Definitions of Words We Use

What is spam?

In the case of electronic mail, spam is any electronic mail message that is:

1. Transmitted to a large number of recipients; and
2. Some or all of those recipients have not explicitly and knowingly requested those messages.

It does not matter what the content of the message is. It can be an advertisement for a commercial product, a solicitation for donations by a charity, or a religious pitch by somebody intent on saving your soul. If it meets the two criteria above, it is spam.

The word "spam" is also used as a verb to describe the act of sending spam, and the derivative "spammers" is used to describe the person who sends spam.

What is SPAM?

SPAM is a canned meat product by Hormel. The writer of this document has cans of SPAM in the kitchen and uses it on home made pizzas. The writer hates spam, but loves SPAM.

What is UBE?

UBE stands for "Unsolicited Bulk Email". It means the same thing as spam. "UBE" is used in formal writing, where "spam" is usually only used in its verb and descriptive forms.

What is UCE?

UCE is spam that advertises a commercial product, service, or company. With UCE, the sender is usually hoping to get you to spend money with them - although senders of UCE may get their revenue from selling other forms of advertising. The term "UCE" is used most frequently in the United States, where constitutional restrictions are believed by many to prevent legislation restricting other types of spam.

What is Acquaintance Spam?

Acquaintance spam is spam that is sent to you by somebody you have dealt with previously. For example, if you order a product from a web based merchant, you might supply your email address so that the merchant can confirm the order, or notify you of problems. If the merchant then starts sending you advertising material, that is acquaintance spam. Like the name says, it's still spam, and even though legislation is not likely to ever ban this form of spam, it can completely destroy a business' relationship with even its most loyal customers. Our pages for businesses teach businesses how to manage email relationships with their customers without risking destroying those relationships.

How Many Messages is Bulk?

As a rough rule of thumb, if a human makes a conscious and informed decision, on a message by message and recipient by recipient basis, that the individual message should be sent to that individual recipient, it is probably not bulk. If you put somebody on a mailing list to be used multiple times, that will be bulk, and if  you just decide your message should be sent to a bunch of addresses just because you can get your hands on them, that is bulk.

Rules that try to pick a number typically mark a line between 20 and 50 substantially similar messages in a day. Using such rules, anything above the line is bulk, and anything below the line is not bulk.

Please note, however, that laws and industry codes typically deal with anything that is unsolicited and commercial. As a consequence, you can be in breach of such laws and codes by sending just one unsolicited advertisement via email.