Lowest spam quotient
If you have no tolerance whatsoever for unwanted e-mail, you can still do a fair amount online without getting yourself in trouble. I was surprised to find that some of the most common activities on the Web--shopping online, registering at member sites, and registering software online--generated virtually no spam.

One word of warning: When you sign up at any site, don't take empty promises such as "We care about your privacy" at face value. Even if there's an official-looking TrustE seal on the page, it doesn't mean the site in question won't use your information for e-mail marketing messages; it just means that the company discloses the information it gathers about its subscribers and how it uses that information. Unless a company specifically states that it won't share your e-mail address with partners or use your browsing habits and e-mail address for targeted marketing, it reserves the right to do just that. Check the privacy policy carefully.

The (non)culprit: an online shopping trip

Spam servings: few and far between
I've spent several years shopping online at several different outlets using a single usa.net e-mail address for them all. I've received surprisingly few unsolicited messages from the merchants themselves and none that I could trace to companies having sold my address. Still, the occasional mail trickles in. Amazon.co.uk sends out a money-off or free-shipping-style offer once every three to eight months, but Amazon.com has dropped only a single piece of targeted advertising at me in four years: in June, it offered the chance to preorder a book from an author whose book I'd bought at its store before. (I passed.)

eBay and Half.com generated small amounts of mail to my special shopping account, with Half.com generating traffic mainly from friends sharing the wealth with $5-off coupons (so that they, too, can get $5 off). In two years on eBay, I've gotten one solicitation from a seller who thought I'd like an item similar to one I'd bid on. All in all, these few messages cause me very little grief, and they're not lewd, lascivious, or offensive.

The (non)culprit: opening a free e-mail account

Spam servings: negligible if you're careful
Conventional wisdom has it that merely opening a free e-mail account--especially a Hotmail account--generates spam. I found just the opposite. My Excite e-mail address, which I didn't distribute to anyone or to any site, accrued six offers directly from Excite in a month, with topics ranging from Fun Summer Entertainment to Cool Films, but no outside spam. America Online pitched to my master account to sign up for AOL Plus twice in a month, but, again, no outside spam. Meanwhile, my opened-and-completely unused accounts with Hotmail, Yahoo, Netaddress, and Mail.com didn't get a single pitch in six weeks.

Most free e-mail sites have strategic partnerships with e-mail newsletter publishers and provide pages of suggestions of newsletters you may want to subscribe to. Some also ask whether you want to be listed in their user directory. Think like Nancy Reagan: Just say no. If you refuse these offers, you'll find that the only e-mail messages you get are administrative (notification of new features, site maintenance, and so on) or cases of mistaken identity. I've received messages for a bass player, a football player, and a collector of porcelain figurines--all "wrong numbers" with similar addresses. But that's not technically spam. In fact, even subscribing to newsletters doesn't generate any real spam (see below). But putting your name in a directory of e-mail addresses is a banner ad that screams "Just spam me now!" to data miners.

The (non)culprit: free software registration

Spam servings: negligible if you're careful
Some sites won't let you at the good stuff until you register--a process that's free at such sites as the New York Times on the Web, AtomFilms, and MP3.com. I signed up at several such sites and made sure to preserve the default settings in each cases (these included check boxes agreeing to periodic updates from the site).

The results? Very little e-mail. The New York Times on the Web sends out one confirmation and, after two weeks, a onetime reminder of some of the site's coolest features. If you don't opt out of periodic updates, you may get an occasional message; I did, but I hit the Unsubscribe link and have seen nothing since. AtomFilms, MP3.com, and EMusic occasionally send out their own product announcements, but they include prominent opt-out links in these e-mail messages and stopped sending stuff when I followed them. (Unfortunately, MP3.com did suffer from occasional server problems on the opt-out page, so I had to try several times throughout one day to get off those lists.)

The (non)culprit: subscribing to an e-mail newsletter

Spam servings: once in a blue moon
If you sign up for e-mail newsletters, you have to expect mail; after all, they are newsletters. When I signed up for newsletters from Apple and a couple of list server sites, including Yahoo and Topica, that's exactly what I got. In each case, I got a welcome message that confirmed that I'd signed up, then the newsletters I asked for--more than a dozen messages a week. That's a lot of mail, but it's not spam. Each sported an unsubscribe feature that worked.

Most Web sites with newsletters respect your wishes not to receive any extra e-mail. A couple of iffy "update" e-mails about new developments at a related Web site and the occasional content-weak newsletter with a lot of ad links may count as borderline spam, but they're not so bad. Make sure, however, that your newsletter sign-up page doesn't have a check mark next to a "Keep me updated with news from select partners" option. If your newsletter is a free-for-all list that keeps its archives online, make sure your e-mail address doesn't appear in the archives.

The (non)culprit: registering products online

Spam servings: negligible
You don't need to fill out a little postcard to register products such as RealPlayer, Easy CD Creator, or a new Gateway or Dell computer. Their online registration forms do the trick, but in many cases, they make you submit an e-mail address. I've used a single dedicated e-mail address for this field since day one, and I've always made sure that any check box in the registration form labeled "Updates from select partners" is emphatically unchecked. If it's a program I don't care much about, I'll make sure that I uncheck the option about product updates and patches too.

Guess what? I've never received a single item of spam to that mailbox. Sure, I get occasional administrative messages touting product updates, but only for the products I've specifically chosen. Some may call this spam; I don't, because I did indicate interest in the product. Your mileage may vary in this respect if you're not careful about unchecking opt-out boxes on your registration forms.

Tell me whether unsubscribe messages actually work!