Is AOL blocking political emails from their subscribers?

[shance]

I send out a political newsletter to a few of my friends. Everyone on my list I know personally. I send it out in separate groups.

Within each group, there are no more than 7 to 10 recipients with and aol address. Today all of the AOL addresses came back with permanent errors. This is the third time its happened over a period of about two months. I tried to send again, and the same message came back.

I have no idea why this would happen.

Has this happened to anyone else?

[Mojambo]

1. I don't use AOL

But I'd be very interested to learn more about what is happening there.

Have you contacted their support?

[brainshrub]

2. Dump the email and go to an RSS feed.

It's less intrusive, AOL can't block it and won't get marked as spam.

As an added bonus, when you actually have something to tell your friends, they won't ignore your emails as just another newsletter.

Learn here:
http://searchenginewatch.com/sereport/article.php/2175271

I just installed an RSS feed for my site. It's easy.

[shance]

10. Thanks for the info. Do I need to have a website to use an RSS feed?

I don't have a website up yet.

[brainshrub]

19. Yes.

But they are easy to make.

But you don't need to even go that far, sign up for a blog. Most of them have built in RSS feeds.

I used to go the "newsletter" route. It does nothing except annoy people. (Sorry, but your friends are to polite to tell you that they could care less about your newsletter and it got filtered as SPAM months ago.)

Go the website and/or blog route if you want your message to go out.

or...

You could enroll in an Ivy-League school for a few years, write a book and go on Oprah. That also works.

[shance]

21. Thanks. Nobody is on the list gets the newsletter unless

they've asked for it specifically. I get too much stuff myself.

Its anyone I send on AOL that has been thrown back.

[Hugin]

3. AOL blocks me from voting in their own slanted polls.

The last couple of months I haven't been able to vote
in their on-line polls.

Weird, huh?

[Hugin]

5. and I'm trying to vote from inside the AOL app itself! n/t

[shance]

14. That wild. Have any AOL'ers complained?

Seems like there could be some legal problems for AOL by snooping through and blocking/censoring AOL members emails and/or activities don't you think?

Meanwhile, male prostitutes like Jeff Gannon receive carte blanche access to White House press conferences and the White House doesnt know who the guy is?

I know it looks like a different situation, but it's really not. It seems to be a selective invasion of people's privacy. Or just another coinky dink?

[noamnety]

4. When I send emails from work

They generally get rejected for the aol users. It's been a problem for us for over a year now. We think it's because we're a commercial comcast customer, and AOL blocks their email routinely because it doesn't meet their spam filtering requirements. We were temporarily set up to bounce our email through another noncomcast ISP, and that solved it, but we don't have access to that anymore.

[ClintonTyree]

6. AOL.................

both sucks and blows, at the same time. The only time I ever used it was to get online to download another ISP. Everyone I have ever talked to that had AOL says it totally sucked.

So the question is, why are some people so enamored with AOL? I don't get it! :shrug:

[Hugin]

8. I study AOL...

Like one would study a bug... Just before they smash it
with their thumb. ;)

I'd prefer an ISP... Cept they've already been assimilated
in my area.

[Greenberg240]

7. I'm stil getting mine - no change.

[Donailin]

9. I get all mine

but i have the blockers off. when you sign on for the first time with a new account or new version, the settings are adjusted to block mail that appears bulk. same with yahoo, as I just learned last night. just tell folks to make sure they maunually turn off the blockers.

[shance]

12. My emails go through, its the newsletter that's blocked.

I know my friends want the newsletter so thats not the problem.

Its selective. I don't know why AOL is choosing to do that. If I were an AOL subscriber, I would want to know.

[Warpy]

11. The problem may be that you're sending to so many at once

and you're running afoul of AOL's bulk mailing filter.

The round robin discussion groups I was in back in the dark ages before I got a real ISP all went to first egroups and then Yahoo, when Yahoo took them over. The groups did that because of disruptinve behavior by petty and meanspirited right wingers who would complain to the abuse department when they didn't like what anybody said, which was usually.

You might consider starting a Yahoo group. It's fairly easy to do, and it eliminates a lot of the headaches.

[seabeyond]

13. aol wont take our email from our server

thinks it is spam. so i have a few friends i cant send an email to

[shance]

15. You know that's just flat out illegal. Spam my arse.

Your friends should be letting AOL have it.

Come to think of it, so should mine. :)

However, I haven't mentioned it to my friends who use AOL yet so I doubt they know that their mail is being blocked, which essentially means AOL is monitoring their incoming email.

[Freddie Stubbs]

16. Probably thinks that its spam

[shance]

17. The spam excuse looks like an excuse to censor/block emails.

Think about it. If the internet is the biggest obstacle and/or instrument to releasing important information and/or "real" news, then many of these servers are going to do what they can, LIKE AOL, to censor information they deem as "spam".

It certainly provides a convenient excuse. I remember when snooping into someones mail was a felony. Was it that long ago that we had laws that prevented such 'thefts'?

But this is so easily done because, like the electronic vote*, where snooping is easy because there is no trail.

[Freddie Stubbs]

18. AOL has a lot bigger fish to fry than your little email letter

Almost 9 of of 10 emails are spam. ISPs and online services like AOL have to devote massive resources to try to block out span. No system is going to be perfect.

[shance]

20. Maybe true, but there are alot of other minnows swimming around

that seem to be having the same problemas.

:)