, it is going to put an unfair tax on e-mail. Jonathan _______________________________________________ Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion list. If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members page on the Hidden Tech Web site. http://www.hidden-tech.net/members