I've also noticed the huge increase in image spam for stock scams. The solution to this seems pretty simple to me. Just block any email with an image in it.

Sure, a lot of people who like to flood their friends' mailboxes with pictures of cute puppies will whine, but is this really a critical need for email? Much of the evil of spam is enabled by the bloat that emails have become in recent years, with HTML and embedded graphics (just one more bit of proof that Microsoft is evil).

Just say no, mail servers, and go back to ascii. And for users, if you want to show someone a picture, send them a link, or attach it.

The cute puppy people were the first I put on the block list. If it's really sooo cute and important, host the damn picks on Flickr instead of filling the valuable space in my inbox.

Jeez people, it's been established netiquette for decades that you DONT attach binaries or stupidly large images to emails. Read the bloody pamphlet.

Sure, Rand, it's MS fault--regardless of the fact that Netscape came out with HTML email long before MS did.

OK, it's Netscape and Microsoft's fault. Netscape introduced it, and MS popularized it. And I don't think that Netscape designed it to automatically open up viruses by simply viewing the message.

Though you're right. They were just keeping up with the Joneses.

Either way, it was a major factor in the spam and virus problem.