But I will reply in one.

a) You act as though we don't know what Goodmail is doing and then complain about what they're not doing. This is pointlessly antagonistic. As I've said many times, this is about the concept, the precedents, of which Goodmail is the first successful salvo. No, goodmail is not a tax, no, it is not charging you to mail your girlfriend, but these things are often proposed as part of this school of anti-spam thought. We're opposing the school, not just goodmail, so that goodmail is not doing some of the the things is not germane to the debate about the _trend_ and whether it's good or bad. I hope nobody is so foolish as to think this trend stops with what Goodmail is doing today. Rather, if Goodmail succeeds it makes it easier for others to follow with more. The Korean example largely failed. Goodmail makes it easier for the next one to go further.

b) Yes, I believe that people on the list have been blocked by AOL in the past, I don't know the recent situations. I would have to check for specific cites. However, again, this is not about AOL or Goodmail in specific. This is about a principle. There are lots of hardworking, well intentioned people at AOL. Presumably at Goodmail too.

c) The whole point of the essay I wrote to start this is that spam is not, in spite of many people's instincts a cost issue. The whole point of the internet cost contract is you don't get to account for the cost of individual traffic. The subtle difference is that spam is more correctly a DoS issue. DoS is the one place you do get to account for the traffic. No one spam is a DoS, no one spam is an unfair "shift" of cost because the internet deal is there's no shifting of cost in either direction. The mass of spams that overload our systems and mailboxes -- that's the real issue of spam and the place to find the solution.

d) In spite of your admonition not to worry about this extending to Aunt Tilly, that's exactly what we see people like Esther Dyson suggesting is inevitable. If you want to cite her arguments so much, don't leave out the big part.