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Do Not Call List Under Attack
smooth wombat writes "Do Not Call. Those words are music to millions of Americans who have signed up for the list so they're not bothered by telemarketers. Not content to let things as they are telemarketers are now lobbying the FCC to have state laws which regulate the practice overturned. In April an ad-hoc group of firms ranging from the Direct Marketing Association to the National Children's Cancer Society filed a joint petition asking the FCC to declare that it has 'exclusive jurisdiction over interstate telemarketing calls.' The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call laws are more strict than Federal law and which prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship." Update: 07/21 18:42 GMT by Z : Official EPIC page, with contact info and background.
Worse than if the DNC list was never introduced, because now they have all of our numbers!
What part of DO NOT CALL dont they understand? I do not want people calling me trying to sell me stuff.. so DO NOT CALL me! hard to get much simpler.
- Your stupidity got you into this mess, why can't it get you out? -Will Rogers
I used to care about this, but now not so much. I just got rid of the landline phone. Actually I moved and did not get a landline phone in my new abode. It's illegal for marketing types to call my cellular phone. I win. If you really don't want anyone calling you throw out your busted old landline.
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The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call laws are more strict than Federal law and which prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship.
Wah! I can't bother people and piss them off during dinner, quiet evenings, and fill up their answering machines with partial recordings not knowing how long the machine's message was.
Businesses are busy scrambling to create new and interesting ways to get your phone number so that they, and their subsidiaries and sister companies, can contact you with their telemarketers. Companies telling me that they cannot process an order without my telephone number, companies telling their employees that they must take a telephone number down for pickup orders placed over the phone, and requiring a phone number to ship a package. Most employees are doing their job and refuse you service (which is a company's right to do at any time) but I find it increasingly annoying. I'll do anything to not give out my phone number including asking for a supervisor, giving out a phone number with the area code and all zeroes, or just giving the switch board number out at work.
I really have no sympathy for companies that are crying to the FCC about this. The public had been whining to the FCC for how many years to get telemarketers to stop? They finally did, creating a list that the telemarketers can reference to narrow their endless search of a customer to people that might be interested in their products, and they still complain?
Give me a break and stay off my phone.
Thanks to the "No Child Left Behind" act, military recruiters have the phone numbers of many teens. These guys don't take "don't call me again" for an answer.
"There is no evidence that (a favorable FCC ruling) will lead to large increases in telemarketing calls," he said. He, obviously, does not consider the fact that the large amount of telemarketing calls before the DNC list took effect is evidence that, without a list, that they would once again reach their old levels.
Just what the USA needs. More Federal involvment instead of state by state.
/sarcasm.
I never understood why we don't get yelemarketing calls on our cell phones. Is it actually illegal? What is keep the sleezy marketers from invading this technology.
I don't CARE if they never call me again, regardless if I have dealt with them in the past. Thats what the DO NOT CALL list is for! I'm sick of getting up in the early early morning to hear a recording about home loans. My aunt and her kids are all in the hospital after getting hit by a drunk driver this week, and I can't just 'unplug the phone'. I bolt out of bed, thinking she's out of surgery or something and it's someone trying to sell me ticket's to the Policemen's Ball.
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My name is Duke, and I'm calling from the Great American Do-Not-Call-List Giveaway to let you know that you're a winner in our one million dollar sweepstakes entry sweepstakes, and are already automatically entered to win! Isn't that great?
On top of that, as one of our lucky winners, you're eligible to recieve outrageous discounts on subscriptions to all your favorite magazines! Exciting, huh? Which magazines do you like to read? Entertainment Weekly? Sports Digest? TV Guide?
Art Schools Dietzilla
This law makes perfect sense being a federal law. Why? Because almost all telemarketing calls are crossing state or possibly national borders. Thus there's a natural complication when you have different laws in different states with different abilities to enforce those laws on others.
Better to have one federal law to simplify things.
And I still wonder, why do those telemarketers want to call me if I'm on this list. Seems like they are being done a service here. I'm not going to buy their crap so no sense wasting time on a call.
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The worst thing about an action like this it is CLEARLY against the will of the people. The Do Not Call list is opt-in, it only applies to those who go out of their way to sign up. The only "victims" of something like this are the CORPORATIONS who are being denied the right to directly attack those who don't want to have their houses invaded by direct advertising. The people gain nothing from this sort of action, they only lose out.
How is it possible that a democratic governing body, which is supposed to be looking out for the people, is taking a direct stance against them? Which American citizens are rallying against the DNC list?
Yet more sad evidence that the government is more concerned with corporate interests than those of the people.
"The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call laws are more strict than Federal law and which prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship."
OOP comes to the legal system.
I moved and did not get a landline phone in my new abode. It's illegal for marketing types to call my cellular phone
If these bottom-feeders manage to get the DNC laws overturned, what makes you think they won't then start whining^Wlobbying about how unfair it is that they can't call cell phones?
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..ends at my nose.
What part of DO NOT CALL ME do you MORONS don't understand? I'm not buying your crap, so quit wasting my time and your time. Annoy me enough, I'll NEVER do business with you again!
Seriously, do what I did-- lose the landline. They call you on your cell phone, send them a bill for the airtime.
Yeah, these jackasses think people that don't want to recieve calls selling stuff are potential customers.. they're like the girl that loves the 'bad guy' and figures they'll be the one to change him. Don't want to buy a subscription to Gerbil Enthusiast? You just need the love of a good telemarketer!
wow, that's a really weird analogy. Time for my morning coffee.
Starsucks
It alarms me just how riled up people can become over our nation's inability to say "Thanks, but I'm really not interested, please take me off the list."
Lately I've been getting more calls from a recording that makes me listen to the whole spiel before I can get to a live person to ask them to remove me from their call list. I signed up on the Do Not Call list but then I moved and had to change my number.
Too bad I'm not asked automatically if I want my new number to appear on the Do Not Call list.
Using the best knowledge of today to create the problems of tomorrow.
A Do-Not-Show-Me-Poorly-Written-Flash-Ads list?
FCC? Are you reading this?
If a state allows its citizens greater individual freedom than the federal statute, then the federal statute is to be given first priority. Obviously, the reverse is true as well.
Fuck Slashdot
I wouldn't care so much about the DNC if the telemarketers calling me were selling something that would even remotely generate some interest. I don't wake up each morning hoping that some random stranger calls me and signs me up for an unheard of magazine that would waste my money and bore me to death. I wouldn't mind if it would actually be something I would buy
The law we need even more than "DO Not Call" is a law which says "You can not sell data about people unless that person gives you consent". There must be a way to opt out of having your information added to a sales list. For example, how can anyone opt out of the bank sales lists? Banks are well known for taking their clients data, and selling that information to credit card companies. Credit card companies use this information to mail solicitations for their services.
Likewise, when I go buy a DVD from a store, why do they need my phone number? They want to sell that information to someone, here is a good lead for a guy who buys DVD's?
The Do Not Call list is a great start, but consumers need more protection from harrasment. We need our information kept confidential. When we do buisness with a company, the company should not be allowed to sneak some fine print in the contract which allows data to be sold. God knows what rights I signed away when I applied for my grocery store shoppers card.
And did anyone here about the lawsuit against the company that made the small gadget you connect to your phone line. When you get a call, the device lets out some small noises. These are noises the phone companies use to signify a line is disconnected. Marketing companies that use computerized auto-dialers recognize these noises and immediatly hang up. The marketing associations sued the company of this product saying it violated the marketing companies first amendment rights.
And while we are making laws protecting consumers, lets do away with the mail in rebate.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
The FCC is NOT a law-making entity.
The FCC has no power to overturn state laws or find them unconstitutional, this is the Supreme Court's job.
The FCC is not the way to go. Lobby Congress.
And watch how they laugh in your face as they think "I don't want these whiny bastards calling me everyday trying to get my money that I just weaseled from the taxpayers."
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Although I have little sympathy for pesky telemarketers they do have a point. It is a burden to have to deal with 50 different state laws. Having a uniform national standard does have a lot of virtues.
Rather than doing what the telemarketers are asking for and relaxing the rules to the lowest common denominator, I wonder if there isn't a straightforward technological solution: create a database containing all of the state rules that telemarketers can use to filter their call lists. When a telemarketer proposes to call a number, a program checks the number and responds: "sorry, that's a Louisiana number and its Acadian Day; you can't call there today." It sounds like there isn't very much variation among states, just a few holidays to avoid and differences as to what an existing business relationship allows you to do, so it seems like it wouldn't be very difficult to implement or much of a burden on the telemarketers.
A lot of phones out there seem to only be programmable from the telecommunications company. Want a phone number blocked? The company will do it for a price. Where's the programmable consumer product that handles 1-800 numbers, or private numbers (all that's customizable by the end user) and takes them differently, whether it's to have them just ring once, or automatically pick it up to leave a message of no more than 10 second length (to give a call back number, name, and organization)...so basically spam filters for the phone. Where are these products? I haven't heard about them, so if they are around, the marketting is not being done properly! Where the hell is my cell phone that manages my minutes so that it alerts me EXACTLY how much my phone bill will be whenever I press a button, and the amount of minutes I used between the hours of 8am - 6pm? To reiterate, the telephone and mobile phones in this day and age are ancient technology and there is a huge market for products that empower the consumer.
...they're right, there should be a uniform standard: NO ONE should be allowed to call anyone on the Do Not Call list at all.
Re the automated dialing, back when I was a kid and you called a phone # and hung up it was called crank/prank calling and it was a crime. How is their machine dialling different (aside from the fact that kids don't contribute to politicians)?
Clearly, anyone on a Do Not Call list does not want to be called. They went through the work of registering for the list, so they clearly are annoyed by people. If a company had an existing business relation, I'm sure the customer would not report the company for continuing to call on business related matter. For this reason, people should be able to register "Valid Business Associates" who are free from the stricter regulation.
Voice your opinion!
"DO NOT CALL" do you not understand?
Are these people so F-n brain dead that they can't take a hint? I think the list is way to lame. I think they should have a "will beat your ass if you call" list.
That's right. If you call me to peddle bullshit I will come find you and beat your ass. Now that would be an effective list.
Really, I don't understand why they don't flat out outlaw all telemarketing. It's intrusive and obnoxious at the very least.
I have never met anyone who straight up bought something through an unsolicited phone call. This is one of the most broken business models and yet we continue to hear from brain dead companies concerning the do not call list and how some facet of this is unfair for them. I don't get it.
My humor is probably your flamebait
the marketing firms will find arguments to postpone laws that make it harder for them to harrass customers. when the do not call list went into law, all the dish and satellite calls stopped comming from new york, and started comming from Canada. who do i sue to stop those calls? do i sue AT&T?
i can appreciate the argument for a federal law regulating telemarketing. but maybe congress should pass a law saying they give states the right to make laws however they see fit.
what is eventually going to happen, is the telemarketing firms will get sophisticated and hire powerful lobby groups. they will donate money to politicians who don't want to regulate telemarketing. and the laws will be reversed. it will be hard to overturn the "do not call" list, but i bet lawmakers could sneak in an exception like "related buisnesses exception", so if you buy a DVD from bestbuy, bestbuy can sell your phone number to columbia house since they sell DVD's too. and i bet the lawmakers will give the law a name that is the exact opposite of what the law does, like "consumer telemarketing protection amendment".
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
Broadcast Flag, ClearChannel, Do Not Call...
Seems to me the FCC is more trouble than it's worth. I don't see how their jobs couldn't be split up between Congress, IETF and Underwriters Labs.. We could scrap spectrum allocation in favor of a law that says you have to comply with the RFC's. Congress could regulate media ownership. UL could make sure your radio doesn't asplode.
Right now it's just a big beaurocratic loophole controlled by partisan hacks. 3 political appointees who easily are corrupted by lobbies. Congress at least has to answer to us. We can have direct say in IETF if we choose to participate and UL's main source of value is their word.
The landscape has changed dramatically since the motivations for creating the FCC. I think it's time to either sit down and do some serious rethinking of what the FCC's role is or scrap it entirely and replace it with something that matches todays reality.
I was really skeptical about signing up to that list. I figured that it was going to end up being like the "Remove" buttons in spam that verify an email address. Has it worked at all so far?
If the telemarketers get their way that Do Not Call list is going to be a fantastic source of active phone numbers.
At least my telemarker calls don't read like my inbox. I'd blush every time I picked up the phone if the person on the other end was trying to sell me dick pills.
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I remember a movie with Jim Carrey (he wasn't the main character, tho) about a guy who loved accepting cold calls.
He would receive a call from an insurance salesman, and begin saying yes to most things until they arranged an appointment.
Then, after making him waste 2 or more hours, when the insurance salesman was leaving, he'd say:
"There's one little... problem.
I'D RATHER... BE... DEAD!!!" (Then he shut the door on the poor salesman)
Oh joy. How I loved that moment. I know it's cruel, but it vented my frustration towards spammers and the like.
Can someone start lobbying to make lobbying illegal?
[alk]
I have blown off PBS because of this!
Evil people don't think they're evil. - George Lucas, Making of Ep III
Danny Schnieder, owner of the Washington Redskins, perfected this "call at home during dinner" tele-marketing thing.
Thanks, Danny !!!
Hail to the Redskins !!!
I have to work with these lists, because part of my job is to support a telemarketing system. Nobody told me squat about that on the interview, nevertheless here I am. I've been here long enough to see the lists come into being. It's making telemarketing harder, and all that good stuff.
I also have the misfortune to need to telemarket in two states, one of which has it's own state list. As it happens, we only call five small towns in this state. In order to get access to the State's DNC list we have to purchase it for the entire state. To make matters worse, this state has a very different set of rules.
On a federal level, you are allowed to call customers you formerly did business with for 18 months after the termination of the business relationship. Not so in this other state. Apparently you aren't allowed to call even the day after the relationship ends. The federal system actually allows the people who get called some recourse. The state system I have to deal with makes it very clear in their fine print that you are allowed a certain amount of accidental calls. Because you are a paying list subscriber, they actually have a department to handle these situations. If you get caught calling people on the state DNC list, you had better have paid the man or else it's game on for lawsuits. What it ends up being is simply extortion. You want to call people of that state, you buy the list, which costs more annually than the entire federal list, for what that's worth.
I really feel sorry for the people who live in that nameless state, because they are payin a ton of taxes to manage a list system that offers them no protection whatsoever. The federal list is a big pain for telemarketers, but at least it has and element of fairness, and really attempts to protect the people who want not to be called.
I'm not interested in arguing the notion of whether the freedom not to be bothered should trump the freedom to call any phone number you want without fear of prosecution, but for the nerds out there, here's some technical details:
The federal list can be downloaded in it's entirety or in updates by date selected once a day by any business who pays the fee. The list is numbers only, no names at all. The state list I have to work with is available by e-mail or on CD-ROM. I picked e-mail, and the updates are entirely at the discretion of the state. So every month or so, my office e-mail gets choked with the list in several parts, so I had to work a special deal with the MIS guys to get extra space on the server. When I first signed up for it, the state didn't send a file until the next scheduled update, but made it clear that we'd be covered in the event of accidentally calling somebody on the list we didn't have access to! Of course almost everybody in the state list is also on the federal list, so we never got a complaint.
I imagine the only people on that state list that are not on the federal list are people looking to sue somebody. They are out there; we've encountered them before. I'm not a fan of telemarketing and would support it if I didn't have to. The federal list makes sense, and really does eliminate any reason for states to keep their own lists, except that grand-daddy of all reasons for government programs - the pork. It's all about the pork, folks. Always has been; always will be.
I always tell marketers to "hold on" and then I lie the phone down until they hang up. It usually takes about 60 seconds. I figure that if everybody would do that, then it would make the practice unprofitable and they'd stop.
Ha, ha! Nobody ever says Italy.
It's not just businesses that are making annoying calls. About a month ago, my area had some local elections. There wasn't a day that went by the two weeks before the election day that recorded "representatives" for the candidates called me half-a-dozen times to encourage us to give said candidate my vote.
Clearly, this did not want me to vote for any of them. I'd rather write in some absurd individual, say, Saddam. At least he didn't have to harrass people on the phone to gain his position of power.
Could you state to one of the harrassing business' callers that you have "terminated the business relationship" and have that be enough? How can you create a "do not cross this line", after online purschase for example?
Just because you can, does not mean you should.
Be nice to the telemarketers. They get paid based on how long you remain on the phone. Sample conversation:
"Hi, Is mr va.. van... van....wijckikewsf??? there?"
"Yup, talking."
"Oh, would you be interested in..."
"Hey, you see the Sox game last night?"
"What?"
"Pretty sweet. What is your favorite baseball team?"
"Sir?"
"Haven't heard of them - what league are they in?"
"would you like a new credit card?"
"Would I ever! I hear Rodriguez has one of those. You know his batting average was ### last year? I saw him 3 weeks ago at a home game."
"I saw that game on TV - remember the bottom of the 4th?"
And so forth. The business loses money, you get to talk to someone. We all know that us compy geeks are looking for a good conversation.
www.olin.edu
I put my cell phone and land lines on the do not call list. Even though its illegal for them to call on my cell, I still put it on there coz I dont trust those greedy bastards.
The Doormat
If you're not outraged, then you're not paying attention.
I do have to say that the number of calls I receive have dropped dramatically. Not completely, but a pleasant reduction. Anyhow, I liken cold calls to spam. Even though the vast majority of us despise spam/spammers and would never purchase anything from them, there are obviously still a lot of people who do buy from spammers. Enough money is being made so that the spammers are willing to keep doing what they do. It's the same with telemarketers. Sure, MOST people hate being called by a salesperson, but apparently there are enough people out there spending money this way to make them want to keep doing it. They wouldn't be fighting it if there hadn't been a lot of people buying from them.
I still occasionally get unsolicited calls. In order to combat this invasion of my personal space, I answer in a different language or gibberish. Maybe I 'll even start spouting code at them next time.
Every form of communication and line of site has been infected with marketing. Mail, E-Mail, TV, DVD, Billboards, Buses, Bus stops, web pages, etc... I propose a market free zone.
One ring to bind them - should probably have more fiber and less rings in their diet.
Before the DNC list, I got a dozen calls an evening. Now, I very rarely get calls. Just a few from businesses that I have a "relationship" with, and a few charities that I was stupid enough to donate to once.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
That's the White House switchboard, btw. Reminds me how I deal with junk mail. Just open it up, take the prepaid business reply envelope out, and shove their marketing stuff back in. Drop it in the mail and they pay the postage back.
I was dumb enough to donate to a few charities, and I suddenly got constant calls from everyone in existence with a remotely similar cause, and several who didn't.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
I've only had a couple phone survey calls around the last election, and I think those are excepted from the Do Not Call list. Other than that, no sales calls.
The National Children's Cancer Society has 14% of its expenses as fundraising. It gets two stars on the CharityNavigator review -- see http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm/bay/sear ch.summary/orgid/4168.htm
r ch.summary/orgid/4167.htm
By contrast, the CureSearch National Childhood Cancer Foundation (four stars) spends half that amount on fundraising, yet manages a program of the same size. See http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm/bay/sea
Telemarketers should LOVE do-not-call registries. It's a list of phone numbers who won't under any circumstances buy the crap you have to offer because they hate the way you're selling it. You don't have to spend any of your telesales people's time dialing these numbers.
How the heck do they not get that it HELPS them to have DNC registries?
The high-tech community has an obvious similar problem, with an obvious similar fix.
We have spam blacklists, why not do something similar for direct marketers?
It would require a hack on existing caller-ID technology. In particular, a caller ID display that stores an updateable blacklist and blocks all calls from those numbers, before allowing a ring-through. Someone was doing something like this with "private" and "unknown" calls back in the late 90's.
The blacklist itself could be updated via a web site, ala Spamhaus, etc. and transferred to the caller ID via cheap USB key or something similar.
The hardest part is getting the list started, because it would require efforts by hundreds or thousands of participants adding the numbers of telemarketing firms.
At $50-$75 per ID/blocker, it could easily take off with the gadget crowd, and once word got out, economy of scale would drop the price and increase availability.
{This post does indeed constitute prior art and the concept is released into the public domain for the benefit of all.}
FrontDoor 2.02; Noncommercial version Press Escape twice for...
I signed up for a state do-not-call list, and the following week I had three times as many telemarketing calls as usual. The calls continued at that rate for several months, during which time I told everyone who called to take me off their list. Now it's back the rate it was at before I joined the do-not-call list. I really don't think it did anything.
One flip side to these DNC lists is that most don't prevent calls by non-profit organizations, so the non-profits get the DNC list and start calling everyone on the list. It's an easy way for them to get phone numbers. The ones I hate most are the non-profit credit consolidation people.
On a lighter note, the next time someone calls and asks for the lady of the house, I'm considering saying "speaking" instead of "there is none," just to see if the caller plays along or gets freaked out.
Bed goes up. Bed goes down. - Homer Simpson
I never did get around to getting my name on the Do Not Call list. There was also this nagging feeling in the back of my head, "Here's a big list of vetted phone numbers. I know it's supposed to be 'Do Not Call,' but I'm sure SOMEBODY's going to get a hold of it and start calling." And to be truthful, we don't have that many problem calls. Most of our phone-spam comes from charities we may have donated to, in the past few years.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
I think if they manage to get the do not call stuff revoked, we should start up an anti-telemarketing campaign where we get people to be as completely obnoxious and resource wasting as possible.
And, with things like Asterisk, its probably easier than ever to do something like this. If they're going to waste our time with thier crappy calling, I think we owe it to them to waste as much of their money as possible, and make being a telemarketing droid as unpleasant as possible.
You insensitive clod!
I cut the cord several years ago and since my cell phone number has landed on some lists. I've actually found it's tougher to deal with telemarketers now that I'm cell phone only. My state Do Not Call list doesn't cover cell phones, and hell if I find the right place to report illegal calls to my cell phone.
My state AG says that I need to contact the feds, but the federal do not call list complaint form is pretty much useless. There's nowhere you can specify that you received the call on a cell phone, and pretty much the only information they collect is the name of the telemarketer and your phone number.
There's a particular tech rag that calls me about once a month to "verify my contact information". Each time I've asked to be removed from their list and filed complaints with the state and with the feds, but nothing has ever come of either.
"I am guaranteed NOT to vote for your party if you don't take me off of your call list RIGHT NOW"
As someone who happens to make cold calls to drum up new business almost every single day, (I'm a stockbroker) I know the laws inside and out. Cell phones in certain states are not allowed on the Do Not Call List just as businesses are not allowed to be on it. My state just happens to have no restrictions on cold calling cell phones, so I do. I call anything that will ring.
Cold calling is an excellent way to meet Tons people in a very short time. I call, introduce myself, qualify the prospect, (Do they have money or not), ask if they're interested in getting together and that's that. Quick concise. to the point. No Bullshit as it were. Any other method just wouldn't be as quick and easy. I could go knock doors or waste money mailing things, but a phone call is quick, free, and painless.
Not to toot my own horn or anything but my book of business is well over 100 Million dollars in size and about 95% came from cold calling. I clear around 250K a year and again it's all stemmed from the cold call. I dont' see any other way to get huge results in a short amount of time. I can talk to 20 - 30 people an hour depending on the day and time I call. So while all of you are bitching about not wanting to be called and sold something probably don't have the money to be able to buy it in the first place. Besides, there are some of us out there that are actually bringing a solid benefit to the table. Not just do you want to buy some of this or take a survey. I at least give people that cold call my numbers the respect and a small amount of time to explain what they're after. I'm not on the DNC because I don't like it, and because I'd not want to piss off the Kosmos or something. I've never understood Karma (The not /. version) all that well.
This link will take you to more info on the Global DNC Law restrictions and allowances etc. Consider this my two cents.
My dad was one of the first hundred people on the "list". He poked and chided me, saying, "Boy, I bet you Libertarians are stumped on this one, eh?" (Not Canadian, but he talks like one)
... well, maybe it's not so drastic, anymore.
I truly didn't have an answer for him. That is, until he started getting calls to donate for a firemans' ball in another county (where he once had a speeding ticket). Then it was a policemans' ticket raffle in our county, then there was the half dozen calls for the American Heart Association. I think it was the worst though when the CDC called on a "marketing study". Last but not least, I saw a paper survey from the US Postal service. Call it coincidence.
Ironically, he still gets credit card calls, mostly from Puerto Rico or some other location where I suppose this doesn't apply. He told the last one he was on the do not call list, and the guy promptly took him off.
I asked what the policeman said who called about the raffle, "We don't have a list to take you off of." That was last year.
He got another call from the same officer last week. It's a small county/town too, so there really is no excusing it. He told me (over the phone) he was just going to buy a cell for my youngest sister and remove the phone.
I told him he'd lose Internet, but he said the phone line would still be there, just not the phone.
I guess drastic times call for
It's pretty simple, really. Try to follow. There's a national DNC registry. Some states (Indiana, Florida, New Jersey, Wisconsin, and North Dakota, to be exact) have stricter laws. A "favorable FCC ruling," in this case, means that people in those five states will lose some protections, but still have the protections that people in the other 45 states have. The people in those other 45 states will be unaffected.
"The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call laws are more strict than Federal law and which prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship."
Then there's nothing to worry about. It'll never happen with the GOP in control of both the White House and both houses of Congress, as they've always been friends to states' rights!
I never signed up for the DO NOT CALL list because I thought it would be a political football and I could not be certain of the out come. (like if they change the law and now all these telemarketing firms would then use the DO NOT CALL list) To that end, I set up an asterisk box.
http://www.asterisk.org/
And if there is no caller id, straight to voicemail without ever ringing the phone. Call me with some telemarketing BS with a caller id (or any other BS for that matter), well then you get the blacklist and it plays an obnoxious recording with no person having to answer the phone or listen to a telemarketing voicemail. Pretty sweet.
Perhaps if laws cannot stop them(or they just overturn them), and by "them" I mean telemarketers, maybe it's time to fight fire with fire.
If we're talking regular office lines that can take incoming calls(oviously they make outgoing calls), let's phone mob them. Let's give 'em a good cactusing. let's ask THEM if THEY want aluminum siding. Or if they want to buy a ticket to MY ball!(er, that didnt' sound right, which makes it even funnier).
What's all the fuss about? What has the Democratic National Convention done to you lately?
But these are companies that take the phrase "existing business relationship" to levels where the case is that both parties do not agree that the relationship exists, the "Do not call" list is designed to make it clear under what circumstances there is such a relationship. Here we see just another example of telemarketers trying to move that line. I don't know why the cancer society is complaining as from what I heard charities and non-profit groups were exempt.
Those elelctrocnic voters are st0len the election severla yeasr now. they are rules the w0rld by dis deceptions. peper is cheaper and securify crackers, arnold sux juicy infected nose puss.
any firm that has ever bought or sold anything from any firm you ever did business with, had a pop-up ad get in the way of your mouse cursor, or that pretended to be a Survey or Poll.
plus any firm that any of the following sold their lists to.
think about it - that's virtually any business anywhere.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I am in the UK do not call list. It did made a difference but some of the telemarketers try to sneak out of it by saying that it is a "survey".
How can they immagine that one that is in a "do not call list" is willing to ansnwer some personal questions for a "survey" ?
Yes, I know that it is a telemarketer in disguise, but it is surely one with little brain.
What part of this call list is online?? None? So why is it filed under "Your Rights Online?
It alarms me just how riled up people can become over our nation's inability to say "Thanks, but I'm really not interested, please take me off the list."
When the person on the other end won't take no for an answer, or even give you a chance to reply, you are denied any opportunity to end the conversation politely. They know this, and you know they know it, and they know you know, in an infinite regress like some hellish Escher painting.
Their whole spiel depends on your being polite long enough to get interested. Thanks and sorry were not designed for this situation.
you can have my violent video games when you pry them from my cold, dead hands.
Prime UID Club
When I had my cell phone (which was my only phone), I never got telemarketer calling me. When I got the land line installed, about 5 months after I got it, I put my name on the Do Not Call list and suddenly, I get about 5 calls a week from all sorts of sales people. The list doesnt work.
Actually, banks can *NOT* just sell your information to credit card companies. It is very difficult for banks to release *any* information about you due to the GLB requirements.
I can not even verbally confirm that company X is a client of bank Y. It's illegal.
They can only tranfer information to companies that have affilations with them already and have to disclose that to you as a customer.
Yes, some banks abuse that power. Simple answer: Don't bank with them, and tell them why.
Verisign has a back door into the control network for the US phone system. Using this, they can divert, block, or intercept calls as desired. When a call is placed, Verisign's database is checked to see if it requires special handling. For telemarketing companies that use this service, Verisign checks their database to see if the destination is on the do-not-call list, and if so, blocks the call. Similarly, for wiretapping requests, the call is forwarded to a wiretapping center to be fed out to some agency over a T1 line, per CALEA standards. It's all done at the central office switch level via the SS7 network; there's no gear on customer premises at all.
Better solution - hook up a phone to your requisite land-line and just turn off the ringer. If Verizon (or whoever) requires the local service, then you might as well set it up to your advantage. The way I see it, I installed the phone for *my* convenience, not the convenience of anyone else. I have no qualms about being terse and hanging up on the telemarketers. They're not paying for my phone service, and they're wasting my time. G'bye. I've got the local unlimited package service on my land-line, and I use it instead of the cell to talk to "chatty" folks. The wife will spend several hours talking to her mom several states away without incurring long distance charges, nor worrying about using up all the cell minutes. There aren't any batteries on the land-line to burn down, either. The land-line has it's place, and gets used accordingly.
If these do not call laws are successfully overturned, my new method of telling these phone spammers to piss off will be a portable airhorn blast into the mic.
The DNC is useless. I don't see why they're even complaining.. They use the list to farm numbers now.
I have been signed up since the beginning, and I get 2-3 calls per day. Before signing up, I got 2 or 3 calls a week on a bad week. 90% of these calls are reported as 800 numbers (which I believe are false) with no names on my caller id and there is never anything (not even a recording) on the other end of the line - some are even blocking caller id, now, making impossible to file complaints. I have filed, literally, hundreds of complaints on the DNC, and nothing has been done about it. From the FTCs FAQ:
Violations get put into a database and could lead to action. Yeah, right...
End of line..
NYTimes: Sir, are you interested in a 12-month subscription to NY Times? Seinfeld: YES!!! (and slams down the phone)
They can only tranfer information to companies that have affilations with them already...
It would seem to me that every bank has some sort of affiliation with Visa and Mastercard, among others...
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
"The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call laws are more strict than Federal law and which prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship."
But if the person has an existing relationship with the business and has said they do not mind them calling, which is the only time they should be able to call anyway, then they will not mind being called and the business will not get into trouble.
To be frank, I was getting a few marketing calls before I signed up my name in the list, but all that changed after my buddy decided these were a nuisance and put the no. in the Do Not Call List.
Now we get EVEN more calls... (no kidding)
We were told to keep the customer on the line, interacting for as long as possible. If they were not interested, we were supposed to weasel more 'leads' out of them; meaning we asked them for the names/phone numbers of their friends that might be interested. This constitutes a business-relationship which we could exploit.
Another business-relationship was when we'd call everyone within 20-25 miles of our recent customer. The sales pitch went like:
Hello, this is X calling from Y. Your neighbor, Z, living at Z has recently purchased our product and since we're in the area, we're offering special discounts....
We'd use their address and names to get their neighbors to start listening to us.
When we got somebody that was obnoxious, or just didnt like that we disturbed them, we'd often set them up to be called back in the next few hours. Asking for a supervisor most often yields a hang-up as well. What we were supposed to do is fill out a form stating that the customer didnt want to be called back but since it takes a second to press the 'next' button and a lot longer to fill out a form, virtually nobody was taken off.
Actually, even then I dont think it was possible to permanently remove yourself from our list - even with the form you'd get maybe a few months of respite but after a while, all these forms were just added back to our database. Although this was before the DNR, I cant imagine anything's changed.
Yes, tis true. We are the future!
If the telemarketers succeed in repealing the Do-Not-Call lists, then I will have NO mercy on them when they call me! I'll act like a lunatic... I'll talk about the daily news... I'll read them one of my kids story books... I'll just set the phone down and leave them with dead air. Whatever I can think of to annoy them, I'll do it. Telemarketers beware: You do not WANT to call me.
I think this is great news because it will render the phone as useless as my mailbox. My mailbox is 99% crap and 1% useful material and packages. When they start calling me I'll just stop answering the phone and eventually everyone else will to and we'll have an entire industry that uses machine to leave messages with other machines for goods and services no one ever learns about let alone buy.
When they start spamming my cell phone, it won't matter I rarely pick up an unrecognized call anyhow.
So let er rip telephone spammers. Please accelerate the end of the home land line phone.
because when the telemarketers called I'd simply say "Hold on just one second... someone's at the door. Then set the phone on the table for 5-10 minutes and eat my dinner. Pick it up and check if they're still there, "Hello, oh, sorry about that, my neighbor Bob was just out front showing me the new cam he bought for his pick-up. Are you into trucks? It's a really fun hob... Oops, hold on a sec, my son just shit his pants and I need to go grab some wipes." Put the phone back down... rinse, repeat.
"What is the answer?" (Silence) "In that case, what is the question?" --Gertrude Stein
To have to answer the phone and say no thanks. Geez. It may not be your preferred method - but many non-profits' fundraising efforts rely on the wide net cast by telemarketing. Not to mention all the jobs that the telemarketing industry provides to unskilled workers. And most of those jobs are above minimum wage with the potential to earn a decent living with experience.
I used to have my answering machine play my greeting in RTTY. It certainly reduced the number of calls I got to almost 0. But since then I droped the land line service for cellular. Now I am in control once again..... for now.
"I bow to no man" - Riddick
I'm not sure how it works out in the states, but here my landline number is hidden (ie, it doesn't show up on any lists, the yellow pages, etc...) so I never get any problems from telemarketers.
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This attitude of Telemarketers. They should be lobbying in FAVOUR of Do not Call Lists. What does a do not call list represent? People who DO NOT WANT to be called. People who are not likely to be influenced by your sales pitch because they find this kind of call intrusive. Do not call lists allows telemarketers to weed out the most unlikely clients from the bunch who are more amenable to that marketing strategy. By having to call less people, they need to hire less employees for the same number of sales at the end of the road. It's actually BETTER for them.
I like my dinosaurs feathery, and my pterosaurs hairy (or is it pycnofibery?)
They never went away; during that time, they were calling Europe.
Residents in the UK, Holland, Denmark, Finland, Spain and several other countries are being targetted by telemarketers with the old "You've won a holiday" story; and their national Do Not Call registers, appear powerless to stop the calls. e.g. The UK TPS).
To make matters worse the victims often don't have a clue about the American legal system and therefore have great difficulty in getting any money back when they realise they've not won a sausage.
I know all this becuase
So, rather than decreasing the restrictions, if the Slashdot readership has suggestions on how we can increase them so they have international effect, then many thousands of Europeans will probably want to have your babies, or at the very least promise not to phone you at dinner time to say thanks.
boakes.org
Why telemarketing can't be made totally illegal in the first place? Does anyone actually know anyone who actually wants to get phoned about their mobile phone plan or magazine subscription offers?
I would at least prefer to have one last refuge from all the advertisement these days.
Amendment to Do Not Call Legislation: For the purposes of Do Not Call lists, a business relationship is NOT established with any second company simply because they have purchased any loan, contract, or other outstanding debt from a first company with such a relationship to the customer. A business relationship may only be established with the second company if the Customer Opts-In by returning a pre-paid, single mailing, signed postcard, or selects an opt-in option on the acquiring company's web-site using a PIN number mailed to them. Punishment for pretending otherwise is severe!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I admit I'm a 1st Amendment extremist and a bit of a black-helecopter wacko, but I've always had a trouble with DNC lists because they are not content neutral. Basically, they say it's OK to telemarket political contributions, telemarket nonprofit contributions, and telemarket beads 'n' trinkets (from nonprofits), but not legal items from individuals or corporations. I could live with these laws if they banned all telemarketing other than between 7-9:00, but not if they only ban telmarketing from politically-unfavored groups.
Hey, suing is easy. Doesn't mean he won. Otherwise telephone calls into any noisy environment would be targets afterwards.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
and over ruling all state statues as long and the take ALL the restrictions that EVERY state has and making them all FEDERAL.
And I also would like them to restrict campaigning, at the very least requiring them to have a REAL PERSON call and not just a freaking recording, that what RADIOS advertisements are for.
Just remember, your phone number is 212.768.7277, or 212.790.1500. They want an email address? privacy@the-dma.org
A lot of those cute calendars & other glitsy marketing material is donated. The ad agency making the stuff gets a tax write off for it because it's a donation.
You want to call people of that state, you buy the list, which costs more annually than the entire federal list, for what that's worth.
Cool, not only do they make it difficult to telemarket in their state, they're probably turning a profit on those that do call in their state.
Looks win win for the citizens to me.
'exclusive jurisdiction over interstate telemarketing calls.'
Excuse me, actually not really, business relationship or not - I am paying you for a service. The only thing you have a right to do is respect my privacy - especially if you want my money.
I do computer consulting on the side (particularly web design, but other stuff). So when a telemarketer decides they need to call me - I start soliciting myself until they hangup.
These guys just piss me off.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
for each Telemarketer that calls, I will use an air horn hooked up to my telephone to blast the caller's eardrums who try to sell me something. After telemarketers start to go deaf, they will be fewer in numbers.
That or I will use this device to screen calls and use the star key to tell off any telemarketer that dares try to get through. I will make a custom recording for them, telling them to take me off their calling list and cuss them out in 6 different languages. English, Spanish, Hindi, Russian, Traditional Chinese, and German.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Before you go pulling out your airhorn on the next telemarketer who calls you, sign up at your local telemarketting call center and work there for just one month. You'll see that telemarketers aren't really as evil as they seem. All they are are people trying to make a living, often times in some small, nameless town where the telemarketting company actually pays the best wages because they can get away with it in Middle-of-Nowhere Ohio (mind you it's barely over minimum wage). They are supporting families, supporting their lives, not signing up because they love annoying people. You have to go a few levels up to find those kinds of people. Because in their contracts and training, if you airhorn a telemarketer and hang up and they never got a 'contact' (spoke to someone who can make decisions) they are required to call you back, and you will keep getting called back until you've been called the maximum number of times (which can be more than 10, and answering machines don't count). Telemarketers are not trying to annoy you. The calls are all computer dialed and it doesn't make a difference to that telemarketer if you hang up right away, they push three buttons and you're called back the next day. Yelling at a telemarketer does absolutely nothing either. They are trained to be sickeningly polite, but in the end, if they never got their contact, you're getting called back. If you don't want to be called, react calmly, rationally, and just ask to be removed from the list. All companies are required to maintain company Do Not Call lists (political and non-profit are exempt of course). But seriously, you're taking your anger out on the wrong people. You want to do something about getting less calls, identify yourself, react calmly, ask to be removed from the list, and hey, while you're at it, write your congressman and tell them what you'd like to see happen with telemarketing. They aren't going to kill it completely, too much money is invested in it, but if you have a good suggestion that can save us all some trouble, hey, kudos to you. This matter here has absolutely no meaning, as state Do Not Call lists are next to meaningless compared to the Federal one. Federal law makes sense for a Do Not Call list, as mentioned above, because most calls are made over state lines and State lists are often very similar to the federal list. Almost nothing will change if state regulations are placed into the same regulations as the federal list. This is a non-issue. I work for a telemarketting company, but only because there isn't much choice here in this little town. I do quality assurance, so you'll never hear me on the phone unless you have a problem, but hey, if you're going to flame me, it's tonyb452@hotmail.com Telemarketting companies only exist because big business companies pay them huge amounts of money to call you. You want to complain about telemarketting, find out who the company is behind the call (SBC, Verizon, American Express, Discover, etc, etc, etc) and call them and tell them you're unhappy. That is the way to make progress.
CASH. Phone numbers are normally requested ONLY if you buy with a credit card. That's why one should use cash as much as possible, no tracking! :)
Additionally, one can ALWAYS refuse. Most store clerks look at you quizically for a second and then move on to taking your cash and bagging your item.
I received a phone call from a marketing company in Miami, Florida the other day. I live in the UK. I just called the bloke a cunt and hung up. You stupid chiefs! Does it say "Every morning is a Smirnoff morning." on the bottom right corner of your page too?
Somehow I think it would be even more amusing with male callers... so long as they don't show interest back anyhow
dick pills
I read this as "dill pickles".
-- It only takes 20 minutes for a liberal to become a conservative thanks to our new outpatient surgical procedure!
This is exactly what I do. I pay $10/month for the cheapest possible local phone service (no long distance) and don't plug a phone into it. I just think of the $10 as part of my DSL bill.
Telephones really are interstate commerce. Would you really want to have to bitch at Oregon from your home in Missouri if you were getting called from there?
I share your skepticism about the federal government's abilities, but since we move freely from state to state, and call freely from state to state, it really does seem that some things are far more simply handled by one body rather than 50 separate ones.
Or perhaps you'd prefer 3,000 separate county bodies? If local control is necessarily better, what makes states so fabulous?
No, the federal government doesn't handle all things well. Hell, it doesn't handle anything well, really. But I don't see that implying that the separate states can do it better when it's a nationwide problem.
Most of the telemarketers won't let you get a word in edgewise. He gets them started on their spiel, and just puts the phone down (not hung up, laid on the table gently).
He'll then pick it up every ten minutes or so to se if the telemarketer is still talking, and only hang up after he's wasted their time and money.
Myself, I don't have a landline phone, so telemarketers don't bother me.
It's fairly foolish for companies that are techinically exempt from DNC lists to go ahead and make telemarketing calls to people who are on a list. I (and I'm sure most others) put myself on the list because I don't want telemarketers to call me, period. It wasn't my idea to exempt some random selection of industries; if it were my choice, those industries wouldn't be allowed to call and bug me either. I also don't want companies to make fresh sales calls to me just because I've bought something from them in the past.
So calling someone on the list is counterproductive; it will get you nothing but ill-will. A smart company would respect the DNC list even if they're in an industry that's exempt. Smart companies also should be sparing about making dinnertime sales calls to existing customers who are on the DNC list, lest they drive them away.
I am a telemarketer you insensitive clods!
You'd think that millions "voting" not to be bothered would make a difference, but apparently businesses know better than we do. Do these idiots realize that they're just going to spend more money calling people that will hang up?
We can just file a class action lawsuit for harrasment if they start calling again. Any lawyers want this case? Seriously, if I say "Don't call" and they call that's harrasment right? I'd go to jail or get fined if someone told me not to call and I did anyway. Exactly how are telefucketers above the law?
Can anyone explain how this is legal? I'm stupified.
I don't consider telemarketing a legitimate business, even though it is legal. Therefore I applaud making telemarketers feel unwanted, despised and hated. Because they are!
The entire do-not-call registry should be scrapped and replaced with a DO-call registry - making the process opt-in instead of opt-out. Such a system would eliminate questionable "existing business relationship" determination, and place the control of telemarketing back where it belongs.
This has NOTHING to do with the Do Not Call list!
The Do Not Call list is a federal list. It is not under attack, or at least, the details of the article don't discuss it.
What is discussed is STRICTER state laws in 5 specific states. These are completely separate laws, and are outside the scope of the DNC list.
The federal list is not under attack at all. I'm not in an affected state, so this doesn't affect me (or those of you outside the 5 specific states) in any way whatsoever.
Now it could be that this is the first step in a slippery slope of attacks, but nowhere in the article is that mentioned. You can put your tin foil hats back in the drawer, for now.
1. BT has recently launched free caller ID.
2. AFAIK, it is illegal for a UK bank to give out any customers details (except to the police I imagine, and the government of course).
Americans desperately need this do not call list, not so much for the convience, but for their OWN PROTECTION.
When I was younger, I used to do a lot of telemarketing. 90% of all telemarketing companies in Canada sell to the US and there is a VERY GOOD REASON FOR IT. Americans are naive.
Mod this as a troll, flame me, I don't care. 3 years of selling the DUMBEST THINGS to americans have taught me something.
The thing I sold the most of were packages that contained a list of banks that could potentially offer a low interest rate credit card to the person I was selling the list to. The package was always priced between $350 and $450. No one was pre approved. It was just a list of 10 banks. It was up to the "customer" to buy it. There were at least 100 companies across Canada selling this to americans. None of these companies sold this "product" to anywhere else in the world, other than america.
I dialed 1000 numbers a week. 75% of the numbers had no one picking up. That means I spoke to 250 people. Out of those 250 people, I was averaging 15 sales a week.
Thats a lot, for a grossly over priced list of 10 non pre approved banks. Of course, it was completely legitimate, and I was making $2500/wk at the age of 16.
15 sales a week? pfft nothing right? Try at least 50,000 kids who can't speak french in Montreal looking for jobs that only require english. Now we're looking at 750,000 sales a week. This is why America absolutely needs the strictest possible do not call programme. It's for their own good, and damn anyone who disagrees.
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
"Awww would you listen to the gibberish they've got you saying. It's sad and alarming. You were meant to alert school children about snow days and such. Ah well. Let's get you home to Frinky. I wonder if your wheels still work."
The issue revolves around some states whose Do Not Call ... prohibit telemarketers from calling anyone on a Do Not Call, regardless of an existing business relationship.
I actually wandered into your store (online or otherwise) and bought something. You call it a business relationship. I call it a purchase.
DO NOT CALL ME at me home because I bought cheetos from you. DO NOT START SPAMMING me left and right because I bought something from your online store AND for heaven's sake don't start sending junk mailto my house! And what's worse, don't give my name to all YOUR FRIENDS (people who paid for you to give up my info) and have them start calling me, spamming me, and sending me crap!
You are not my business partner just because I bought something from you once or twice and you certainly aren't entitled to anything from me but fair payment for what I bought.
If I want to buy something else from you, I'll find you or one of your "friends". Otherwise, LEAVE ME ALONE.
I never watched so much TV to see "Jerry Seinfeld" before it went into syndication, but there was one program that I did see that really made an impression.
When receiving an unwanted call from a telemarketer, ask for their name and home number to call them back when it's more convenient (preferably at their most inopportune time.)
Paying a little extra (extortion?) to the local phone monopoly in order to have an unlisted number also seems to help somewhat.
Well, you must be new here.
as in Do Not Breathe. weasels call we don't want to hear from, a Fed comes out and ties a bag over their head.
no appeals.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
I take one of those really loud marine air horns and blast it into the phone when they call..My kids think it's funny and they always know when dad gets a call he does not like.
No joke this is what I do. Bored, middle aged, cranky white guy who just wants to be left alone at night.
I have a fever baby and the only cure is more cowbell!
"Fuck those mother fuckers."
What I'd like is a way to make my landline cost any corporate body (including non-profits of all descriptions) $1-per-minute to call, with the money coming to me. If the telemarketers have to pay me to listen, I might not get quite so cross at them.
"I don't want to buy insurance from you at the moment, but do tell me more about it anyway. I feel a slight twinge of doubt coming and going, so perhaps a good long pitch ($50 worth, perhaps) will change my mind..." [some time passes] "No, I think I'll just ring off now as I want to get that pizza you've just paid for with this call. Thanks anyway, and rest assured that I value your subsidizing my pizza habit so feel free to call again!"
"Little does he know, but there is no 'I' in 'Idiot'!"
That stops ALL telemarketing.
(Telemarketing cell phone users is ILLEGAL in the USA.)
As Hicks(?) said in Aliens: "It's the only way to be sure."
Well, I can see why you wouldn't want to waste any precious mime time. :D
qntm.org
Actually here's a question. Do businesses go through the same hell with telemarketers that everyday joes do?
Well, the part of do not call that I didn't understand, here in indiana, one of the 5 states in question, is that they aren't just bloacking telemarketers; they are also blocking people who I want calling me, people with whom I have an existing business relationship, like, say, my bank.
So I wanted off. Went to the AG's home page, no way to do it online. i.e. their page is broken.
So I called the number, 1-888-834-9969.
After waiting on hold for a human, I asked to be taken off the list. The guy asked a bunch of personal questions, entered some data, and said "ok, now you're on the list." I explained that I had called to get OFF the list, and asked to speak to a supervisor. Long waiting on hold.
Woman comes on, asks a bunch of personal questions, says "ok, now you're on the list."
I explained that I had called to get OFF the list, and had asked to speak to a supervisor. Long waiting on hold.
A guy who calls himself Bo Barnhouse comes on.
Says he can't take me off the list. Says he is an employee of the Attorney General, but has no supervisor and never reports to any one. Won't give out the address of where he is, other than in bloomington. Long periods on hold.
Gives me a number for the AG's office, 1-800-382-5516, and admits no one's answering that phone right now. Refuses to give any useful info or figure out how to get off the list.
My current position is now that the FTA -should- pre-empt Indiana's broken system, if it has been authorized to do so by congress. My next step will be to look up and try to figure out if "Bo Barnhouse" is a real person -often in talking to telemarketer types I've been given fake names.
Everyone I spoke to there was polite and courteous, just didn't care that their system is broken, and weren't willing to forward my concerns to anyone who might give a damn.
A stem that blocks too many calls is as useless as an over-eager spam filter. If I didn't want any calls, I could just unplug my phone.
Now I understand why my land-line has got to go! The only thing it does now is receive forwarded calls I miss on the cell phone, and that isn't really worth twenty dollars per month.
Goddamned kids! Get off my lawn!
During the comment period when the national DNC was proposed - I stated that there should not be any loopholes or exemptions allowed. If there hadn't been any - then we wouldn't be going thru this bullshit now...
Here's the comment I sent to the FCC, have you sent in yours yet?
Dear Commissioners:
I write to you today because I:
1) Support strong state-level protections against telemarketing if they surpass the protections provided by the Federal DNC. To be crystal clear, if they're better than what the Federal law provides - I want those stronger, better laws enforced. The Federal law should be the MINIMUM standard.
2) Don't want ANY pre-recorded messages or telemarketing, even from your own bank or companies with which you do business ever.
3) Believe that you should fix the "established business relationship" loophole so that businesses can't telemarket individuals unless they first give clear notice of the intent to telemarket, and gain verifiable, affirmative consent of the customer. Moreover, stipulate that they must gain verifiable, affirmative consent of the customer via regular first class mail, and that they must provide a business reply envelope for an affirmative response. All responses should be required to remain on file for 10 years in their paper form. Each violation should result in an immediate $50,000.00 fine - no exceptions.
4) Respectfully demand that the FCC protect the privacy and sanctity of the American household by denyning the petitions filed in the following docket numbers: CG Docket No. 02-278, DA 05-1346, DA 05-1347, DA 04-3185, DA 04-3187, DA 04-3835, DA 04-3836, DA 04-3837, and DA 05-342.
5) Believe that you should remove ALL exemptions and stipulate that anyone on the National DNC List can not be called by anyone whether they are telemarketer, politician, surveyor, etc. unless they have affirmative consent by the telephone subscriber or their authorized lawful agent to do otherwise; such affirmative consent may be revoked by the telephone subscriber or their authorized lawful agent at any time, and all calls must stop as of the day following the date of receipt of the revocation as determined by a certified mailing via USPS, return receipt requested, and that if the entity having such authorization revoked refuses the notice and/or refuses to sign the return receipt, that the notification shall remain in full force and effect as if it had not been refused and/or signed.
In essence - if I'm on the National DNC - that means I'm 100% not interested in hearing from anyone I don't know - whether I have some strong or tenuous "business relationship" or not.
6) Believe the right to be let alone is well-settled law that has been heard numerous times by the US Sup. Ct. in a broad spectrum of matters, including, but not limited to those dealing with marketing via the USPS. Refer to my original comment regarding the implementation of the National DNC under the same email address for a supporting and relevant US Sup. Ct. case citation.
For the FCC to allow some persons or entities to contact me against my express wishes is tantamount to legalizing a form of trespass and violating the ancient tradition that one's home is a castle which not even the King may breech without permission. In the instant case, I've put out an electronic NO TRESPASSING notice, and I demand that it be adhered to 100% at all times. The fact that I may miss out on some message which someone considers to be important is my decision - I made it, I've made it clearly available to them, and it doesn't violate their right to speech - they can still speak, I just can not be compelled to listen nor should I be.
The National DNC and the State DNC's are not vague or unconstitional - limitations on "commercial" speech are well-settled law, and the Petitioners are not being denied their rights to speech or due process. Indeed, they know PRECISELY what they must do - NOT CALL A PARTICULAR PHONE NUMBER ON A LIST THAT IS EASILY AVAILABLE
http://gullfoss2.fcc.gov/ecfs/Upload?hot_docket=10 06400939%7C02-278%7CTelephone%2BConsumer%2BProtect ion%2BAct&Send=Continue
This one's easy. Just create a whitelist and code it into a custom caller id. Then, only approved people would make your phone ring. All others would be immediately disconnected.
1) create whitelist
2) create custom caller id
3) ???
4) PROFIT!!!
if you give the Cheetos guy your phone number, expect him to call.
+++
I once was a great hacker.
I must go on record.
When you receive call for a non-profit organization, the person who is calling is not -- I REPEAT NOT -- a volunteer. That person is a professional telemarketer working for a FOR-PROFIT telemarketing agency. And they are every bit as unscrupulous as any other telemarketer.
They SWITCH their organizations around so that they can claim that you've never requested to be on "THEIR" do-not-call list.
These people cheapen any organization that they work for. Their sleaziness alters my entire sense of humanity.
The entire advertising industry is a world of delusions. They even use their delusions to sell thier delusions until all of the advertising industry operates under the delusion that there is, somehow, more to be gained by further saturating a market that is already faced by intense consumer anger and a deep hatred of the current advertising and marketing environment.
These people deserve to be severely punished. They trample our lives with their cheap dishonest trash. Their punishment may as well come in the form of -- DARE I SAY IT -- REGULATION -- SEVERE HARSH INDUSTRY CRUSHING REGULATION.
There; I feel so much better getting that off my chest... for now.
{ return clarity; }
So if someone calls me on my vonage phone line, can I have them arrested for unauthorized access to a network?
Since they just arrested that guy for WarDriving and charged him with that, and since my phone is vonage.. I think I should try it!