[OS X TeX] Re: [OT] Spamming?

Bruno Voisin bvoisin at mac.com
Fri Sep 29 11:22:50 EDT 2006


Le 29 sept. 06 à 15:36, Alex a écrit :

> I guess I should've expected it: take a minute or two to offer a  
> suggestion to someone who complained of Spotlight shortcomings, and  
> the reply is a dressing down which implies I'm a spammer or phisher...

In no case this was what I had in mind, or what my message was meant  
to imply. It was just a warning that URLs, such as those provided by  
TinyURL, which are just "proxys" pointing to totally different and  
hidden actual URLs, are dangerous.

It was my understanding that TinyURL offered site owners a service,  
by which the site owners could pay TinyURL for creating a TinyURL  
address pointing to their site. Hence my message was essentially a  
message to you, telling (in case you were not aware) that using  
TinyURL addresses was potentially dangerous.

Now, from John McChesney-Young's answer I have the impression TinyURL  
is actually a service (a Firefox extension) that anybody can use to  
create themselves a tiny URL pointing to any site. Which would mean  
you had created yourself, for our convenience, the tiny urls included  
in your message, right?

If so, my fault. It was a misunderstanding on my part.

> You're welcome, Bruno. And, FYI, there are widely used email  
> clients which do not honour long URLs, even when quoted or enclosed  
> in angle brackets. Hence the need for TinyURL. But thanks for the  
> lesson, anyway.

It wasn't intended as a lesson. Only a warning.

Either a consequence of Rowland's email messages and the public  
exchanges that followed recently, or the consequence of wider  
exposure, or a disconnected phenomenon, or paranoia on my part, but  
in any case the atmosphere of this generally friendly list seems to  
have changed of late. It does not feel as cosy as it used too...

Bruno Voisin

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