This is just another version of Habeas, only from people who don't even pretend to not be spammers. People who maintain legitimate email lists (confirmed opt-in) don't need it. The only people who have any reason to want the certification are spammers.
Okay, I read the first few pages of the lawsuit, and then I couldnt stomach the legalese anymore
There's no legalese in it. I think it was written by a broken random word generator. They certainly have no clue how the internet works. Hell, they claim they own their IP addresses, despite explicit contracts to the contrary.
"Mailblocks reserves the right to release any personally identifiable registration information regarding you to third parties who provide goods or services that we believe may be of interest to you. Some third parties furnishing you with promotional materials may permit you to "opt out" of receiving such communications from them. However, Mailblocks is not responsible for any such party's failure to comply with its own "opt out" policies."
They guarantee you'll get no spam, while selling your address to spammers.
Still, could be worse. Last time I sent something to using a challenge-response "anti-spam" service, the challenge was sent in pure HTML, and rejected by my mail server as spam.
Spammers are winning, because anti-spammers are stupid.
All Electronics . The movie industry people call it the "toy store of the industry." Sometimes, they even have a book on programming stuff like you want.
Er, dude, that wasn't precendent. That was what Walmart claimed. They then proceeded to back down when their victim pointed out that they'd claimed that under penalty of perjury.
As a sociologist, I really do need to call "random" people, and can't consider a survey consisting only of telephone owning people who are willing to take a survey and who are clueless as to the do-not-call registry a valid sample space
Telemarketing call to cellphones without explicit permission are illegal, and there is no excemption of any kind. And the telemarketers are required to know if it's a cell phone number in advance. Most will actually put you on a no-call list if you tell them it's a cell phone. Screaming obscenities seems to help, as well (seriously). I've never gotten two calls from the same sleaze on my cell phone.
It's never the charity that calls you. It's a telemarking service working for the charity. Get the name of the charity, and the service if you can (they generally won't tell you, even though that's illegal). Then call the charity direct, and tell them you'll never support them because they used unethical harassement to try to coerce money out of you. Talk fast, and shout them down if they try to interrupt. If they ask who you are, refuse to tell them. In short, act like the asshole who called you. Once you're sure they know what it's like, hang up. And call them again, the next day.
Oh, it's far worse than that. Rumor is, the FTC has already signed a contract with AT&T to run the list. It's like they went through their complaint file to see what phone company had the most complaints, and put them in charge of the henhouse.
I don't see why I should pay the phone company to avoid calls that occur only because the telemarketers paid the phone company for my phone number. It's a racket.
I just don't answer the phone. Anybody who I actually want to hear from knows how to get ahold of me.
It is also claimed that the software can deliver any type of text or phone number to a recipient's caller ID box, no matter if it's true or false, and that it can also bypass the anti-telemarketer blocks made available by some telephone companies, such as SBC and Qwest.
Anybody with an IDSL or PBX phone system can put in anything they want on Caller ID. And recognizing SIT tones is a feature on better telemarketing rigs, and generally one that can be turned off. They don't "bypass" the telezapper, they simply ignore it. Duh.
On the other hand, any telemarketer that pays $2700 for something so obivously a ripoff will get no sympathy from me.
What I find most interesting about this is not the use of the junk fax law, but that Mark was able to sue Sears about it.
This is possible under the federal anti-fax spam. Hooters was fined over a million bucks for a fax spam run by a marketing company that went out of business before the complaint was files.
If the company actually being advertised is aware of the ads, they are responsible under the fax spam law.
That was an illegal threat on their part. They can't do that. They can make copies of hard drives, but they can't shut you down.
Ask Steve Jackson or the Secret Service about it. It isn't everybody who can claim to have gotten $300,000 in punitive damages, and had the lead agent called incomptent by the judge, on the record, against a federal police agency.
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Anybody who takes legal advice from an Anonymous Coward deserves what they get.
Anybody who mods legal advice from an Anonymous Coward is an idoit.
If it becomes profitable to identify spammers, then everyone will be a spammer. Yes, even you.
This is just another version of Habeas, only from people who don't even pretend to not be spammers. People who maintain legitimate email lists (confirmed opt-in) don't need it. The only people who have any reason to want the certification are spammers.
Okay, I read the first few pages of the lawsuit, and then I couldnt stomach the legalese anymore
There's no legalese in it. I think it was written by a broken random word generator. They certainly have no clue how the internet works. Hell, they claim they own their IP addresses, despite explicit contracts to the contrary.
A) This is old news.
B) It's a Weekly World News story.
C) You missed April Fool's by over two weeks.
D) You're stupid.
. . . to invent a business model that let's the porn industry make you look sleazy.
These people claim to have patents on digital cell phones. I wonder if they realize that yet.
Slashdot is experiencing a Denial-of-content attack!
Slashdot is a denial of service attack.
... it would at least make it illegal to run an open relay mail server for spammers to rape.
Not that is has a chance of passing, or surviving a legal challenge if it does.
"Mailblocks reserves the right to release any personally identifiable registration information regarding you to third parties who provide goods
or services that we believe may be of interest to you. Some third parties furnishing you with promotional materials may permit you to "opt out" of receiving such communications from them. However, Mailblocks is not responsible for any such party's failure to comply with its own "opt out" policies."
They guarantee you'll get no spam, while selling your address to spammers.
Still, could be worse. Last time I sent something to using a challenge-response "anti-spam" service, the challenge was sent in pure HTML, and rejected by my mail server as spam.
Spammers are winning, because anti-spammers are stupid.
The law in question has been upheld in other federal circuits, and not recently. Take a look at Destination Ventures v. FCC
My spam filters are working overtime since Wednesday. An increase of about ten times as much. Fortunately, the filters are still working.
Carter said in an interview. "If you were to prosecute someone and give them three years, I think this would act as a deterrent."
I agree completely. That would be a very effective deterrent to trying to prosecute file traders. I suspect it would only take once.
All Electronics . The movie industry people call it the "toy store of the industry." Sometimes, they even have a book on programming stuff like you want.
Er, dude, that wasn't precendent. That was what Walmart claimed. They then proceeded to back down when their victim pointed out that they'd claimed that under penalty of perjury.
At least try to pay attention.
As a sociologist, I really do need to call "random" people, and can't consider a survey consisting only of telephone owning people who are willing to take a survey and who are clueless as to the do-not-call registry a valid sample space
It must really suck to be a sociologist.
It does. IIRC, there's a right of private action, too, if you can figure out who they are to sue them.
Telemarketing call to cellphones without explicit permission are illegal, and there is no excemption of any kind. And the telemarketers are required to know if it's a cell phone number in advance. Most will actually put you on a no-call list if you tell them it's a cell phone. Screaming obscenities seems to help, as well (seriously). I've never gotten two calls from the same sleaze on my cell phone.
It's never the charity that calls you. It's a telemarking service working for the charity. Get the name of the charity, and the service if you can (they generally won't tell you, even though that's illegal). Then call the charity direct, and tell them you'll never support them because they used unethical harassement to try to coerce money out of you. Talk fast, and shout them down if they try to interrupt. If they ask who you are, refuse to tell them. In short, act like the asshole who called you. Once you're sure they know what it's like, hang up. And call them again, the next day.
Oh, it's far worse than that. Rumor is, the FTC has already signed a contract with AT&T to run the list. It's like they went through their complaint file to see what phone company had the most complaints, and put them in charge of the henhouse.
I don't see why I should pay the phone company to avoid calls that occur only because the telemarketers paid the phone company for my phone number. It's a racket.
I just don't answer the phone. Anybody who I actually want to hear from knows how to get ahold of me.
It is also claimed that the software can deliver any type of text or phone number to a recipient's caller ID box, no matter if it's true or false, and that it can also bypass the anti-telemarketer blocks made available by some telephone companies, such as SBC and Qwest.
Anybody with an IDSL or PBX phone system can put in anything they want on Caller ID. And recognizing SIT tones is a feature on better telemarketing rigs, and generally one that can be turned off. They don't "bypass" the telezapper, they simply ignore it. Duh.
On the other hand, any telemarketer that pays $2700 for something so obivously a ripoff will get no sympathy from me.
... and they'll learn that what makes a hit is not being the same as previous hits, but rather being different from them.
What I find most interesting about this is not the use of the junk fax law, but that Mark was able to sue Sears about it.
This is possible under the federal anti-fax spam. Hooters was fined over a million bucks for a fax spam run by a marketing company that went out of business before the complaint was files.
If the company actually being advertised is aware of the ads, they are responsible under the fax spam law.
That was an illegal threat on their part. They can't do that. They can make copies of hard drives, but they can't shut you down.
Ask Steve Jackson or the Secret Service about it. It isn't everybody who can claim to have gotten $300,000 in punitive damages, and had the lead agent called incomptent by the judge, on the record, against a federal police agency.
Does it mention that it was just a stupid idea?