Re: Water tight opt-in (yet another FUSSP)

The reasons you list, and more, are why I've long advocated a much
more restrictive definition of spam and why I'm usually kind of
laughed off the stage when I try to describe it but in a nutshell if
it's not being (significantly) paid for and is intended to make a
commercial entity money directly or indirectly then it's spam.

Obviously one can write 500 pages splitting hairs on that but you get
my point I hope even if you don't agree, a much, much more draconian
definition.

I think what I feared 15+ years ago is coming to pass.

Basically, what attracted the loathsome to spam has now attracted the
respectable members of society which is generally what any such
distinction comes down to, we respect Amazon, we don't respect the guy
hawking herbal weight loss products, but also those with bad
intentions of course.

It's nearly free, you can send out literally a billion a day for chump
change (relative to other forms of marcomm), it's low maintenance, it
replaces something much more expensive (e.g., paper "junk" and
administrative mail.)

Consequently so-called "legitimate" spam is not only being inundated
and obscured by so-called "non-legitimate" spam, but also by other
"legitimate" spam.

Who even reads any email from, say, banks or airlines etc you do
business with?

I rarely do unless I have some very specific reason (e.g., I recently
bought a ticket) and even then think long and hard as to whether the
sender is authentic if it calls for any sort of action on my part.

I suppose one can shrug and say who cares, that sounds self-limiting.

But I think when something is so nearly free...well, quantity does
eventually become quality.

And isn't this something so-called legitimate senders should have some
interest in?

Amazon et al do have billions on the line and this is part of that
picture. Some chicken-boner not so much. And of course end-users.

My point is I don't even think much of so-called polite society -- a
term used in internet governance for "legitimate" interests -- is
really thinking along these lines outside of people like us.

I go to meetings like ICANN, try to stir up a discussion of spam and
you get mostly blank affect which can be interpreted as something
ranging from "it's the way it is you can't do anything about it" to
"not my problem" to "psst, I make money off it indirectly so STFU" to
the usual minor nod to phishing or other easily identified immoral
activities, "it's law enforcement's problem".

They're having a potentially valuable resource degraded to below any
utility value, not just by miscreants but also by their own use.

It's been said a million times before but it's the Tragedy of the
Commons writ big and at this point the primary focus on miscreants is
almost a red herring.


-- 
        -Barry Shein

The World              | [email protected]           | http://www.TheWorld.com
Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 800-THE-WRLD        | Dial-Up: US, PR, Canada
Software Tool & Die    | Public Access Internet     | SINCE 1989     *oo*
-
This is the asrg mailing list.  To change your subscription settings, see
http://lists.services.net/cgi-bin/mj_wwwusr/domain=lists.gurus.org