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JR, nice post, but i think you are in la la land ...
1) It may not be so simple, but the average schmuck CAN do it. that's the problem. any retard with a computer and some software can send a few million emails. not necessarily 'properly', but what's your definition of properly? as long as it gets in their inbox, that's all most spammers care about.
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what i mean by "properly" is that it takes serious volume to make money. by "properly" i was talking about the people who send most of the spam on the web. its not a question of "reaching the inbox". its a question of millions reaching the inboxs' everyday. thats no easy task... and that is increasingly beyond the reach of the average schmuck to do.
AOL is the most profitable address on the planet and they are getting ready to try to put people in prison. if you remove AOL from the spamming equation, that in itself reduces the profitability of spam quite a bit.
i did not say anything to be fact, just my opinion based on my limited experience. but i am usually in lala land. :P
there are two types of spammers basically as far as i have seen:
1) the schmucks. (apparently all using dial up accounts in Brisbane)
2) the professional spammers. i think these people are responsible for what is by far the largest part of spam. probably more than 90%. its the ability of these people to do what they do that will determine how much spam you get in the future.
in the professional spammers in my opinion, there is again two categories that i have noticed. the "i dont give a fuck" crowd that just tries to do whatever volume they can before they shut down... especially when it comes at someone elses expense (someone elses hosting and relays) and even go so far as to mail remove lists just to get a couple extra signups.
... and the people that have a real investment in what they are doing and are trying to stay online as long as they can before their ISP cant take the heat or they run out of IP's. The bulk of e-mail comes from the serious crowd. not from "any schmuck" and it will never come from GFY types.
Brisbane dial up providers also block and filter dial up accounts when they start sending too much e-mail... most do everywhere. I know people who were in Brisbane doing exactly that. they went elsewhere for that reason. it depends i guess on what type of volume you are talking about. what you can do with a dial up account and a desktop program is increasingly limited. there are severe limitations as to what "any shmuck" can do and that bar is being raised daily.
(note: Nick is an "exceptional schmuck").
I agree with you that the bigger problem is the lack of laws and controls. but things are also evolving in the direction where that is changing as well. several states have came down pretty hard on spammers. Washington has in the past, California has, and now AOL's home state is definately going to try to make some examples of people. Paul Vixie caused a lot of damage to people who were not offenders and did not have the law on his side.
I think its all going to continue to change and evolve in a direction where it will become increasingly difficult to make money at all with spamming. that pattern cannot be denied today. its happening.
i think we are going to see a peak in spam soon and probably a decline.
maybe Hooper has already solved the problem.