In the last few days I noticed that Comcast High-Speed Internet has dropped support for plus aliases. (A plus alias is an email alias that is formed using a plus sign. For example, joe+63noggin@example.net is an alias for joe@example.net.) This disturbs me. With plus aliases, an email user has an unlimited number of aliases, which he can use to dodge spammers. The concept is simple: if an email alias is compromised to spammers, one can create a new alias.
It may be true that plus aliases are not easy to use. But that's only because mail clients don't take advantage of them. And mail clients don't take advantage of them because the largest ISPs don't support them. And the largest ISPs don't support them because there is no consumer demand. And there is no consumer demand because most consumers don't know about them or understand them. And most consumers don't know about them or understand them because the mail clients don't handle them. In short, it's the classic chicken-and-egg problem.
And now Comcast has taken a step backwards. Could it be because of AT&T's patent?
Posted by Doug Sauder at September 2, 2003 09:19 AM