State of the state: While this community is probably the one with the most to lose as result of the spam deluge , it unfortunately has the least power to do anything about it. Most end users (individuals, companies, and other organizations) are uneducated about the complexities of spam. They are easily seduced into supporting (or demanding) ineffective laws or using solutions that may provide temporary relief, but do nothing to solve the problem. Because of the non-delivery problem, which most filtering solutions do nothing about, this community needs to understand that on its current course (where a highly fractured approach is being used to combat spam), "spam is going to get you, one way, or another."

			JamSpam Report Card, May 2003 End Users Grade None  See Legend End users can hardly be faulted with malfunctioning technology and laws. They just want their privacy protected, and they want to be able to rely on the Internet's e-mail system to make sure the mail they send gets to its destination.

Unfortunately, most end users only become aware of this problem, as I did, when the e-mail they send, without warning, fails to reach its destination. By patronizing band-aid type solutions, this community could actually be doing more harm than good. While it may be relieving itself of the most obvious problems caused by spam (inbox clogging, productivity draining, etc.), as long as it continues to invest in non-strategic solutions, it is applying none of the economic leverage it has on the solutions providers to change their approach to the problem.

This community also has a predisposition toward supporting unworkable solutions--such as charging for e-mail, creating the equivalent of "do not call" lists, and putting bounties on spammers' heads. These and other schemes invariably fail to consider the international nature of the Internet and the weaknesses in the existing protocols that amount to loopholes that spammers can take advantage of to circumvent such schemes.

Report card: No Grade End users can hardly be faulted with malfunctioning technology and laws. They just want their privacy protected, and they want to be able to rely on the Internet's e-mail system to make sure the mail they send gets to its destination. Unfortunately, this community is getting mixed messages from all of the other communities on what to do about the spam problem. Until all the communities get together behind an effort like JamSpam and make the launch of a high impact educational campaign (much like anti-smoking campaigns) one of its priorities, this community will be led down the wrong path like a thirsty horse to a dry well.

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