Talk:Newsgroup spam

Untitled section
The article notes that newsgroup spam came before email spam, dating it as 1994. But another page notes that DEC made the first email spam in 1978 (anniversary is around today, give or takle a day or two). Both articles can't be correct. Rhialto 07:16, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that is right. The Thomas incident did mark the beginning of the never-ending modern wave, but there were isolated incidents of this kind of thing earlier in both mail and news. --iMb~Meow 14:49, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Citation
Please see WP:V and the associated documents regarding citing things from usenet and other self-published sources. Making the claim that " The first widely recognized Usenet spam (though not the most famous) was posted on January 18, 1994 by Clarence L. Thomas IV, a sysadmin at Andrews University. Entitled "Global Alert for All: Jesus is Coming Soon"" with the only citation being usenet violates WP:V. A credible source needs to make that claim or present that as fact in order for it to be used on wikipedia, otherwise its original research.--Crossmr 02:22, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * This article in an exception proving the rule. Obviously, an article about Usenet can legitimately cite Usenet! It is perfectly acceptable to ignore all rules in cases when they are nonsensical, that's why "ignore all rules" exists. --iMeowbot~Meow 02:57, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * actually it can't. You're making a claim about this being the "first" piece of spam. Tell me where on that citation that it credibly sources the fact that that is the first piece of spam? It doesn't. While you can link to that piece of spam as the first piece of spam you need a credible source saying that it is, otherwise, do we just take your word for it?--Crossmr 03:02, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Actually, I'm not making any claims about what was the first spam, I didn't write the article. It is extremely obvious, if one merely looks at it, that reference for the Thomas thing is to provide an example of the spam. You are looking for a reference for a different thing, it's not that the reference there fails in what information it does offer. --iMeowbot~Meow 03:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * also re-read WP:V it clearly states "These three policies are non-negotiable and cannot be superseded by any other guidelines, or by editors' consensus", which means nothing gives you the ability to ignore it. All we need is a proper citation, an article, a book, something. I'm sure as the inaugural piece of spam someone has covered it somewhere.--Crossmr 03:05, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Um, no, the Google reference is the appropriate place to get an example of the Thomas spam. You are, of course, encouraged to look up and add references for other points you deem important. --iMeowbot~Meow 03:10, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
 * If you want to keep the information its your job to find the citation. Google groups is an example of usenet spam. It can't be used to support the claim that that is the FIRST piece of spam. Its called "widely recognized" widely by who? see WP:WEASEL for that. From WP:V The burden of evidence lies with the editors who have made an edit or wish an edit to remain. If you'd like the information to stay, the burden lies with you to find the citation. I've tagged it, I'll leave it a few days, if not citation is forthcoming the claim will be removed until it can be properly cited.--Crossmr 03:16, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Which was all that was needed. Its not that hard to make an article that follows wikipedia policies and guidelines. Thanks Bryan!--Crossmr 07:03, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * If it was so easy (and it was), I think you should just as well have done it yourself. It strikes me as a waste of time to be arguing whose "responsibility" it is instead of just fixing it. Bryan 07:14, 11 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't have any particular interest in the subject or any knowledge about it. I was linked to the article by someone else who was trying to use this article as justification for similar improper citings on another article. I made notation of them and left. If I took the time to find citations for everything I find uncited, I'd never get to work on the articles I want to work on. Most don't turn into debates like this.--Crossmr 07:20, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

How on Earth is it possible to have a Wikipedia page dedicated Newsgroup Spam and fail to mention the one overwhelming source in recent times: "MI5 Persecution". Obnoxious as it is, that spam is terribly prevalent across hundreds of groups and is definitely notable. Trimbo (talk) 00:16, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Amazing. The SPAM term and the process was a result of shady (or opportunistic?) individuals trying to make a quick buck with little or no expense at the expense of those of us trying to organize vast amounts of knowledge into thousands of little news slots. At the time, they violated only the professional and gentleman's agreement and trust we all had at the time to follow the forum and BBS rules of conduct. Average users would complain about all the identical, non-relevant ad messages in multiple newsgroups. As an abbreviation we called these annoying messages SPAMMA, which was quickly reduced to just SPAM. It stood for Same Post Across Many Message Areas. Later it was universally known as any unwanted solicitations or otherwise annoying duplicate messages. These individuals have no more credibility now than then. Let alone credible books or web sources to cite. I'm 63 years old. I was a Sperry (Unisys) then LAN Sysadmin. For a hobby I spent hours moving and forwarding my local BBS news spools to the next hub over phone lines at 300 then 1200 baud. These were later merged into USENET. I was there. There may have been advertising earlier, but the term SPAM was born in news groups and USENET. I'm a little saddened that a search of the acronym SPAMMA and USENET returned no results. I would hate to see the truth die with us old timers. 216.186.242.44 (talk) 20:21, 25 February 2013 (UTC) LanMan

Google Usenet News Archive
Neutrality is challenged, but not commented upon, so no response possible at this point, other than to say it reads as neutral to me. Wickorama (talk) 00:31, 24 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I believe there's a need to find a reference for the 3rd period in the first paragraph ("Critics have suggested..."). That would somehow give grounds to the section, which honestly I don't believe are verifiable at the moment. Al (talk) 15:01, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

The current two versions of Google Groups both have a way to flag a posting as span in the UI; the newer version immediately hides the flagged post for anyone else who looks at it in the new UI. Does that affect the validity of this section of the article? DavidLeeLambert (talk) 22:22, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Entertaining self-referentiality
I'm amused by how the coda about Google Groups makes the wikipedia article itself read like a USENET thread, with the main article as the original post and the Google Groups thing as a reply. I had to resist the urge to post this message on the talk page, instead of as another reply at the bottom of the article... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.210.11.182 (talk) 07:16, 24 April 2012 (UTC)