[Mimedefang] Rewarding plaintext

[David F. Skoll]

On Fri, 17 Oct 2003, Les Mikesell wrote:

> > Now count how many of those legitimate HTML e-mail actually make use
> > of HTML formatting.  In my experience, it's a tiny, tiny minority.

> I'd say 90% or better is html here if I omit program-generated messages
> and open internet-mailing-lists where html is considered impolite.

I don't dispute that, but of all that HTML mail, how much of it
would lose anything by dropping the HTML formatting?

> I see a lot of assorted highlighting/colors, and fine-print disclaimers added
> as footers.  If you are throwing away that part you wouldn't know if it
> added meaning or not.

Well, let me put it this way:  I've never received an e-mail where I've
been confused because of lack of formatting.  I've also never been
involved in an e-mail exchange where it was obvious I was missing something
because I was nuking the HTML.

[...]

> > The dubious benefits of HTML (formatted e-mail, colors, images, etc.)
> > are simply not worth the cost (a terrific vehicle for spammers to evade
> > content scanning.)

> This may be true in some places but it is coincidental.  Exactly the
> same things that make email useful in general make it useful for
> spam.

Yes, but the things that make it easy for spammers to evade content-scanning
do not (IMO) add much utility to e-mail.

--
David.