This is interesting because perhaps I'm wrong about it . . .
  
> In the local newspaper, 3 - 4 months ago, there was an item about 
> someone offering a new service.  Subscribers would be informed 1) that
> the mail had been delivered, and 2) when the mail was opened.  And 
> that is all I know/remember about that.

Had I seen it, I'd have laughed, because my view is that it's always 
possible to disable it.

>> Not if it's coming to me, because I invariably disable the
>> function that would acknowledge receipt or opening.
> 
> And how do you do that?

Well, in most mail programs I know of there is, somewhere, a toggle 
for doing it.  My understanding is that my mail program would have to 
_do_ something -- and _send_ something -- in response to a command, 
for someone to know I'd received the mail. That should always be 
possible, in principle, to disable.  I know there are preferences or 
options for setting that in Pegasus Mail, Netscape mail, and our 
Communigate Web mail program (and, if I remember right, in Hotmail). 
Maybe I'm missing something.

-- Russ

Russell Hunt
Department of English
St. Thomas University
http://www.stu.ca/~hunt/