Some unintentional humor fell out of the serious discussion of AOL's antispam policies, which we discussed last issue: AOL blocks emails that merely contain a link to sites AOL doesn't approve of. ( http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2004/2004-04-19.htm#2 ) Many AOL subscribers were incensed and asked AOL tech support for an explanation. Reader "Ray" for example, got this immediate reply from AOL:
...I assure you that AOL is not blocking emails of any sort from arriving on your mailbox....
Ray sent that to me, not knowing whom to believe.
But at almost the same moment Ray's mail arrived, I also got this:
Dear Fred, I just thought that I would let you know that I forwarded your [send to a friend] letter to all my friends on aol. Guess what, aol bounced everyone of them. This is the reason they gave: "(reason: 554-: (HVU:B1) The URL contained in your email to AOL members has generated a high volume of complaints... AOL will no longer accept email with the URL contained in your message. 554 TRANSACTION FAILED" ---Kris
Then I got a note from Fred and Anne Weaver:
After reading your recent newsletter on AOL I tried to send it to an AOL friend. Your URL caused it to be rejected by AOL! Why anyone uses AOL is beyond me. ---Fred and Anne
Then a note from Diane H Kuhn:
I tried to email the latest newsletter to 2 of my family members with AOL address. Both were returned to me within minutes of sending...the reason? It contained a link to a Malicious site....hmmmmm. I guess I better print it and mail it!! Thanks, Diane
It went on all day--- notes from AOL members telling me that AOL techs swore that AOL would *never* block email... followed by mail from readers outside of AOL who tried send to AOL members, and got their mail blocked. <g>
The amusing thing, aside from AOL's blatant duplicity in telling its customers one thing while simultaneously doing the opposite (ok, I have a dark sense of humor), is that the only link in the "send to a friend" letter was a link to the current LangaList issue on Langa.Com--- there was no ad link, no spam link, no tracking link, nothing but a link to a newsletter that criticized AOL. But that was enough for AOL to install a block on Langa.Com email. (Or, as AOL might say: "Block? What block? We'd never do that...!" <g>)
