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Telemarketers Sue to Block Do-Not-Call List
chumpieboy writes "A story on Yahoo tells about about the DMA's attempts to stop a national DoNotCall list, essentially claiming that Opt Out is not a viable model for telemarketers. Yet they claim that Opt Out is a viable model for email marketing?"
They don't think "Opt Out" is a viable model? Fine, we'll do what they want, go the other way. Make it Opt In.
Phones are slightly different, because a) they can't phone you from the island of Vanatau that easily (perhaps - voIP could change this) and b) there are laws (in the U.S. anyway) forcing them to respect the do-not-call (aka opt-out) list. So really, they only like 'Opt Out' when they can ignore it. This isn't really surprising though, considering the lack of morals we've repeatedly seen from direct marketers.
Karma: pi (Mostly due to circular reasoning in posts).
Where in the Constitution is Freedom of Privacy stated? You may be able to infer it from other amendments but it is not nearly as clearly stated as Freedom of Speech.
The previous poster is clearly in error. "Freedom of speech" is a diversion - this has absolutely nothing to do with free speech.
"Freedom of speech" means "you can say what you want." It does not mean "you can force people to listen to you."
If someone says "I don't want to hear from you", you can't force them to listen by claiming "free speech." Since that is exactly what a DNC list is, the whole "free speech" argument is BS.
" Linux advocates unveiled a new passthrough connection for Linux users that extends the common firewall set IPChains on to any in home phone line... Now you can specify Inbound and Outbound rules for phone calls, it now allows for certain phones in the house to allow incoming calls, and others only can place outgoing calls....."
I know you're being kind of sarcastic here, but you're talking about something I'm sure a lot of people'd like to have. I'd love to run our phone line through my computer so that it can filter the BS calls. One of the features I wanted to have was a 'Press the right 4-digit code in order to make the phone ring, otherwise you will be transferred to voice mail'.
So the rules would be like:
-Let anybody on my contact list through.
-Let anybody with the following codes through.
-Anybody left over that has a Caller ID number, send them to voicemail.
-Anybody left over that does not have a caller ID may only leave their phone number.
Man I'd LOVE to institute that on my phone.
Telemarketers will absolutely not hang up the phone just by you saying 'no' politely. A national DNC would mean that those people could make a single phone call, and never have to feel bad about wanting to hang up on a telemarketer.
Even so, the nationwide DNC is a good idea, and I'm even more so for it by seeing that they're against it. IMHO, If your entire business model is based on calling people who don't want you to call, then fuck your business.
Many people would, at this point, compare this to spam, Which would almost work, but telemarketing is 1000x worse than spam to me, for a few reasons:
My personal email address gets 2 spam messages every one to three days. Just, if you have to have your email address posted somewhere, spamproof it a little. I doubt that any of you that refuse to do this go around writing your phone number on public walls...
I work late. I don't get to sleep till around 5am, usually. I don't get woken up to deal with spam 3 hours after i've fallen asleep. I don't deal with spam during dinner. I don't deal with spam while I'm concentrated on a good video game. I don't deal with spam in the middle of sex. It just goes into a small folder in sylpheed and I delete it when i feel like it.
There actually are a lot of spammers who put an "ADV: " at the beginning of their subject line. Another example is repeat spammers- those who email you every week or so letting you know that your website can be listed on the top 300 search engines for some relatively[1] nominal fee.
When you're bored, and you notice an email that says:
Subject: I JUST GOT LOTR:TTT IN HIGH QUALITY!
i just went to http://www.theres-no-lotr-here-only-naked-people.
AND THEY HAD THE NEW LOTR MOVIE! YOU SHOULD GO THERE TOO!
Well, at least I got a chuckle out of it.
Spam really doesn't bother me nearly as much as telemarketing. This nationwide DNC list is a very very good thing.
[1] According to Miss Vanessa Lintner, who sends me this important email every few days, although the prices may be high, it will make me a lot more money by having my site listed on over 6,000 search engines, including specialty ones like where-can-i-find-a-cheap-gay-whore.com or scatsearch.net..
get 0wned. irc.w30wnzj00.com
They'll probably end up building voice-over-IP networks for toll bypass, seriously. :-/ That's for the price of some basic computer telephony, some $20/hr foreign engineering, and some leased lines.
Think about it, though. I talked to probably an average of 500 people a day. 400 of them were as rude as they probably ever are in their lives. 250 were pissed that I was calling them. 100 yelled at me. 50 tried to be clever and expected to trigger some sort of emotion in me, and 0 did.
By the way, if I was lucky, maybe 3 or so of those 500 would end up with a shiny new Discover Platinum card.
Whale
Well, seeing how much manufacturing has moved overseas from the US, about the only jobs left here are either selling something or sueing someone.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
"people will have to register for a 'Do Call' list"
Isn't that the problem, really? 99.99% of people don't read the 10 or 20 pages of legal mumbo jumbo before clicking "ok" on a website or saying "yes" on the telephone to something else that sounds like a perfectly reasonable offer/idea/etc. Thus, almost everyone on the existing lists (there are exceptions, sure) has, in some way or another, "register[ed] for a 'Do Call' list."
http://publicvoidlife.blogspot.com
Not necessarily. Try this on for size:
1) SmegCo, the telemarketing company, promises to market your product or service for $0.20 per completed call. (As opposed to ForeskinJuiceMarketing, the "reputable" telemarketer that observes the DNC lists and charges $1.00 per call for scum like AT&T.)
2) Trailer Trash LLC, some dirtball in a trailer park in Floriduh, reads about SmegCo and says "Dayam! That's whut ah needz to permote my timeshare scam!! Ah kin reach five times as many suckers with SmegCo than with ForeskinJuice, and besides, ForeskinJuice guys called me a scammer and hung up on me. The SmegCo salesman I talked to understands me, that I'm just an honest small bidnizman!"
3) Trailer Trash LLC, cuts a check for $1000 to SmegCo.
4) SmegCo takes $1000, makes 5000 calls to "verified" numbers, all of which tell SmegCo's reps to fuck themselves in various bodily orifices.
5) Trailer Trash LLC doesn't make any money. But SmegCo's not about making money for Trailer Trash LLC - they're about making mone for SmegCo.
The aforementioned scenario is played out all the time in the email spam world. Bigtime Spammer sells spamware, and sells "spam runs" to local losers trying to run their scams. Bigtime Spammer makes money whether the local losers make cash or not.
The numbers and breakeven points are certainly different in telemarketing, but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see that (deliberately) ignoring DNC lists is profitable business for at least some telemarketing firms.
It reduces the number of people that they can call and try to get to buy their crap, therefore it doesn't work. Remember your idea of a DNC list "working" and the DMA's idea of "working" are different.
I dropped my landline and started using my cell phone as my primary phone about a year ago. How many telemarketers have I had call me in the past year?
Zero.
Not only that, but I'm not paying the local phone monopoly $40 a month for the "priveledge" of having a home phone.
Now I realize that it's not possible for everyone, some people are on dial-up or like being listed in the phone book. But I'd highly recommend it.
People who get themselves put on opt-out lists don't like telemarketers. They don't buy from telemarketers. Some of them won't buy from a company that they know engages in telemarketing.
An opt-out list is a list of people who won't buy your product, so you don't have to waste your time selling to them. What's more, it keeps you from reminding people who are sufficiently averse that you telemarket.
And they think an opt-out list would hurt their business?! It can only improve their business!
How mind-boggling.
There is not governmental obligation that laws be made to ensure that telemarketting/junk mailing/spaming remain a viable business.
While I probably agree that it would be wrong to make telemarketting/junk mailing/spaming illegal, I do support every effort to remove their ability to contact me.
The easier it is for me to opt out, the better. Heck, I would prefer to see an opt in system that I could happily ignore and never hear from these bottom feeders again.
-- "Most people prefer a popular myth to an unpopular truth"
I agree. Pennsylvania has a DNC list that started last September. Compliance was mandatory as of November. I think I received 1 or 2 calls the first week, but decided that I'd be "nice" about it until November 15. Since then, I haven't received a single TM call. Prior to that, I used to get at least two every evening.
Since I haven't received any calls, I can't verify the out of state thing. However, if somebody does call and claim that the law doesn't apply to them, I'll simply ask them for their name, company the work for and company on behalf of which they are calling. Then I'll suggest that now would be a good time for a career change while I'm firing up my computer to draft a letter to my AG.
I also don't think moving their operation out of the country is going to have a long term impact on the effectiveness of a nationwide DNC list. Instead, it's more likely that the law will be changed to hold companies who employ firms that operate in this manner responsible. For example, I used to receive annoying solicitations for Discover, all of which came from a telemarketing powerhouse that Discover was using. If that telemarketing company relocates to India, I think it's reasonable to expect that laws would eventually be passed that charge Discover with large fines every time the law is violated. Eventually, Discover is either going to drop them, or start charging them for all the fines they have to pay out.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
That's actual wisdom, and that's assuming your business model is tuned to meeting people's needs, not manipulating them into buying something they don't need.
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
Every telemarketer should be legally required to anally insert a stun baton before beginning to make their daily calls. Then, if you are annoyed by their call, you can press a button on your phone to deliver 75,000 volts of pain right up their ass.
;)
Aluminum siding? BZZZZZZZZ!!!
Credit card? AAAAIIIIEEEEE!!!
Rip-off charity? ZAAAPPPPP!!
Valuable stress relief, I think... gives new meaning to the word TeleZapper, anyway...
"The advanced societies of the future will be driven by competing systems of psychopathology." -JG Ballard
Umm.. yeah. You're a troll, but I've heard too many people make this argument, so I'm gonna respond anyway. How about all those legitimate businessmen that made their living dumping raw sewage into our rivers and lakes? They were just protecting their business by resisting environmental regulations, right? Yet we make laws prohibiting the dumping of sewage into rivers because it is bad for the environment, and therefore bad for us in general. We make laws against panhandling, tresspassing, harrassment, etc. Why can't we make a law prohibiting people from calling people who explicitly state that they do not want to be called? Sort of the electronic equivalent of a "No Soliciting" sign on your phone? If we could all have unlisted numbers free of charge, then we might not have much of a problem. But, it's practically impossible to keep your number a secret, as it's required by practically any state agency you deal with, as well as banks and increasingly by practically any business that you form any kind of ongoing relationship with. There are damn few restrictions on how this info can be used too. Even DPS in many states will sell the data to marketers. There's really no reason that anyone should be allowed to call anyone else they want in order to sell them something. You can claim freedom of speech, but we put limits on that as well. If a person specifically states that they don't want you calling them to sell them something, then I think that gives you plenty of notice and they even give you a nice database so you'll always know which people do not want to hear from you. Nobody's rights are being infringed here. It's my phone, it's my phone number. I pay for them. Having the government enforce my desire to not be bothered by people who I do not want to hear from for commercial purposes seems entirely reasonable.
The problem with having a "Do Call" list is that shady telemarketing firms would just add people from their database to the "Do Call" list. How is the organization in charge of managing the "Do Call" list supposed to verify identity so that this doesn't happen? Telemarketing lives to gather information about people, so they could easily come up with your SSN, address, birthdate, etc., to falsely sign you up.
I'd much rather have a "Do Not Call" list. The only people motivated to be added are the people themselves. There's no benefit for anyone to sign up people they don't know.
Of course, the counter argument is that "Do Not Call" lists are a big database of phone numbers and addresses that non-profits and politicals can access but don't have to obey. "Do Not Call" lists just make those agencies' lives easier and adds to people's frustrations.
my blog
As a consumer I absolutely love Missouri's list.
I *never* want to receive unsolicited calls.
I have *never* purchased anything through an unsolicited call.
The Missouri No Call list SAVES telemarketing companies money because they don't have to waste their time or mine calling me. I pay for my phone service and I should be in control of who is allowed to use it and who isn't allowed.
The MO NO Call list still lets non-profit orgs and existing business relationships through. I don't really want calls from non-profit groups either, but they are fairly rare.
I did have a weird call today, some company called claiming to be a Domain Notification service and they had some information they wanted to fax me because their email system was down. I couldn't get them to tell me their name. She just kept saying, we're a "domain name notification service."
Consequently, Missouri HB228 is trying to create a No Email list. It has flaws in it's present state but we're working on making it beneficial to everyone except spammers.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin