From: John Stanley (stanley@peak.org)
Date: Sun Jan 14 2001 - 23:53:58 CST
Brad Templeton (brad@templetons.com):
>There is an interoperability problem if a user puts an email into a
>message which is unreplyable and does not indicate it.
Baloney. Not a single news system in the world stops functioning if
someone uses a munged address without .invalid at the end. Not a single
one. If there aren't any news systems that care what appears in the From:
header, then it cannot possibly be an interoperability issue.
On the other hand, if you want to continue to argue that it is, then
I will count you as a supporter when I bring those issues I want changed
back up for discussion based on "interoperability".
>That's false data, and
>will cause the user agent to issue replies to that email address which
>will generate a bounce error. (And waste the sender's time.)
Big deal. It's a waste of time to send YOU email and you don't seem to
care, so why should we care that you've sent mail to
"biteme@nowhere.you.can.reach" and decided to waste your own time? When
YOU choose to send email, YOU choose to pay the price -- whatever that
happens to be. The poster didn't give you a blank check with his name on
it. And if your mail system breaks when a message you send bounces, get
a working mail system. The ability to bounce is found in the basic RFCs
for email.
>You should not put false information into an article indicating you have
>a replyable address when you don't.
That is a political statement, not a technical one, and thus does not even
come close to meriting a "MUST" to prevent it.
> It is a
> violation of important privacy principles to put truly identifying
> information into the header such as an IP address or email userid.
I agree. Remove the From: header altogether and let's stop violating
privacy principles.