cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/1898981
Archived version: https://archive.ph/sfxWW
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20230825182626/https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/08/judge-tears-apart-republican-lawsuit-alleging-bias-in-gmail-spam-filter/
Spam filters are also built with users in mind.
If users are hitting the spam button, that’s people signaling that the email is shit.
If people are telling them to shut up, that’s not bias, that’s “your words are garbage to GTFO”
Sent an email to my local representative looking to improve things locally. No response, but I was signed up for several newsletters and campaign donation lists after that. Nearly as upsetting as the endless torrent of advertisements from the vet that put down my dog. No, I’m not in the market for heart worm medication anymore. Fuck that vet, and fuck my local rep.
Also, spam filters are trained by user response. Guess what personality type/computer education level is more likely to hit “REPORT SPAM” button versus the more technologically sophisticated and patient methods of deleting an email, unsubscribing, or filtering out, and how that may relate to their political party.
I work in IT and hit Spam on everything I perceive as spam.
Poison all the data and fuck spammers straight to hell, tyvm.
This is the way. I hit spam on every email I’m upset about receiving before unsubscribing.
I’ve seen some people deal with newsletters they signed up for that way and it’s unarguably a misuse and abuse of the system. “I don’t want these messages any longer” is not the same as unsolicited or abusive mail. For instance I see a small chocolate company and a granola company in my spam folder in gmail. Do they “spam”? No, there’s a really huge difference between e-mail marketing and spam. It sounds like what you ‘perceive’ as spam is based on not really knowing what it is.
Poison all the data
Is that some juvenile badassery or something?
fuck spammers straight to hell, tyvm.
yes, fuck spammers but not small companies doing email marketing. Email marketing is the only effective way to grow a business online these days without paying some giant fuckstick corporation like Facebook, so I don’t believe what you stated is accomplishing what seems to be your goal. If you make email marketing unusable, that helps google sell ads.
Email marketing is the only effective way to grow a business online these days
Sorry, but I call horse_shit_ on this. If the only way you can grow your business is to shovel your garbage into my personal inbox, then it’s spam, plain and simple.
If I have to give you my e-mail address to order something and you default “sign up for more of my bullshit” to checked, then fuck you.
I see this as “Did I intend to get this email?” Then nothing happens. If I did not intent to receive it then it is spam because I never intentionally subscribe to any marketing emails.
That’s accurate and reasonable.
You’ve never done something and thought “oh hell this isn’t want I signed up for”?
misuse and abuse
🤣
Do you, by chance, run a business that sends out mass email spam?
No, I sure don’t. I don’t have anything to do with companies that do legitimate email marketing, either. But I am able to understand the difference.
I’m not sure what the stupid emoji is supposed to mean, by the way.
So you’re just a mass-market email fanboy?
🤣
So you’re someone who doesn’t understand the difference between newsletters and spam, and uses stupid emoji to make your points?
No, there’s a really huge difference between e-mail marketing and spam.
From Wikipedia:
Spamming is the use of messaging systems to send multiple unsolicited messages (spam) to large numbers of recipients for the purpose of commercial advertising.
So yeah, what you described is spam by definition.
No, the difference i have noted is solicited vs unsolicited. If you sign up for something it is solicited as based on the definition of the word. Deciding you no longer wish to receive it is different than if you never signed up in the first place. Amazing how confused people are about this.
unsubscribing
Great way to show an e-mail spammer that the address works and is monitored by a human. Standard IT guidance for at least two decades has been to NOT use unsubscribe.
and how that may relate to their political party.
If there is a correlation between tech savvy and political party it’s so small as to be meaningless.
That’s for actual spam, not merely a newsletter or marketing email you don’t wish to receive any longer. The distinction is my entire point. If you signed up for something and don’t wish to receive it any longer, that’s not spam.
Older people are more likely to be republicans. Older people are also less likely to be technologically sophisticated.
I’ve never signed up for a newsletter. Buying things and donating to places and emailing anyone puts you on lists, and they are spam, because they never got consent.
Yes, that is spam.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The RNC is seeking “recovery for donations it allegedly lost as a result of its emails not being delivered to its supporters’ inboxes,” Calabretta noted.
Calabretta, a Biden appointee, called it “concerning that Gmail’s spam filter has a disparate impact on the emails of one political party, and that Google is aware of and has not yet been able to correct this bias.”
“The Court grants Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss in full on the ground that it is immune from suit on these facts under Section 230 with leave to amend to establish a lack of good faith,” the order said.
In January, the Federal Election Commission rejected a related RNC complaint that alleged Gmail’s spam filtering amounted to “illegal in-kind contributions made by Google to Biden For President and other Democrat candidates.”
The lawsuit in the US District Court “is not over” despite yesterday’s ruling, RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel said in a statement quoted by Courthouse News Service.
If the Republican group “were to amend its Complaint to seek injunctive relief only, the Court would likely dismiss the entire action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction,” the order said.
The original article contains 679 words, the summary contains 190 words. Saved 72%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Isn’t it funny how they are so quick to cry that they’re not fascists, but when you ask them why they use “anti-fa” as a derogatory insult they still have trouble putting it together?
Persecution fetish
Google previously ran a pilot program that let political emails bypass the Gmail spam filter.
Straight fuck Google.
I wondered why I was getting more political spam in my inbox for a bit…
Ever since spamming was invented, spammers caught trespassing on other people’s mail servers always say they’re being unfairly targeted.
