batray

I use CAPTCHAS for every post, not just registration.

Eric, Good luck with your spamer battle. I have had to deal with it on my forum as well. I had to implement the use captchas for every post to stop the spambots. I had very little luck with text filtering. Chris

Roger, Your apology is gladly accepted. I hope we can do business in the future. Thank You! Chris Grossman diver.net

It is certainly not among the banners on this page or on the front page, perhaps they need a bigger ad because whatever they have now is well hidden.

The message you sent is spam, and here is why; Your message is a bulk message because you sent the exact same message to multiple recipients who did not request it and with whom you had no prior business relationship. You may not have done it on the scale of hardcore spamers, but your message is a bulk message. You harvested the email address of a web site and sent an unsolicited email to someone who has no use for it. The reservationist for our dive club to whom you sent the message is not a photographer and has no need for your services. Therefore your email is spam because you sent an unsolicited bulk advertising message to a recipient who has no need for your services. Your denial does not change the facts. Unfortunately many people respond to spam as is proved by some of the postings in this thread. However it is my firm belief that not only is it unethical to send spam, it is also unethical to respond and purchase products advertised by spam. Those who respond help perpetuate the deluge of unwanted email on us all by making spamming profitable. The other problem I have with your email is that I bet you did not ask the people whose names are being used as references for permission. I am willing to bet that if you asked them the honest question ”Can we use your name as a reference in unsolicited email advertising?” that you would get a resounding no. I have given permission for my name and work to be used to promote products on a web site, but that permission does not include using my name in unsolicited emails. I understand as a business you need to advertise your product, however you should use ethical methods in doing so. Here are some examples you should consider; A: Web site advertising. You could choose this web site and perhaps digitaldiver.net to target underwater photographers. I am willing to bet the rates are very reasonable. I do not know Eric, but if he is a regular customer of yours you might even be able to work out a barter deal with him. B: A non bulk email addressed to the person you are targeting. If your employee had spent another minute you might have turned me into a customer instead of a pissed off spam recipient. To do that you might have noticed that my photos say diver.net on them, go to that web site, glean some personal information and personalize the email. For example if your message was targeted at me with the following beginning paragraph it would not be spam. Chris Grossman, I was looking at your web site and a really liked your pictures from San Miguel Island at diver.net/californiadiveboats.com/Peace/2009.05.01-02/. Many of them would look great reproduced with our AluminArte process. You could then insert your from message after the personalization. The fact that you actually looked at my work, managed to read the title, and acknowledge it at the start of your message would get my attention, and make me read the rest. If you are an ethical businessman you will apologize for sending spam and refrain from doing so in the future. If you are not you will continue your ways and no ethical person should do business with you. Chris Grossman diver.net

It is possible to configure the server with a .htaccess file so only authorized web sites can display your work. That way you don't have your bandwidth stolen as well. I for example enable photos to be displayed from my web server on this site and a few other forums.

Yes, if they harvest an email address from a website and send it an unsolicited message it is spam. The website they harvested the email address from is the dive club's. The email address they used was the reservation email, not my personal email. This is spam and there is no excuse for it.

I received a spam message today that used Eric Cheng's name as a reference from imagewizards who did the prints for his show. The message was sent to an email address harvested from the web site of a dive club (The Sea Divers) I am president of. The message was unsolicited, and there is no prior business relationship. The email address used has never been used to subscribe to any lists. The company may make a good prodoct, but being sent unsolicited email to a harvested address is spam. I hope that Eric does not condone the use of his name in this spam. I refuse to give any business to spamers and hope that you too will avoid doing business with spamers at imagewizards. The spam email follows (with contact info redacted) My name is Tammy Pierce with Image Wizards. I was looking over your web site and was very impressed with your work. Our company can take your work and showcase it on ALUMINUM. This new ALUMINARTE process brings out the depth and color like nothing else. I would love to send you a sample packet free of charge. Once you see out samples you will understand the beauty of the product. If you want me to send the samples please just let me know what address and to whom I should send them. You are welcome to visit our web site at www.xxxxxxxxxxxxx.net. Here are a list of clients that we have done work for: Photographers * George Schober * Eric Cheng * Aaron Chang * Stephen Frink * Danny Clinch * Kevin Kubota * Larry Lambrecht * Al Aatterwhite * Jeffrey Stoner * JP Design Studios * Ken Jenkins Photography * Kenneth Pearson * Melissa Lea * Photos for You - Ken Minyard * Seth Beaudreau * Ardy Arani * Anyes Galleani Tammy Pierce Account Executive 800-xxx-xxxx Ext 234 www.xxxxxxxxxxxx.net Chris Grossman diver.net

Last April I went on the first dive trip to ever go to Clipperton Island. Here are some photos from that trip. Click here to see all of the photos from The First Dive Trip to Clipperton Island Chris Grossman diver.net

It was a great trip and a tru adventure. However the almost complete lack of mature sharks was very sad. I really enjoyed meeting Mary-Lynn on this trip. This is her with her camera above the reef at Clipperton. I will post a gallery of pictures on my web site soon, however I do have some images of the Clipperton Angelfish (Holacanthus limbaughi) posted here and here and images of the Clipperton gregory (Stegastes baldwini) here. Chris Grossman diver.net

I posted the large (but reduced) picture becasue I wanted to show the detail in it. That detail is completly lost in your reduction of the picture. Just compare the original picture with your reduced version.

This was taken on my second outing ever with my Olympus D-40 about one year ago. It was taken at Yellowtail Point on the front side of Catalina at a depth of about 100 ft. The lighting was a sigle UK100 with diffuser in one hand with the D-40 (an no accessory lenses) in the other. I like this shot becasue of the detail in shows in the bug's (California Spiny Lobster) eye. ISO: 400 (fiixed) apature: f 4.8 shutter: 1/30 sec (fixed in S mode) focal length: 19.4 mm (full zoom) The only post processing was an image resize (down) with ACDSee

This lingcod shot was taken at San Miguel Island, California last September at a site call Wycoff Ledge. The camera was an Olympus D-40 in a PT-012 housing, with an INON wide angle lens. Dual INON D-180 strobes (in auto mode) were used for lighting.

blue tang on a night dive in Curaçao. Taken with an Olympus D-40z in a PT-012 housing with an INON wide angle lens and dual INON D-180 strobes