I no longer consider google to be 'good at filtering' - it's over zealous - so it could be true that the huge spam problem has been reduced by a large percent,

I no longer consider google to be 'good at filtering' - it's over zealous - so it could be true that the huge spam problem has been reduced by a large percent, but that comes at a great cost. To some the cost is less - to those who use email for business, I'd say there are significant loss possibilities. I have recently discovered this in several situations. I think of it more like an a middle man in the ATM or a change making machine that is looking for counterfeit bills - sure it may be great to have it shred 90% of the counterfeits, and some people may never get several hundreds passed through - but if you did and the machine shredded the hundreds being sent to you often - I would not consider that good.