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True.com Wants Warnings On Personal Ads

Posted by timothy on from the parliament-of-whores dept.

An anonymous reader submits "News.com.com is reporting that personals company True.com is behind a push in several state legislatures to require everyone but them to include scary looking warnings above personals ads. I'm sure they're not the first, but this looks like a particularly slimy way to corner a market. And the unintended consequences look big, too: by my read of the proposed law, even Slashdot would need to include the warnings above user profile pages." In just a few weeks, this would sound like an April Fool's joke. I hope every legislator to whom this is being shopped is sent a copy of Declan's counter-example.

2 of 418 comments (clear)

  1. Let the legislators know how stupid this is.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    California Sponsor: Asm. Fran Pavley (assemblymember.pavley@assembly.ca.gov)
    Michigan Sponsor: Rep. Jim Howell (jhowell@house.mi.gov)
    Texas Sponsor: Sen. John Corona (john.carona@senate.state.tx.us)
    Virginia Sponsor: Rep. Joe T. May (Del_May@house.state.va.us)

    Let your voices be heard!

  2. Failed in Virginia by lax-goalie · · Score: 5, Informative

    I saw this one close up. True.com's hired a professional lobbyist to try to push a bill through in Virginia, and it resulted in this: The Online Dating Safety Act, HB2467

    I was bird-dogging the House Science and Technology Committee meeting the day they dealt with it, and had a front-row seat on the results. Even among the most socially conservative legislators, it was seen as a company trying to legislate their business model for competitive purposes. Gotta hand it to the lobbyist, he took the True.com reps to all the right people. But in the end, it didn't really matter. When the bill came up, there was lots of snickering, and the bill died a quick and painless death.