Thursday, January 20, 2005
Verizon blocks European e-mail messages...
Man, I can't believe the sheer gall to do something like this. Aparantly due to spam concerns, Verizon has decided to block e-mails coming from europe. They say they will white-list things after complaints, but I really don't think that is acceptable.
This came to my attention after a post on a yo-yo board I read, which makes sense considering how spread out the community is over the world. I can only imagine the headaches this has caused for various people. I was planning on getting Verizon soon, but if I do, I think I'll stick with GMail for now instead of using their pop account if they are going to pull stuff like this.
Such a big part of the internet is about connecting with the world, to suddenly lock off half the rest of the world without warning seems almost inconceivable. This isn't some tiny ISP, but one of the largest DSL providers around. The rep from Verizon that says "If it's really important you might want to make a phone call" doesn't exactly change my mind in thinking they are out of touch.
It makes me feel sad that we're so American-centric at times in this country that a company feels like they can get away with something like this. Can you imagine the uproar we'd have on all the news stations if say a huge ISP in Britain said "we're not taking e-mails from the US anymore due to spam concerns"?
This came to my attention after a post on a yo-yo board I read, which makes sense considering how spread out the community is over the world. I can only imagine the headaches this has caused for various people. I was planning on getting Verizon soon, but if I do, I think I'll stick with GMail for now instead of using their pop account if they are going to pull stuff like this.
Such a big part of the internet is about connecting with the world, to suddenly lock off half the rest of the world without warning seems almost inconceivable. This isn't some tiny ISP, but one of the largest DSL providers around. The rep from Verizon that says "If it's really important you might want to make a phone call" doesn't exactly change my mind in thinking they are out of touch.
It makes me feel sad that we're so American-centric at times in this country that a company feels like they can get away with something like this. Can you imagine the uproar we'd have on all the news stations if say a huge ISP in Britain said "we're not taking e-mails from the US anymore due to spam concerns"?
