With the widespread proliferation of spam on the Internet these days, it is an unquestionable requirement to have a hardy spamfilter to protect our e-mail inboxes from assault by junk dealers, fake pharmaceuticals, phony paramours, and every scam known to man. I get it. You get it. No big deal.< p>

What has irritated me in the past and continues to perplex me to this day is the lack of consistency of e-mail addresses by legitimate entrepreneurs and other Internet businesses that we should and do whitelist. (For those who are not familiar with the term, when you "whitelist" someone, you are telling your spamfilter that the address is good and it should always send the e-mails through from that particular sender. Think of it as the functional opposite of "blacklisting" bad addresses.)

What is the challenge, then? What I have found is that one sender can have as many as a dozen e-mail addresses sending me information, which means that I need to whitelist each one to make sure I receive all e-mails without sifting through my spamfilter. To illustrate, let's use my username, which is also the basis for all of my e-mail addresses.

If I had an online business selling widgets and I showed you how to successfully market them, correspondence might work like this:

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%74%68%65%2e%77%69%64%67%65%74%2e%67%75%72%75%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%74%68%65%2e%77%69%64%67%65%74%2e%67%75%72%75%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%77%65%62%6d%61%73%74%65%72%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%77%65%62%6d%61%73%74%65%72%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;;

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%77%65%62%6d%61%73%74%65%72%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%77%65%62%6d%61%73%74%65%72%40%6a%64%75%62%68%75%62%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;

<script type="text/javascript">eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%6d%61%69%6c%2e%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%6d%61%69%6c%2e%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%40%77%69%64%67%65%74%67%75%72%75%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))</script>

;

and so on depending on which server I was "on" when I sent the e-mail or how I compartmentalized my information.

If you have a finite amount of whitelist spots in your spamfilter, how many e-mail addresses is too many before you start questioning whether the correspondence is worth your time? While, yes, you could just white list the domain name and only have to do two, the sender will start throwing you curveballs, i.e. "widgetdude@gurujim.com" and other variations.

In this age of fly-by-night companies using spam-happy servers from all over the world, legitimate businesses should be looking at making things easier for their customers, not complicating things unnecessarily. One, maybe two, e-mail addresses (or a single domain name) should be the goal.