[SpamCop-List] Re: SpamCop-List Digest, Vol 60, Issue 18

[Trish Roberts-Miller]

spamcop-list-request at news.spamcop.net wrote:

>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Message: 1
>Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 17:12:19 -0600
>From: "Vanguard" <vanguard.code at comcastNIX.net>
>Subject: [SpamCop-List] 	Re: Spam filters and storage limits okay
>	under First Amendment
>To: spamcop-list at news.spamcop.net
>Message-ID: <dpmtgk$nes$1 at news.spamcop.net>
>Content-Type: text/plain;	format=flowed;	charset="Windows-1252";
>	reply-type=response
>
>"Possum Trot" <PossumTrot at dont.spam.me> wrote in message 
>news:dpmsho$mju$1 at news.spamcop.net...
>  
>
>>This from a July, 2005 decision in Federal Court in the Southern District 
>>of Texas.
>>
>>http://www.internetcases.com/archives/2005/07/spam_filters_an_1.html
>>    
>>
>
>
>"de Mino complained of the University's practice of shutting down e-mail 
>accounts for adjunct professors during the summer, when they were not under 
>contract to teach. "
>
>Yeah, as a contract consultant, I would love to retain use of every resource 
>available at all any any employer where I was once contracted for employment 
>but am no longer there.  I could have incredible bandwidth, run proxies all 
>over, and have access to all those computers, too.  What stupidity.  If you 
>aren't currently employed then you don't get access to an employer's 
>resources.  Gee, I should be able to walk into any business where I do NOT 
>work to use whatever I want however I want.  Right, uh huh.
>
>"He further complained of the inability to transmit e-mail after his account 
>had reached its data storage limit."
>Gmail might have a 2.5GB disk quota but that is still a limited quota.  No 
>e-mail provider can supply infinite storage space simply because there isn't 
>an infinite number of storage media available.  What a boob!  The asshole 
>can't be bothered to organize his mails and then bitches that it is someone 
>else's fault for his stupidity and laziness.
>
>"certain messages he had sent to other faculty had been caught in the 
>system's spam filter"
>Probably several of the employed teachers didn't want to correspond with him 
>anymore and just added him to their block/blacklists.  He obviously wasn't 
>the shiniest gem and the other wanted to disassociate themselves from the 
>dull rock.
>
>"De Mino contended that he was denied access when he tried to communicate 
>with other faculty regarding University policies."
>Well, pretty goes for the rest of us regarding some business where we are 
>NOT employed.
>
>See, even educated folk are stupid.  Be careful to not visit this boob on 
>the day he does hedge trimming; else, he might drop that lawnmower on you.
>
>  
>
I don't know this guy, but I do know something about how contract 
employees are treated (although I am not one), and I also know about how 
state universities often treat their employees.

If your contract says you start September 1, you probably expect to 
start working September 1. You probably don't expect to start working 
August 20. At many places (and some Us in Texas follow this practice), 
university teachers' contracts start September 1, but they are expected 
to begin teaching late August. (They are paid for that time in August, 
but not until October 1.)

Further, when you show up the first day of work, you expect..well, you 
expect to start working. Not at a U, where it is assumed that you have 
worked several weeks, unpaid, in order to prepare your classes. Class 
prep time is unpaid.

Similarly, much post-semester time is simply assumed--if a student has a 
complaint, if s/he needs a letter of recommendation, it is assumed that 
the U can contact you via email (at many Us, email is the only method of 
communication for and by U policy). Hence, if you don't have access to 
email during the summer, you will miss all the announcements, many of 
which will affect your (unpaid) class planning.

Finally, for tenure track faculty, promotion and retention depend upon 
publishing, which is done in the summer. An untenured faculty member who 
took summers "off" would find him or herself unemployed in short notice.

In short, far too often, the contract only covers the time the U pays an 
employee, not the time the U expects its employees to work.

-- 
Trish Roberts-Miller    redball at mindspring.com
http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~robertsmiller/homepage.html
"though we could fool each other, we should consider--
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark."
("A Ritual to Read to Each Other" Wm. Stafford)