Is there any way to screen out advertising (emails and popups) on a Macintosh 
computer?  Is there anyway to eliminate ads for pornography from my email?

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Request for Question Clarification by missy-ga on 24 Apr 2002 15:21 PDT

Hi there!

Which e-mail client do you use?

There are two parts to this question: Blocking email spam and blocking
ads on the web.

Email spam is best blocked by a dynamic service such as SpamCop (
http://www.spamcop.net ). I personally use it, and have gone from 50+
spams per day to 2 or 3. It very rarely catches legitimate email, and
when it does, it's usually email from a mailing list. SpamCop works by
actively tracking and blocking the sources of spam, instead of relying
on the spam's content for blocking. This allows it to react more
quickly and catch more unwanted email.

SpamCop costs $30 per year, and is easy to set up -- you can either
forward all your mail to your new "@spamcop.net" address, or SpamCop
can automatically check your email with POP. Then, you simply check
your SpamCop address instead of your old email address.

You can also use filter-based email screening, such as Email Magician
( http://www.yav.com/emailmagician.html ) with Eudora, but these are
more complex to set up and maintain, and tend to let more spam
through.

Blocking web ads is somewhat more straightforward. Pop-ups are easy to
block using one of two browsers:

1) My favorite, OmniWeb, lets you block both pop-ups and most standard
banner ads by checking two boxes in its preferences: "Javascript ->
Scripts are allowed to open new windows only in response to a link
being clicked" blocks nearly all pop-ups, and "Privacy -> Don't
automatically load images whose sizes match the standard sizes for
ads" blocks all standard-sized banners. (Non-standard-sized banners or
text ads still get though, of course.)

You can download OmniWeb at:
http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omniweb/

2) Mozilla, which is related to Netscape 6, allows you to block
pop-ups by unchecking "Allow webpages to -> Open unrequested windows"
in the Advanced -> Scripts & Windows Preferences

You can download Mozilla at:
http://www.mozilla.org/releases/

Another solution, which will work with most browsers, is to program in
a list of common ad server addresses. This will only block ads served
from the major Internet advertising companies, but if you're reluctant
to change browsers, it can offer a little relief. Instructions for
doing this can be found at:
http://uyf.tripod.com/adblock.html

Search terms used: blocking web ads mac

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Request for Answer Clarification by leehan-ga on 25 Apr 2002 06:39 PDT

Netscape 4.75
pacbell.net DSL
Macintosh OS 9

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Clarification of Answer by alexander-ga on 25 Apr 2002 09:31 PDT

You can also try using WebFree to block ads:

http://www.falken.net/webfree/

It won't work on OS X, but I've used it very successfully in the past,
and it doesn't require you to switch browsers.

Very complete answer, but I realized that I should have given
additional info in my question (Netscape 4.75    pacbell.net DSL    
Macintosh OS 9) in order to help clarify the question.  I added the
info a few minutes ago -- don't know if that helps the researcher.

I have signed up with spamcop.net
Helps a LOT

Michel

I was also going to suggest http://spamcop.net . It (or some system
like it) is probably the most thorough way to block spam, although
nothing is totally spamproof.

If you're looking for something you can install on your computer, it
would help whoever answers the question if you indicate which e-mail
software you use and whether you get mail from a POP3 server or from a
Web-based server.

One good tool to eliminate pop-ups is WebWasher (http://www.webwasher.com)

You didn't specify whether you're running MacOS X, but if you do, you may want 
to look at Junkbuster (http://www.junkbusters.org) and SpamAssassin 
(http://www.spamassassin.org), both of which are Unix-based programs that may 
or may not work in Darwin.

If you can consider switching to another email client than the one
you're currently using, I would suggest trying "MailSmith", a great
application from BareBones (the same folks that make the super-sexy
BBEdit text editor).

Info:
<a href="http://www.bbedit.com/products/mailsmith.html">http://www.bbedit.com/products/mailsmith.html</a>

Mailsmith (OS 9 and OS X compatible) includes a direct integration
with SpamCop (the wonderful spam reporting site that others commenters
have noted), a feature (as far as I know) unique to a Macintosh email
application.

Good luck getting rid of spam!

simple answer, complex issue: hotmail, operamail, yahoo, ...seem to
make money by selling email address ...no simple choice to find
'private email' ..any time you sign up for a 'online service ' you
risk the other party selling you're email address to a 'spam' service.