As of May
19, 2004, I am using 24% of 1000 MB (243 MB). Another week, another
4800 plus emails.
Looking at my results, one could assume that Gmail's spam filters are
not ready for everyday use (and at times I have been critical of Gmail's
abilities). However, this isn't necessarily the case. The idea that
one can request spam isn't entirely scientific. Spam by its very nature
is unsolicited. I do receive a lot of emails that allow me to opt in
or opt out of newsletters. I don't ever opt in, but messages that allow
me to opt out are probably legal under the CAN-SPAM act. Even so, the
idea that someone is able to subscribe me to a newsletter that I don't
want
is
certainly
annoying. If organizations all switched to a double opt-in procedure,
I bet I would see fewer messages in my inbox every day.
So what can we learn from these tests? For one, Gmail does not seem
to adapt right away to user input on what its customers consider to
be spam. It's possible that Google updates their spam filters all in
one
fell
swoop.
Such
an update
may
have occurred on May 14th. Since
that time, it has been identifying 40% of the messages that I don't
want and moving them to my spam folder. It should be noted that I have
not been defining custom filters in Gmail. If I were to use custom
filters,
I would certainly be able to cut down on many more unwanted messages.
After all, no email provider will be able to eliminate 100% of spam
for 100% of its users without using some custom settings. The real
question is whether Gmail will be able to combat Hotmail-levels of
spam and provide users a positive experience. The jury's still out
on that one, so keep visiting this site for updates and spamming away
at prattboy@gmail.com.
Spam subject of the day: Eliminate Your Bills the Christian
Way
Through prayer? Divine intervention, maybe? Does communion eliminate my
bills?
As of May
18, 2004, I am using 23% of 1000 MB (231 MB). That's right! I said
23%! My account is back to showing that I have 1000 MB, rather than
1 TB of storage. Thanks goodness! What would I have done with all that
space?
Gmail still is not detecting e-mails with ADV and SEXUALLY-EXPLICIT
in the subject. Another interesting quirk: if I report a message as
spam, it is moved to my spam folder. You would think that any future
messages from the same sender with the same subject would go to my
spam folder, as well. Unfortunately, this is not usually the case.
Sometimes Gmail will think that a new message from the same spammy
sender with the same spammy subject line, is a continuation of a conversation.
It will then thread the original spam message and the new message and
show them both in your inbox. This tells me a couple things: firstly,
it does not seem if input collected from messages marked as spam is
initially interpreted into your own filters. If it were, I would expect
that
these future messages be marked as spam, too. Seondly, this tells me
that Gmail has some quirks that still need to be addressed.
By the way, I'm glad that Gmail's back to its 1000 MB self. A terabyte
of data is a lot of information to have sitting in one place, just
waiting to be hacked. And what if someone were to perpertrate a Gmail
stress test, like mentioned yesterday, on multiple 1 TB accounts? Sounds
like
potential disaster to me! Keep spamming away at prattboy@gmail.com.
Email subject of the day: cowslip
You should always use spaces.
What's the meaning of this message: "cow slip" or "cows lip"? They
both have entirely different meanings, you know
Mid-day Update, I am currently
showing that I have a terabyte of storage (1 million MB) rather than the standard
1000 MB. Did Google add more hard drives? Does every user now get
essentially unlimited storage? Is it just a fluke in
the system? Stay tuned to find out more. I do recall reading that employees
at the Googleplex are given 1 TB of storage for their mail, so my
best guess is that someone accidentally labeled me as an employee.
I'm not the only one with the increased quota, though. Check out this blog.
In the mean time, how long does it take to fill a terabyte with spam?
As of May
17, 2004, I am using 22% of 1000 MB (224 MB) in my Gmail account.
Someone brought up a very interesting point in an email to me today. If Google
is
blacklisting particular domains or senders, I would not be receiving some messages
that are addressed to me. Since I'm not receiving these messages, there's no
way that I can take them into account in my statistics.( Of course, my means
are by no means scientific, and I'll delve into that a little more in a future
post.)
I certainly hope that hope that Gmail is blocking messages from known spammers.
It would be costly to them to deliver all of these messages, and it is certainly
costly to users to sort through advertisements. It would alos be nice if Gmail
were able to detect malicious bulk mailings that are intended to flood an individual's
account, too. At this point, I'm not sure it is able to. Take a look at this
link for an experiment that was run to stress test Gmail's system. It's more
than a little alarming that such heavy loads can be placed on Google's mail system
with seemingly little effort. Note: I do not encourage anyone running this stress
test on anyone's account but your own.
Email Subject of the Day: Win a New Penis!
As of May
15, 2004, I am using 21% of 1000 MB (212 MB) in my Gmail account.
Gmail is showing similar spam filtering accuracy rates for the past few days,
but why the seemingly declining numbers? It's probably because someone requesting
to be spammed is not normal. An email account not used in this fashion would
most
likely
receive spam similar in structure or from similar senders. Publishing prattboy@gmail.com subjects
the address to the widest range of spam, and in some cases, legitimate email.
Therefore, a pattern indicating what is or is not spam might be slower
to emerge.
And for the record, Erick Thomas Gjerdingen has photogrpahic evidence proving
his girlfriend's dad looks like spider hole-era Saddam Hussein.
Spam Subject of the Day: Why do you keep sending me emails?
No... why do you keep sending me emails???
As of May
14, 2004, I am using 9% of 1000 MB (90 MB) in my Gmail account. Apparently
sending me MP3's is all the rage, now. I haven't been opening them,
however, still for fear of viruses. Gmail seems to allow attachments
of 6.95 MB, not 10 MB due to compression
overhead.
Gmail's spam filters continue to do better, but Google is mum on how exactly
they work. According to a message from the Gmail team that I received today,
"Keeping spam out of users' inboxes is something we take very seriously,
and we are continuously working to improve our filtering system so that
spam doesn't reach your inbox. We have filters in place to prevent spam
from reaching your inbox, but beyond this, I cannot disclose specifics
about our anti-spam technology. To help with this process, we ask that you
report any unsolicited messages. To do so, check the box next to the
unsolicited message and select 'Report as spam' from the 'More actions...'
drop-down menu. If you decide an email is spam after it has been opened,
simply select 'Report as spam' from the 'More actions...' drop-down menu
along the top of the message. Please note that all spam will be
automatically deleted from your account after 30 days. We appreciate your
help in keeping your inbox free from spam. By reporting unwanted messages,
you send valuable data to help our spam filters eliminate unwanted email." Looks
like I have a month to store junk mail in the spam folder. If I want to keep
it, I'll have to recategorize it. I think this makes sense for most
users. Who but me is trying to keep spam? Based on the mail from the Gmail team,
it's
not
clear
whether the development of Gmail's spam filtering system is purely algorithmic
at this
point
or if the
data that you send is, at some point, reviewed by Google's staff. Any privacy
policy experts that can shed some light on
the topic?
I'm still perplexed that Gmail shows advertisements on some messages that it
marks as spam. If Google has determined that I won't want to purchase the good
or service advertised in the email, why would they think that I would want to
purchase a similar good or service that Gmail advertises?
Keep that spam (and any stories you have about Gmail) coming to prattboy@gmail.com and
decide for youself whether spamming
me is legal.
Spam Subject of the Day: Pooper Family Insurance Notice
Whoever signed me up using the alias "Billy Pooper" has found
a source that is very effective at spamming individuals.
As
of May 13, 2004, I am using 3% of 1000 MB (30 MB) due in part
to a couple more 3 MB movie attachments. Just for the record, I
am not
opening attachments in case they contain viruses so I cannot confirm
that these messages are actually spam. If you're concerned as to
whether or not Gmail is able to handle large
attachments,
the
good news is it can handle large attachments! Now we'll have to
see if Yahoo! Mail can handle large attachments when it launches
its
100 MB email service.
Today marks a noticable improvement in Gmail's spam filtering capabilities.
While it's probably not yet on an acceptable level for every day
use, it's a start. So why the improvement? Maybe it helps that
I'm getting
more messages (keep 'em coming guys!). Or does Gmail use some sort
of Bayesian filtering system that's adapting to
my input?
Has
Google
updated
their
system? Is it just a fluke? We'll see what happens, so keep spamming
away at prattboy@gmail.com.
I would like to note that some people have been reporting that
Yahoo! Groups invitations are automatically filtered as spam by
Gmail's
system. I have not witnessed this, however. Up to this point I
have received
three Yahoo! Groups invitations, and all have been delivered to
my inbox.
For those interested in Gmail's advertising and what triggers it,
a 30 word message with a 17 word footer (grayed out) triggered
three sponsored
links
today. That's an awfully short message to trigger relevant ads,
and the links were, in fact relevant.
And just for the record, the word "spam", no matter
how many times you type it, does not seem to trigger Gmail's
spam
filters. Nor does
a picture of Hormel Spam (and believe me, someone has tried).
Spam Subject of the Day: Don't Sprinkle While You Tinkle
Best Subject From Someone Testing Spam Filters: Sexy
girls offer mortgages for your viagra |
