≡ Read Gratis Spam A Shadow History of the Internet Infrastructures Finn Brunton Geoffrey C Bowker Paul N Edwards Books

Spam A Shadow History of the Internet Infrastructures Finn Brunton Geoffrey C Bowker Paul N Edwards Books

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Spam A Shadow History of the Internet Infrastructures Finn Brunton Geoffrey C Bowker Paul N Edwards Books

'Tis a very odd feeling to find oneself a footnote to history, so to speak, but there I am, lurking behind note 70 on p. 91, the co-author of probably my most (in)famous web page: How to Sue MAPS (full reference on p. 251). Yes, we were young and brash. We dared the Internet to sue us, firmly believing justice was on our side.

How naive we were, and we learned yet another lesson about being careful what you wish for. But that is neither here, nor there, in this thin volume (~200pp.) purporting to be a history of spam, with the provocative subtitle "A Shadow History of the Internet." I wish this text had lived up to the promise of its title.

I almost immediately began to worry as I read that the book was an expanded version of a doctoral dissertation. I feared an overly intellectualized text was ahead, and my concerns were not unfounded. The author adopts an extremely broad definition of spam: "the use of information technology infrastructure to exploit existing aggregations of human attention." This is not bad as definitions go, but it encompasses such a variety of practices it becomes meaningless, ranging from someone in New Jersey wanting to sell their dinette set to vast networks of surreptitiously infected personal computers involved in the criminal activity of exchanging private credit card info.

Much more could have been said, and I wish the author had not been in such a rush to speed through his material. Yes, I am biased, having lived though and been a part of the story related here, but there are interesting stories left untold. Paul Vixie and MAPS are rightfully cast as protagonists, but this group only receives two mentions in the context of the Rodona Garst exposure by The Man in the Widerness.

Being a part of the story told here does cause me to approach the text with same bias. There's the two mentions of Vixie and MAPS, but only as feared antagonists of the beleaguered Rodona Garst. ROKSO -- Register of Known Spam Offenders -- is mentioned once but only as one among a veritable alphabet soup of anti-spam groups. It seems that in this book, as in Brian McWilliams' much older book, Spam Kings, it's the villians who are the most interesting, the ones who garner more authorial attention. The story of MAPS, of ROKSO, mentioned here but never discussed, are deserving of more attention than they have been given.

The author unnecessarily stretched his definition of spam to cover such a wide variety of definitions. Perhaps this was so that he could support his thesis that the meaning of spam was and is fluid. In seeking to be as general as possible, to speak in post-modernist language, the author eviscerates his subject, draining of life what could have been a much livelier and interesting story.

NANAE -- news.admin.net.abuse.email -- is mentioned, even described as a charivari, a definition I think is amusing, somewhat appropriate, but ultimately dismissive. There is much more interesting history here which remains untold. Other groups are identified only by their acronyms, their stories passed over in silence.

However, this is evidently the author's intent, with his focus on elucidating "a shadow history of the Internet." The sources of light must be hooded so that the narrative the author wishes to spin is not disrupted. Being as close as I was to many of the events referenced in the book, perhaps it is unfair of me to even critique the work, expecting completion where the author is able only to allude, where his intention is no more than to suggest.

There is an interesting history with both heroes and villians waiting to be written. For many years I myself have intended to write such a history, but my attention keeps getting drawn elsewhere. Perhaps this book will be the motivation I need to get started on writing that history.


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Spam A Shadow History of the Internet Infrastructures Finn Brunton Geoffrey C Bowker Paul N Edwards Books Reviews

Spam, the bane of the Web, has polluted the email of anyone and everyone who uses the Internet. No one is immune from the constant deluge of sales pitches intermingled with sex enhancing drugs, salacious come-ons and even outright pornography. Internet service providers are constantly updating their filters but increasingly sophisticated spammers continue to overcome them; nowadays it is a high-tech struggle of computer-generated algorithms combating equally complex algorithms and Spambots.

How did the plague of the information age become synonymous with a popular brand of lunchmeat? According to Hormel, the Minnesota company that produces canned-meat Spam, it all started with a spoof by the British Comedy group of Monty Python's Flying Circus. In the skit a group of Vikings loudly shout ...Spam.Spam Spam.. to drown out other conversation. This story is accepted by the Internet Society and also repeated in the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, which defines spam as "unsolicited e-email sent to a large number of addresses." In the 1980s some malicious users of BBSs (Bulletin Board System) and early chat rooms would flood the system with repeated ..Spam, Spam.. in huge numbers to overwhelm the user's screen and push out any other text.

Initially, Hormel tried to mount a campaign against infringement on its trademark, including an attempt, in 1997, to stop junk-mail king Sanford Wallace from using the word "Spam"; the endeavor backfired when Wallace spammed Hormel's letter all over the Internet. Spam is now universally recognized as meaning junk mail.

Spam is longer just confined to emails, but like fungus, it is spreading; it is now found in Instant Messaging, in Usenet Newsgroups, Blogs (Blam), Video sharing sites, Social networks, Mobile phones (as SpaSMS) and on search engines, where with a blend of spamming and indexing (Spamdexing) attempt to manipulate search engine optimization (SEO) for ranking.

Finn Brunton's book is a fascinating history of junk mail from the pre-Internet era of the early days of the telegraph to the present world of spambots. The author's comprehension of the Internet is clearly demonstrated from his description of nascent online communities, chat rooms and the blogosphere to the present supremacy of Google and Microsoft.
Finn explains the genesis of the spam scourge and its major transmittal sources (#1 is Pitcairn Island), he names the first known deliberate commercial spam, in 1994, by a lawyer advertising his skill to enter aliens into the Green Card Lottery.
Finn says that, "Spam e-mail is about 85 to 90% of all email sent on a given day....we don't see most of it because our filters are pretty good." He also describes how the system works and cautions about malware and identity theft. He uses a password manager to protect himself.

The book touches on almost anything relating to spam, from the CAN-SPAM act of 2003 and the escalating cost of junk mail; to the latest iteration of filter busters, such as Litspam, and the pervasive intrusion of our digital privacy by automated bots. Brunton also describes how the system works and cautions about malware and identity theft. He uses a password manager system to protect himself.

Brunton has managed to present a ubiquitous nuisance in people's daily life in an interesting historical narrative, kept lively with anecdotes... "There is no way to peace. Peace is the way" the first message (opposing the Vietnam war) sent, in 1971, by Peter Bos from MIT, simultaneously to a thousand fellow engineers.
Finn sees spammers not a villains but visionary trendsetters, "From a certain perverse perspective, spam can be presented as the Internet's infrastructure used maximally and most efficiently."

Brunton has succeeded in crafting a very readable book, about a limited subject, into a captivating historical document of the digital culture. It should be "de rigueur" reading for anyone who uses the Internet.
After hearing an interview with the author on PBS, I was eager to read this book. However, it is written for computer geeks. I had the feeling the author was still communicating with members of his dissertation committee. One member must have been a linguist, encouraging him to explore all the nuances of the word spam using esoteric approaches that further obscured what he was trying to convey. The book is very well documented, with about 13 of the pages devoted to footnotes and bibliographic references. But I had hoped for a more understandable presentation.
This book derived from the author's doctoral thesis is a good history of spam from early file transfer mail messages to the present day botnets. The history is complete and well laid out. As is appropriate for a thesis there are lengthy philosophical considerations, semantic discussions and generally broad theoretical points explained. While this is appropriate for a thesis it bogs down the flow of the book.
'Tis a very odd feeling to find oneself a footnote to history, so to speak, but there I am, lurking behind note 70 on p. 91, the co-author of probably my most (in)famous web page How to Sue MAPS (full reference on p. 251). Yes, we were young and brash. We dared the Internet to sue us, firmly believing justice was on our side.

How naive we were, and we learned yet another lesson about being careful what you wish for. But that is neither here, nor there, in this thin volume (~200pp.) purporting to be a history of spam, with the provocative subtitle "A Shadow History of the Internet." I wish this text had lived up to the promise of its title.

I almost immediately began to worry as I read that the book was an expanded version of a doctoral dissertation. I feared an overly intellectualized text was ahead, and my concerns were not unfounded. The author adopts an extremely broad definition of spam "the use of information technology infrastructure to exploit existing aggregations of human attention." This is not bad as definitions go, but it encompasses such a variety of practices it becomes meaningless, ranging from someone in New Jersey wanting to sell their dinette set to vast networks of surreptitiously infected personal computers involved in the criminal activity of exchanging private credit card info.

Much more could have been said, and I wish the author had not been in such a rush to speed through his material. Yes, I am biased, having lived though and been a part of the story related here, but there are interesting stories left untold. Paul Vixie and MAPS are rightfully cast as protagonists, but this group only receives two mentions in the context of the Rodona Garst exposure by The Man in the Widerness.

Being a part of the story told here does cause me to approach the text with same bias. There's the two mentions of Vixie and MAPS, but only as feared antagonists of the beleaguered Rodona Garst. ROKSO -- Register of Known Spam Offenders -- is mentioned once but only as one among a veritable alphabet soup of anti-spam groups. It seems that in this book, as in Brian McWilliams' much older book, Spam Kings, it's the villians who are the most interesting, the ones who garner more authorial attention. The story of MAPS, of ROKSO, mentioned here but never discussed, are deserving of more attention than they have been given.

The author unnecessarily stretched his definition of spam to cover such a wide variety of definitions. Perhaps this was so that he could support his thesis that the meaning of spam was and is fluid. In seeking to be as general as possible, to speak in post-modernist language, the author eviscerates his subject, draining of life what could have been a much livelier and interesting story.

NANAE -- news.admin.net.abuse.email -- is mentioned, even described as a charivari, a definition I think is amusing, somewhat appropriate, but ultimately dismissive. There is much more interesting history here which remains untold. Other groups are identified only by their acronyms, their stories passed over in silence.

However, this is evidently the author's intent, with his focus on elucidating "a shadow history of the Internet." The sources of light must be hooded so that the narrative the author wishes to spin is not disrupted. Being as close as I was to many of the events referenced in the book, perhaps it is unfair of me to even critique the work, expecting completion where the author is able only to allude, where his intention is no more than to suggest.

There is an interesting history with both heroes and villians waiting to be written. For many years I myself have intended to write such a history, but my attention keeps getting drawn elsewhere. Perhaps this book will be the motivation I need to get started on writing that history.