I’ve also seen websites where individual e-mails are not listed, but the format of the e-mail is described – for example, [log in to unmask].  If you know the name of the staff member you want to contact, then you can easily figure out their e-mail.

 

Laura

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Regan Forrest [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Friday, January 23, 2004 3:59 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: To Post Staff Contact Info on Web Or Not To...

 

This issue of web bots grabbing emails and then spamming them is a big issue. One way that some websites get around this is to describe email addresses as person"AT"institution.com. This makes it legible to a human reader but not to a web bot. However I guess it does assume that your website visitors have enough web savvy to understand what you are doing, and deduce the email address.

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Randy Heise [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Thursday, January 22, 2004 6:55 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: To Post Staff Contact Info on Web Or Not To...

Just to throw a totally different spin on the issue ... but one that is issue in and of itself .... due to the proliferation of 'website-mining' marketing 'web bots', each e-mail address that is visible to the web on your website will eventually introduce 20 to 30 or more spam e-mails a day into your e-mail system. Can it, or your IT department handle that? We have 5 addresses on our website. (Membership@, Info@, Education@, etc.) On Tuesday after the three day weekend, I had to deal with over 600 e-mails to those addresses, only 4 of which were not spam. Were I designing a website today, I would severely limit visible email-addresses and certainly not include internal company e-mail addresses. It's costing us close to $4000 a year in software solutions and labor hours that could be better spent elsewhere to deal with website induced spam. This is one problem with contact information on the web that's not often thought about! If you are going to do it, be sure to budget the hidden expenses or they will bite you big time!

Randy Heise
Information Systems Manager
The High Desert Museum
59800 South Highway 97
Bend, OR  97702-7963
(541) 382-4754 Ext. 244
(541) 382-5256 Facsimile
[log in to unmask]
www.highdesertmuseum.org

 

 

 

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