Re: email address grabber

Wes Miller (getwired@tico.com)
Wed, 15 Jan 1997 14:31:04 -0800


Jeff Drost wrote:
>
> This seems to have hit a nerve. The truth is, assuming I can code the
> spider to be carefull enough to email only human resources departments, I
> don't beleve it will cause any real problems. I am certainly not lazy,
> and I realize that I can get a job w/o such a search. In fact, this is
> probably one of the harder ways to get a job.
>
> In responce to Mr.Raisch's statement "I certainly wouldn't want a
> perspective(sic) employer to realize that I take any means whatsoever
> including outright lying--to reach my personal goals, rather than
> consider the needs and interests of my employer." I in no way intend to
> lie. The reason I would not open my comminucations with an employer buy
> telling them I found them with a spider is two fold: (1) most employers
> like to see a personal interest in the company from an applicant (2)
> automaticly submitted messages are less likely to be read.
>
> Please comment on this....
> Would it be more acceptable, or at least in better judgement to have a
> spider generate a web documant of links to potential HR pages, that I
> could evaluate manually?
>
> I'm sorry for my spelling Robert ;)
>
> Jeff Drost

Yes Jeff, I don't think any of us will disagree with you that you must
be putting a fair amount of energy into your project. And yes, as
Webcrawler, Lycos, Infoseek, Netscape et. al. have taught us, a college
project can blossom - if not explode - into a career, and possibly a
very financially rewarding future. However, remember that not all
programmers (especially Internet programmers) will avoid the ethical
question in favour of money. What you are doing, in essence is good.
HOWEVER, as an employer, I would do my best to avoid people who are
spamming HR departments with resumes - How? By only accepting resumes
submitted using a db form (Cold Fusion, ASP, etc.) rather than email -
the same thing that those geniuses :( at HipCrime are making occur on
the Internet as a whole.
Your projects and past experiences should speak for themselves, and the
best way to land a job is to develop an application which will make the
'net easier for everyone to use, without clogging up existing channels
of communication, and making life difficult for those companies where
you are applying. You want to make them notice you? Develop a
resume/application area which submits to a database, and allows you to
do boolean searches & matches between resumes and job postings. Make the
lives of your fellow nettians easier by REDUCING work for them, rather
than bombarding them with trivial mass-postings. Your project suffers
from the same ideology that is seriously hurting Usenet, and really
makes life difficult for people who are uncomfortable with the
technology, and concerned about their privacy.
Regarding "verifying" true HR addresses. If you can do that, then I have
perfected alchemy. Many, if not most POP/SMTP servers no longer respond
to finger queries, and sending a message, receiving an angry response,
and apologizing (or ignoring) doesn't count. How do you purport to
verify that email addresses are what they are, and not aliases or the
improper channel? I don't mean to be negative - and I'm sure my other
colleagues here are in the same vein, and do not mean to put you/your
project down. But please, come up with a better excuse than "I need a
job." Develop positive technologies, and believe me, you can find a job.
Wes Miller
wmiller@getwired.com
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