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- From: dalamb@spamcop.net (David Alex Lamb)
- Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc,comp.answers,news.answers
- Subject: Electronic Mail: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- Supersedes: <email_1082885402@qucis.QueensU.CA>
- Followup-To: poster
- Date: 9 May 2004 09:30:02 GMT
- Organization: Queen's University at Kingston
- Lines: 129
- Approved: news-answers-request@mit.edu
- Expires: 30 May 2004 09:30:02 GMT
- Message-ID: <email_1084095002@qucis.QueensU.CA>
- NNTP-Posting-Host: highnoon.cs.queensu.ca
- Summary: pointers to FAQs about electronic mail
- X-Disclaimer: Approval for *.answers is based on form, not content.
- X-URL: http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/
- Originator: dalamb@qucis.queensu.ca
- Xref: senator-bedfellow.mit.edu comp.mail.misc:79584 comp.answers:57109 news.answers:271042
-
- Archive-name: mail/faq-pointers
- Version: $Id: email.n,v 1.14 2002/07/12 15:48:49 dalamb Exp dalamb $
- Posting-Frequency: weekly
- Maintainer: dalamb@spamcop.net (David Alex Lamb)
- Copyright: 1997 David Alex Lamb
- URL: http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/
-
- I maintain a couple of Frequently-Asked Questions (FAQ) postings about how to
- find e-mail addresses, and, as a consequence, get lots of questions about
- other aspects of electronic mail. This is a collection of links to answers to
- those questions, mostly maintained by other people.
-
- We'll start with a non-question: before you send e-mail, take the time to
- learn about etiquette in cyberspace at
- <URL:http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/etiquette.html>.
-
- 1. How does e-mail work?
- See <URL:http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/basics.html>.
- 2. How do I find someone's E-Mail address?
- See <URL:http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/finding.html>.
- 3. How do I find a celebrity's e-mail address? Celebrities have as much, or
- more, reason than most people to keep their e-mail addresses private.
- However, you can find out more about various celebrities as follows:
- a. Several of the Web-based address books at
- <URL:http://www.cs.queensu.ca/FAQs/email/websrch.html> can search for
- celebrity addresses.
- b. CelebSite at <URL:http://www.celebsite.com> has biographies of
- celebrities from the entertainment industry, sports, models, and
- writers.
- c. The Internet Movie Database at <URL:http://www.imdb.com>
- d. A&E Television lists this as one of their most frequently asked
- questions at <URL:http://www.aetv.com/feedback/mailinginfo.html>, and
- maintains a large database of bibliographies at
- <URL:http://www.biography.com/find> of famous people, past and present.
- 4. How can I find someone's name from their e-mail address? (if, of course,
- there is some reason why you don't want to send them e-mail to ask them):
- a. Use the Internet Address Finder at <URL:http://www.iaf.net/>.
- b. Some sites support a protocol called 'finger' that translates local
- mailbox names to full names (plus other information). See Andrew
- Starr's Finger FAQ at <URL:http://www.emailman.com/finger/>.
- c. Some other Internet directory services support lookup by e-mail address;
- see the list in the finding e-mail addresses FAQ at
- <URL:http://www.aintainerHost]/FAQs/email/websrch.html>.
- 5. How can I stop receiving junk e-mail?
- a. See the FAQ on stopping junk mail, e-mail, and phone calls at
- <URL:http://www.obviously.COM/recycle/guides/junkmail.html>, or the
- CPSR's (Computing Professionals for Social Responsibility) junkmail FAQ
- at <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/privacy/junk-mail/>.
- b. You might try spamblocking at
- <URL:http://members.aol.com/emailfaq/mungfaq.html> your e-mail address,
- but this will also inconvenience people you'd actually like to
- communicate with.
- c. Filter your incoming e-mail; see
- <URL:http://www.best.com/~ii/internet/faqs/launchers/mail/filtering-
- faq/>
- d. If you had a lot of energy, you could try tracking down where the e-mail
- came from; see <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/net-abuse-faq/spam-faq/>
- e. See the e-mail abuse FAQ at
- <URL:http://members.aol.com/emailfaq/emailfaq.html> for a better
- understanding of what's going with unsolicited e-mail.
- 6. How can I find an e-mail pen-pal?
- a. There are penpal clubs, but I haven't researched them yet.
- b. You could post to newsgroup soc.penpals at <URL:news:soc.penpals>.
- Unfortunately that will probably also get you on a lot of junk-email
- lists (as would posting to any newsgroup).
- c. You could find a newsgroup about a subject in which you're interested,
- read it for a few weeks, then see if someone who posts there might be
- interested in correspondence.
- 7. How can I customize my outgoing e-mail?
- See <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/signature_finger_faq/>.
- 8. How can I protect the privacy of my e-mail?
- a. Get PGP (Pretty Good Privacy), a very popular public key encryption
- program, at <URL:http://www.sni.net/~mpj/getpgp.htm>
- 9. How can I find out about mailing lists I could join?
- a. Check out the very large list of publicly-accessible mailing lists at
- <URL:http://www.NeoSoft.com/internet/paml/>
- b. or the guide to social newsgroups and mailing lists at
- <URL:http://www.intuitive.com/social-faq.html>
- c. or the list of gateways at <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/mail/news-
- gateways/part1/> between mailing lists and newsgroups. This list hasn't
- been updated since 1996, so is likely out of date.
- 10. How can I set up a mailing list that other people can use?
- a. Use a Mailing List Service Provider; see
- <URL:http://www.gweep.bc.ca/~edmonds/usenet/ml-providers.html>
- b. Get your site to install mailing list administration software; see
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/mail/list-admin/software-faq/>
- 11. How can I find lots of addresses to create a mailing list?
- Don't, unless you want to become known as a spammer. Many directory
- services are *intentionally* set up to make it hard to create mailing
- lists.
- 12. Can I send e-mail to <*insert name of far-away country here*>?
- See the International E-Mail Accessibility FAQ at
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/mail/country-codes/>
- 13. How can I play games via e-mail?
- See <URL:http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/pbm.html>.
- 14. How can I access Internet services via e-mail?
- See <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/internet-services/access-via-email/>.
- 15. Where can I get more information?
- a. MS-Windows, MS-Dos, and OS/2 mail and news overview at
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/msdos-mail-news/intro> and software at
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/msdos-mail-news/software>.
- b. Reading mail and news offline: overview at
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/off-line-readers/usenet/intro/> and
- software at <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/off-line-
- readers/usenet/software/>.
- c. Yahoo's index on electronic mail at
- <URL:http://www.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/Communications_and_Networking/Electronic_Mail/>.
- d. Inter-Links' guide to E-Mail at <URL:http://alabanza.com/kabacoff/Inter-
- Links/email/email.html>
- e. FAQs about MIME at <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/mail/mime-faq/>
- (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions)
- f. Setting up E-Mail on UNIX; see
- <URL:http://www.faqs.org/faqs/mail/setup/unix/>
-
- Loosely related topics:
- 1. How can I track down a host name if I only have an IP address?
- See <URL:http://www.arin.net/whois/>.
- 2. How can I send a FAX via the Internet?
- See <URL:http://www.savetz.com/fax/>.
-
- Copying conditions: You may freely store this compilation, exactly as it
- appears here (including all the auxiliary headers, copyright information, and
- reference to the master copy), with minor editing for presentation format, in
- any electronic medium (including CD-ROM). For other forms of copying, contact
- the current maintainer. Copyright of the items to which this one is linked
- are governed by the individual authors of those items.
- --
- "Yo' ideas need to be thinked befo' they are say'd" - Ian Lamb, age 3.5
- http://www.cs.queensu.ca/~dalamb/ qucis->cs to reply (it's a long story...)
-