Spam Wars: The Battle History

Preface: Definitions of Spam

The only constant in the Great Spam War is change.

Perhaps now we (tinw) will see street corner dealers selling/hawking/pushing monthly Bullet Proof Hosting to those hooked on spamming, a known and destructive addictive behaviour.

-- Sun Tsu - The Art of War

Being a concept developed over time, Spam is defined differently by different people and under different situations.
Display of these definitions does not mean the authors ascribe to any particular one or combination.

Unsolicited

Spam was NEVER asked for by the recipient.

Bulk

A Spam is by its nature one of many instances received. Of course, there is a very long-standing debate on 'how many is many?'. Some cyberspaces, such as usenet, have been able to define this, others have not.

Recipient-Pays

The Cost of the Spam is paid by the Recipients or other third-parties. Not the Source.
In Addition to the bulk definition; even if the cost of send equals cost of receipt on a 1-1 basis Spam balloons out into a large collective cost for recipients to a very small cost at source.

This has become eminently clear in the email protocols. There a spam-run costing the spammer as little as $0.001 results in over $1,000 for recipients. This even without including transport costs bourne by the network or work-hours spent handling the resulting junkmail.

On a side note:
    The largest spammer as at 1 Jan 2005 uses up over 2.5 years of human work daily just deleting received spam.

Abusive / Disruptive / Off-Topic

The Internet has been constructed in various cyberspaces, each having a purpose. Spam always outside this purpose and often disruptive to the operation of the cyberspace it is entering, at all levels of the network.