In the 2nd part of the post is an e-mail I received about AOL (and, by definition, CS.COM) censoring political e-mails.
It seems to check out.
If this is accurate, then those with AOL/CS addresses should start complaining about littlegreenfootballs.com, andrewsullivan.com, etc. etc. immediately and with, as Teddy would say, "Great vigor!"
AOL is politically censoring the e-mails addressed to its customers.
There is no way for AOL users to turn off the censorship (e.g. by adjusting their "nanny filter" or whatever) and receive all of their e-mails. The censored messages are simply thrown away (bounced) as soon as AOL receives them.
If you are using AOL as your Internet service provider [ISP], web host, or mailing-list server, you should switch to a different company immediately!
If you are worried about missing e-mails if you switch to a
different ISP, because the address people know for you is
whatever@aol.com, you should get your own Internet domain, which you can then point to any mail address (and any web host) you want (and you can change them at any time). Thereafter you can change ISPs and web hosts with impunity (after sending your new address
-- YourName@yournewdomain.com -- once to all your friends and lists you're subscribed to). Your domain mail address will then be independent of your ISP and will never change; I am mark@cosmicpenguin.com no matter what ISP I'm using.
A domain only costs about $10/year (note: you must pay that every year or you will lose the domain), and e-mail forwarding only about $2 or $3/month. Do a Google search for "email forwarding" for instructions.
See below for details of AOL's political censorship:
On Tue, Mar 14, 2006 at 10:49:27AM -0500, RAMillegan@aol.com wrote:
>Subject: [cia-drugs] RoadsEnd's is always bouncing ...
>My posting to lists is being very much hampered. Even though I am
>owner, none of my post have shown up for several days to my yahoo
>groups even my CTRL@aol group.
Note that Millegan (RAMillegan@aol.com, roadsend@aol.com) is using AOL as his ISP, and also as his mailing-list server (for his list CTRL@LISTSERV.AOL.COM).
For at least a year, AOL has been discarding all e-mails containing -- in the text of the e-mail -- URLs of websites about which AOL has "received complaints". Presumably these "complaints" come from Bush supporters, the U.S. government, internal AOL political censors etc.
I often get bounce messages from the lists I run, saying that particular e-mails have been thrown away and not delivered to any of the AOL recipients on the list. These bounce messages contain a code 554.
I've included an example bounce message below, from Jan 3, 2006, featuring Millegan and another AOL customer. The AOL web page -- 554hvub1.html -- mentioned in the bounce messages says, "There is at least one URL in your email that is generating substantial complaints from AOL members."
There is no way for AOL users to turn off this political censorship and receive the e-mails addressed to them. AOL deletes the messages as soon as it receives them. AOL's billionaire CEO Steve Case is a known fascist. The second Google hit on him is this article from a fascist propaganda site, proudly telling how he donated money to an anti-gay church, and lamenting that people are angry at him for it:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/...
No one should use AOL as their ISP, mailing-list server, or website host. If you are doing so, you should switch to another company immediately! AOL should not be used by anyone for any purpose.
A telemarketer from AOL called me up last year and said I should use their service. I told him about AOL's political censorship. He said to me, "AOL is a family Internet service. Our customers don't need to know about political websites."
Here is an example AOL censorship bounce message; I have hundreds of them. Radio4houston.org is the server for the mailing-lists that I run; it doesn't censor anything. That server is reporting to me the rejection messages that AOL sent to it when it tried to send a perfectly good list e-mail to AOL users who are list members.
] Hi. This is the qmail-send program at radio4houston.org.
] I'm afraid I wasn't able to deliver your message to the following addresses.
] This is a permanent error; I've given up. Sorry it didn't work out.
]
] <RoadsEnd@aol.com>:
] 205.188.159.217 failed after I sent the message.
] Remote host said: 554-: (HVU:B1) http://postmaster.info.aol.com/...
] 554 TRANSACTION FAILED
]
] <gus1time@aol.com>:
] 64.12.137.249 failed after I sent the message.
] Remote host said: 554-: (HVU:B1) http://postmaster.info.aol.com/...
] 554 TRANSACTION FAILED
]
] --- Below this line is a copy of the message.
] ...
Mark
*******************
If this e-mail turns out to be bogus, and it doesn't, right now, appear to be, as it was forwarded to me by a nationally-known activist, I apologize in advance.
If however, this is accurate - let's go get 'em!!