Way back when, the Well was known as the "world's most influential online community," with futurists, journalists, and Internet types hanging out in its virtual halls. But these days, the Well seems to have trouble getting its phone calls returned. When Comcast started filtering out e-mail from Well members, according to the San Jose Mercury News, Well communities director Gail Williams wasn't able to get through to a technician to explain why the site was blocked until she contacted Comcast PR.

Comcast later said it had detected spam coming from Well.com e-mail addresses, so it shut down the e-mails. By Tuesday afternoon, Well e-mails were still being blocked, and on Wednesday morning, Well's status page didn't offer any updates on the situation. Yahoo employee and Well customer Jeffrey McManus says that this incident shows Comcast is "not the sharpest tool in the shed" and suggests Comcast broadband customers switch to another Internet service provider.

What do you think? Was Comcast in its rights to block Well e-mail?