Linkage to spam?
I'd like to know about the linkages to the spammers. Yes, many of the spammers do seem to be minor-league nuisances, though they are much more visible in our lives, but I'm curious about such factors as (1) How many major criminals started as spammers? (2) How much cover do the big-league criminals get from the massive noise of the spam? (3) How much of the spammer infrastructure is shared with the big-league criminals?
In short, I do regard these guys as smarter than the average spammer, but about the same level of evil.
Speaking of EVIL that reminds me of the new spammer-friendly policies of the google and Yahoo. Anyone want to report on recent changes in Microsoft's email systems? I'm not using them these days because of their excessive spammer friendliness in the past (and even though Microsoft has done some good work against spammers upstream--I'm still on the downstream end).