Almost everyone hates spam, but most know of no ways to eliminate it, or even reduce it. Here are some tips that should help you. These apply mostly to people who get a lot of email, but everyone can learn from them.

1. Never reply to spam!!!!! Most of the times the reply address is fake, if it isn't then by replying you are only confirming that your email is valid.
2. Never post to the newsgroups with your main email address! If you want to post a return email address try using a throw-away webmail address like a hotmail address.
3. Never give out your actual email address(the one your ISP gives you)!
4. Sign up for multiple forwarding addresses(at Bigfoot maybe) and use each one for a specific purpose; eg. one for newsletters, one for friends, one for workmates, etc. That way if one starts to get spammed then you can easily remove it and get another.
5. Be very careful when filling out guestbooks, forms, etc. Spammers harvest address from any static pages on the net. Rather use an address you don't mind having to delete later.
6. To reduce spam do a search on the net for all places where you email address appears and get it removed.

Next week I will give some tips on finding the true source of spam messages and what to do about spam.

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