nettime: whois Jess Hirsh

[Tilman Baumgaertel <100131.2223@compuserve.com>]

There was a piece of spam by a character named Jess Hirsh on this list a couple
of days ago. It was advertising a number of  "McLuhan Seminars" in Toronto.
Anyone who read this might be interested in the following message from the
McLuhan Mailing List.

Yours,
Tilman 

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 4 Jan 1997 20:56:08 -0500 (EST)
From: Project.McLuhan@astral.magic.ca
Reply-To: mclr@astral.magic.ca
To: McLuhan-List.Subscribers@astral.magic.ca
Subject: McLuhan-List "Raped" -- Your Name "Stolen"


Dear "McLuhan-List" Subscriber:

Since its inception in 1994, this list (run by
the non-profit and charitable CENTER FOR MEDIA
SCIENCES, McLuhan Research Division) has used
"Majordomo" sofware, one of the two currently
popular mail list packages. Majordomo allows for
large list managment (over 3,000 names on our main
list, currently) but lacks state-of-the-art
"security" features. In other words, if you want
to ATTACK our server and STEAL our list, and if
you have the time and the inclination, you
probably can.

It appears that this has, in fact, been done.
Most of our list has received a communication
from "jesse@tao.ca", (also known as
"mcluhan@tao.ca" and "mcluhan-list@tao.ca")
announcing some so-called McLuhan "seminars" to
take place shortly in Toronto.

We did NOT authorize this transmission!! We have
no connection with these people. We cannot speak
for the quality of the seminars they are
conducting. (After Marshall's untimely death in
1980, the original "McLuhan evening seminars"
were conducted by our very own Nelson Thall at
the University of Toronto. Nelson has no connection
whatsoever with these new seminars, however.)

What's more, we think the electronic "theft" of
our list -- a list we took three years to build
-- is REPREHENSIBLE. If you agree, you can direct
your comments directly to <jesse@tao.ca>. If you
receive any more communications from these
people, consider that these also are
"unauthorized". These are no better than junk
mail or SPAM. Worse, they are designed to give
the IMPRESSION they are part of a list you are
already subscribed too. At present the ONLY way
you can be sure you are receiving a VALID message
from THIS list is :

* return URL states "mclr@astral.magic.ca"; OR
* "astral.magic" in the sending ID; OR
* direct quotes from NELSON THALL in the body of
        the message

We regret the inconvenience. We are as shocked
and amazed by this as you are. Probably moreso.

--
*  distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission
*  <nettime> is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism,
*  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
*  more info: majordomo@is.in-berlin.de and "info nettime" in the msg body
*  URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/  contact: nettime-owner@is.in-berlin.de