Most also seem to accept the other invasions into our lives an property.
All forms of "direct" marketing are violations of the recipients space. They all involve use of the recipients property in some manner, and all put some type of burden (even though it may be small) on the recipient.
Snail mail: This is effectively littering. The recipient is now responsible for the disposal of this junk mail. Now imagine the cost associated with dumping fees and the environmental impact on landfills. A cost which indirectly shows up on your trash pickup bills.
Telemarketing/Fax: A total stranger activating a device (telephone or fax machine) which doesn't belong to him.
E-mail Spam: The cost burden is almost totally on the recipient. We tend to look at the costs based on the typical dialup user paying $20/mo. What about two-way pagers and PDA's with those expensive wireless connections? What about the laptop connected to the satellite phone on an airplane at $10/min? What about the guy that loses a big business deal because that important e-mail just bounced due to a full mailbox? The economic impact is very high.
People are being ripped off constantly by these types of commercial terrorism. You can steal $1,000.000 from one person and you'll quicly get noticed by law enforcement, but if you steal $0.01 from 100,000,000 nobody notices. Either way, you're still a thief.
The real enemies are those who try an legitimize these types of theft, such as the DMA.
Legislation is exactly what is needed, but not the weak laws we have already. Something that treats these theive as the criminals they are.
The JHD crowd is just going to get cramped fingers from pressing that delete key endlessly. They won't stop making money because the P.T. Barnum principle applies. There IS one born every minute.
Asking someone not to use e-mail these days is like asking someone to disconnect their telephone to stop the telemarketing vermin. Maybe you should get rid of your car. That way you won't get carjacked!
Slashdot Mirror
Most also seem to accept the other invasions into our lives an property.
All forms of "direct" marketing are violations of the recipients space. They all involve use of the recipients property in some manner, and all put some type of burden (even though it may be small) on the recipient.
Snail mail: This is effectively littering. The recipient is now responsible for the disposal of this junk mail. Now imagine the cost associated with dumping fees and the environmental impact on landfills. A cost which indirectly shows up on your trash pickup bills.
Telemarketing/Fax: A total stranger activating a device (telephone or fax machine) which doesn't belong to him.
E-mail Spam: The cost burden is almost totally on the recipient. We tend to look at the costs based on the typical dialup user paying $20/mo. What about two-way pagers and PDA's with those expensive wireless connections? What about the laptop connected to the satellite phone on an airplane at $10/min? What about the guy that loses a big business deal because that important e-mail just bounced due to a full mailbox? The economic impact is very high.
People are being ripped off constantly by these types of commercial terrorism. You can steal $1,000.000 from one person and you'll quicly get noticed by law enforcement, but if you steal $0.01 from 100,000,000 nobody notices. Either way, you're still a thief.
The real enemies are those who try an legitimize these types of theft, such as the DMA.
Legislation is exactly what is needed, but not the weak laws we have already. Something that treats these theive as the criminals they are.
The JHD crowd is just going to get cramped fingers from pressing that delete key endlessly. They won't stop making money because the P.T. Barnum principle applies. There IS one born every minute.
Asking someone not to use e-mail these days is like asking someone to disconnect their telephone to stop the telemarketing vermin. Maybe you should get rid of your car. That way you won't get carjacked!
File a criminal complaint and get a lawyer for a big lawsuit. Spamming alone is a misdemeanor offense in CA. Forgery is more serious.
There is a lot of information on these types of subjects at: www.suespammers.org. The discussion list is full of shared information on such cases.