Test message. Please ignore

[Peter Hansen]

Jacek Generowicz wrote:
> 
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> writes:
> > Use misc.test,
> 
> Last time I tried that, I immediately got 12 spams, half of them
> claiming that they weren't spam, because I explicitly asked for them
> merely by posting to misc.test.
> 
> That's really great, especially if you're just trying out your fresh
> and unknown-to-spammers email account :-)

Anyone using a real email account with either misc.test or comp.lang.python
should expect to be instantly indundated with spam anyway.  A fellow
from work posted recently with a new-before-seen-on-Usenet email address
and saw a step-increase in his spam at work immediately afterwards.

Posting to misc.test doesn't seem likely to increase the amount of spam
one gets if one has or intends to post to a regular newsgroup.  If you're
really concerned, you can easily spoof your address when posting the test
as well...

And there are tools to deal fairly effectively with spam anyway, so
I personally pretty much ignore it.  (Only a couple of spam messages
a day slip through for me, and if I cared enough I could shut down the
accounts pretty quickly as they all come from real people.)

> > not a regular newsgroup, for tests please.
> 
> Are you sure he wasn't posting to the mailing list ?

Not at all, but it doesn't change the point.  Test posts are almost never
necessary to either a mailing list or a newsgroup, and when they are 
necessary an explanation in the message as to why it was required is always 
appropriate, and ought to be considered mandatory.

All told, there's really no excuse for posting tests to c.l.p or the 
mailing list without a good reason, and an included explanation, so I
plan to continue trying to educate the obvious newbies who don't follow
this advice.  My guess is that for every one who posts a test here,
there are five who see my reply and have never heard of misc.test before,
and it's worth it to help them avoid making the same mistake.

-Peter