It seems to me there are two different questions: (1) Should the law prohibit bulk, unsolicited political email? and (2) Should Internet society discourage bulk, unsolicited political email?
I believe the answers are "no," and "yes," respectively. Any law restricting political email would encounter serious First Amendment problems in the U.S., not to mention that politicians generally like to censor other people -- not themselves. (I think that even laws restricting unsolicited commercial email have problems, but that's another argument.) Yet just because something is legal does not mean it is a good idea. I am a sysadmin and am responsible for running a mail server (true, it's a single box without many users, but anyway). When I sort through over 1,000 email messages addressed just to me each day and find that about 150 are unsolicited bulk email, it doesn't really matter to me whether they're selling an "Online Income Opportunity" or some second-rate political hack who wants to be elected. At the end of this message is a length debate between Paul Levy of Public Citizen and Laura Atkins, a professional anti-spam advocate. -Declan --- Previous Politech messages: "Calif. governor candidate, DNC chairman turn to political spam" http://www.politechbot.com/p-03199.html "Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivist spammer" http://www.politechbot.com/p-03200.html Politech archive on spam: http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=spam *********** From: "Ira P. Rothken" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Bill Jones and spam - Politicians can send unsolicited e-mail Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 19:15:41 -0800 Organization: Rothken Law Firm Declan, The e-mail messages that Bill Jones sent should not be considered spam - political messages, in my view, are not considered "commercial" and therefore such messages are not unsolicited "commercial" e-mail as defined by the State anti-spam statutes. Unless the e-mail messages are sent in such a huge volume as to constitute a trespass to a server - Politicians are allowed to send out unsolicited e-mails. Ira P. Rothken Rothken Law Firm <http://www.techfirm.com>www.techfirm.com <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>[EMAIL PROTECTED] *********** From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivist spammer To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 13:02:57 -0600 Is ANY unsolicited email spam? I'm getting flooded with unsolicited snail mailings right now for candidates. I get 3-4 every day. It's the most standard, basic part of a political campaign. It doesn't bother me at all, and frankly, I've changed my voting plans based on something I learned in one of these mailings. When I make a political contribution I know that most of the money I give them is going to go into such mailings. But with email, people seem to get highly offended if they receive even one email they didn't solicit. I don't get it. Have we gotten to the point that ANY unsolicited email is considered wrong? Shouldn't someone be able to send out the occasional broadcast email? It's frankly much easier to delete an unwanted email than it is to crumble a snail mail up into a ball, walk across the room and toss it in the trashcan. By the way, I don't write this to invite a bunch of spam <g>. But I really think some people have gotten way oversensitive about this subject. I got the Bill Jones email (twice), spent 10 seconds on it, and deleted it. Didn't raise my biorhythms a bit and didn't induce any additional adrenaline. -------------------------- Tom Giovanetti President Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) www.ipi.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] *********** Subject: Political Communications on the Internet Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 14:19:42 -0500 From: "James V. Delong" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> I do not regard political communications delivered over the Internet as spam, as long as they are polite and give the recipient instructions on opting out. I welcome them, for precisely the reasons given by Bill Jones (See previous messages.) Furthermore, I regard the dyspeptics as irrational. I can blip an email with less effort than I can review and toss out a mailed envelope. And it is a small price to pay for the possibility of opening up the political process, and possibly even defeating an incumbent now and then (despite the campaign finance "reforms" passed to protect them). Let us save the word "spam" for the repetitive porn, and encourage political speech. So go to it, Greg Hunter. My bet is that you will get very few objectors. We at CEI are aggressive, but very polite, about putting people on the mailing list if we have reason to think they might be interested, and we get orders of magnitude more "thank yous" than protests. James V. DeLong Senior Fellow - Project on Technology & Innovation Competitive Enterprise Institute 1001 Connecticut Ave., NW - Suite 1250 Washington, DC 20036 (202) 331-1010 TEL (202) 331-0640 FAX [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> www.cei.org/HighTech.shtml *********** Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 17:16:11 -0800 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] From: Kim Alexander <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: Decla McCullagh's Politech mail about Bill Jones' campaign spam Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hi David, Thanks for sending this to me. FYI, I looked up Jones' most recent campaign expenditures on Cal-Access. Between 1/1 and 2/16/02 he listed some web expenses (which includes Internet & email) that may be payments for the spam service, but I can't say for sure. Two payments to Kanatsiz Communications of Placentia, CA, each for $3000 (looked them up on Google and it appears they are into direct email marketing) Two payments to Vote.com (Dick Morris' outfit) of New York NY, each for $2,000 (I'm not sure what he's selling but have long suspected his web site is really designed to gather names and email addresses of politically active people online) Two payments to Integrated Web Strategy of Phoenix, AZ, each for $2,500 (this is Max Fose's firm -- he was the web guy for John McCain and as far as I know he is not into spamming) One payment to Trenton West Inc of Sacramento, CA for $5,273.18 (this looks mostly to be an opposition research firm, run by one of Jones' campaign staffers). One payment to King, Meyers & Associates of El Dorado Hills, made by Trenton West Inc. on behalf of the campaign, for $5,000. Kim *********** Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 10:53:16 -0800 From: "J. Anthony Vittal" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Organization: Vittal and Sternberg To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: FC: Calif. governor candidate, DNC chairman turn to political spam Declan McCullagh wrote: > Bill Jones is a Republican candidate for governor of California. An AP > article on Wednesday said Jones is polling a mere nine percent in advance > of Tuesday's GOP primary: [snip] I am rather surprised at the objections to political speech raised by those who have written to you. Here, in an effort to get a message out to the electorate in a cost-effective manner, Bill Jones and the DNC each have elected to use e-mail. Is this any more offensive than junk mail in one's mailbox or the incessant political commercials on radio and TV during this primary campaign season? The junk mail either gets read or tossed; the commercial either gets one's attention or the viewer/listener changes the channel/station. The "spam" likewise either gets read or tossed by a stroke of the DEL key. Have we become so politically jaded that people automatically view political speech via e-mail as spam and, based on that predicate, suspect the validity of the message [Kevin Poulsen's "wily opponent" question]? A sad state of affairs for our democracy. -- Tony -- <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> J. Anthony Vittal mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Vittal and Sternberg 1900 Avenue of the Stars, 25th Floor Los Angeles, CA 90067-4506 Tel: (310) 282-8914 Fax: (310) 551-2710 <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> *********** From: Webmaster <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "'[EMAIL PROTECTED]'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: FW: Calif. governor candidate, DNC chairman turn to political spa m Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 15:56:28 -0800 > We received your email and apologize for any inconvenience. However, the > Secretary of State's office is a state government agency that has nothing > to do with this issue. > > We have forwarded your email to the appropriate entity -- the Bill Jones > for Governor campaign at www.billjones.org -- to address your concerns > directly. > > Thank you. *********** Subject: RE: DNC Spam Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 10:06:04 -0800 From: "Scott Neugroschl" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Also, the DNC has sent multiple spams. I tried the "remove" link, let's see if they continue to spam me. They use cheetahmail as their spamhaus. Too bad I'm a registered Libertarian, or I'd ask to have a law passed against this :-) Scott -- My opinions are my own and do not purport to reflect those of my employer *********** Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 15:24:09 -0800 From: Tim Pozar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Declan McCullagh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivist spammer FYI... A little detective work on the mail in question... As Received lines are usually forged and there are ways to misrepresent servers sending mail you go to the last Received line you can trust and move back. Received lines are added to the top of the header in order of the machines they go through. I can trust KUMR and FIDO (see headers from the two mailings I got below) as I sysadmin both of these machines so lets look at where this server is. It represents itself as "msn.com" but in reality it comes from a machine gateway-ed by a router/machine in Korea... -- kumr.lns.com:pozar (39) :traceroute 211.250.204.162 traceroute to 211.250.204.162 (211.250.204.162), 64 hops max, 40 byte packets 1 gw-pbi (63.198.122.137) 37.916 ms 27.186 ms 32.438 ms 2 dist4-vlan60.snfc21.pbi.net (216.102.187.133) 31.989 ms 28.367 ms 22.796 ms 3 bb2-g1-0.snfc21.pbi.net (209.232.130.29) 32.487 ms 25.668 ms 22.624 ms 4 198.32.128.85 (198.32.128.85) 35.412 ms 30.308 ms 26.533 ms 5 210.180.97.115 (210.180.97.115) 38.578 ms 28.762 ms 25.977 ms 6 210.180.97.5 (210.180.97.5) 195.216 ms 189.268 ms 210.180.97.21 (210.180.97.21) 162.558 ms 7 211.37.96.18 (211.37.96.18) 197.629 ms 187.745 ms 166.898 ms 8 adsl-seongbook-210220088082.usr.hananet.net (210.220.88.82) 376.201 ms 367.040 ms 358.153 ms 9 local-kii-1-ge2.kix.ne.kr (202.30.94.70) 351.580 ms 331.813 ms 319.446 ms 10 210.204.254.253 (210.204.254.253) 332.640 ms 401.801 ms 394.354 ms 11 210.204.250.5 (210.204.250.5) 362.956 ms 382.875 ms 376.575 ms 12 211.253.254.226 (211.253.254.226) 384.110 ms 373.589 ms 369.685 ms 13 210.204.249.237 (210.204.249.237) 174.434 ms 803.183 ms 1183.207 ms 14 * 172.20.40.30 (172.20.40.30) 390.155 ms 372.274 ms 15 211.250.204.162 (211.250.204.162) 237.512 ms 177.480 ms 183.275 ms -- Doing a whois on hananet.net we find... -- [...] Registrant: HANARO Telecom Inc, (HANANET4-DOM) KukJeB/D 23F 1445-3 SeoCho-Dong,SeoCho-Ku Seoul, - 137-728 KR Domain Name: HANANET.NET Administrative Contact, Billing Contact: Jung-kil, Hwang (WL3104) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Freems RM602, Shinhan BLDG,43-11 YOIDO-DONG,YOUNGDEUNGPO-KU Seoul 150-736 KR 82-2-761-9346 82-2-761-9348 Technical Contact: Lee, EunSeung (ELF75) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unix Korea 8F SinDaeBang B/D 470-9 SinDaeBang-Dong Seoul, 156-010 KR +82-2-6266-6766 (FAX) +82-2-6266-6466 Record last updated on 04-Feb-2002. Record expires on 02-Feb-2004. Record created on 02-Feb-1999. Database last updated on 28-Feb-2002 04:00:00 EST. Domain servers in listed order: NS.HANANET.NET 210.94.0.7 NS2.HANANET.NET 210.180.98.69 -- This is not unusual to see spam from Korea. At my talk to an anti-spam round table conference in 1999 I pointed to the University of Korea among other Korean sites as moving significant amounts of spam to the net (see: http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9910/11/kill.spam.dead.idg/index.html). Note that the "Date" header is in the middle of the Received lines. The mailer forged the Received lines below this and the mail likely originated from the IP numbers 10.95.106.65, 211.250.204.162. The mail never went through machines in the Netherlands or Australia. So it is highly unlikely that this mail came from MSN or that there is an address that you can reply to at MSN. This mail was desiged to deceive. Also, as I never asked for this mail and it came in bulk, it is by definition... SPAM. Thank you Bill Jones. Tim -- > From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Wed Feb 27 13:29:43 2002 Received: from fido.wps.com (fido.wps.com [157.22.0.141]) by kumr.lns.com (8.11.6/8.9.3) with ESMTP id g1RLTgC26234 for <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 13:29:42 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from [EMAIL PROTECTED]) Received: from msn.com ([210.95.106.65]) by fido.wps.com (8.11.6/8.11.3) with SMTP id g1RLTc866126 for <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 13:29:39 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from [EMAIL PROTECTED]) Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2002 13:29:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from unknown (HELO a231242.upc-a.chello.nl) (62.8.23.139) by smtp4.cyberec.com with local; 28 Feb 2002 00:29:28 -0300 Received: from n7.groups.yahoo.com ([63.228.79.142]) by sydint1.microthin.com.au with smtp; 27 Feb 2002 23:26:06 -0200 Received: from unknown (HELO n7.groups.yahoo.com) (179.24.230.227) by smtp013.mail.yahoo.com with QMQP; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 14:22:45 +0700 Received: from [206.65.37.118] by mailout2-eri1.midsouth.rr.com with local; 27 Feb 2002 14:19:24 +0700 Received: from 90.151.205.9 ([90.151.205.9]) by asy100.as122.sol.superonline.com with SMTP; 27 Feb 2002 20:16:03 +0100 Reply-To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Message-ID: <005c83e84ecb$3835d1c7$7eb15bc8@pqrmfp> From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Subject: Bill Jones for California Governor 5040Ql5 MiME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook, Build 10.0.2616 Importance: Normal Status: RO Content-Length: 3715 Lines: 57 [...] -- > From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Wed Feb 27 19:24:23 2002 Received: from msn.com ([211.250.204.162]) by kumr.lns.com (8.11.6/8.9.3) with SMTP id g1S3OKC67683 for <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 19:24:21 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from [EMAIL PROTECTED]) Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2002 19:24:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from mta05bw.bigpond.com ([49.248.168.114]) by smtp-server6.tampabay.rr.com with SMTP; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 22:24:08 +0500 Received: from unknown (HELO mta6.snfc21.pbi.net) (196.247.14.73) by mta05bw.bigpond.com with esmtp; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 21:20:07 +0600 Received: from unknown (HELO rly-xw05.mx.aol.com) (8.223.158.101) by rly-xl05.mx.aol.com with SMTP; Wed, 27 Feb 2002 16:16:06 +1100 Reply-To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Message-ID: <004c31d62bcc$7434c7e0$8ac02ab7@najdia> From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Subject: Bill Jones for California Governor 2773giNJ9-656teuC0896dcMW7-377Ul29 MiME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" X-Priority: 3 (Normal) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Importance: Normal Status: RO Content-Length: 3647 Lines: 57 [...] *********** Previous Politech messages: "Calif. governor candidate, DNC chairman turn to political spam" http://www.politechbot.com/p-03199.html "Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivist spammer" http://www.politechbot.com/p-03200.html Politech archive on spam: http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=spam ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 13:14:15 -0500 From: "Paul Levy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer We all object to unsolicited email that is trying to sell us a product. I can't help but wondering whether it is appropriate to take the same attitude toward a candidate who is trying to promote his program. On the one hand, if every candidate for dogcatcher in East Podunk sent email indiscriminately to every email address in the country, that would be a real problem. OTOH, if candidates were able to select their email addresses carelfully, limiting them closely to the jurisdiction in which they are running, what's so bad about that? I recognize that the facts here aren't exactly that, you had messages from some fellow in Florida who got email addresses from a California gubernatorial candidate; plus you have the problem of routing through the Korean spamgates. But doesn't anybody see political messages as different? Paul Alan Levy Public Citizen Litigation Group 1600 - 20th Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20009 (202) 588-1000 http://www.citizen.org/litigation/litigation.html ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 10:37:23 -0800 From: Laura Atkins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Paul Levy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer On Thu, Feb 28, 2002 at 01:14:15PM -0500, Paul Levy wrote: > We all object to unsolicited email that is trying to sell us a > product. I can't help but wondering whether it is appropriate to take > the same attitude toward a candidate who is trying to promote his > program. On the one hand, if every candidate for dogcatcher in East > Podunk sent email indiscriminately to every email address in the > country, that would be a real problem. OTOH, if candidates were able > to select their email addresses carelfully, limiting them closely to > the jurisdiction in which they are running, what's so bad about that? One of the big problems is that the sender is then forcing me (and hundreds or thousands of other people) to subsidize his political message. If a candidate wants to ask for permission first, and only send to people who agree to subsidize his campaign, then I have no problem with it. The other problem is that, without some sort of permission step, the politician has no way to determine if the address *is* actually in his district. Targetting email is no where near that exact a science. For me, this idiot politican inserted himself into my living room (where my mailserver is located) without an invitation to deliver his political message. This would be unreasonable behaviour if he were campaigning in person. Why is it any more acceptable because he is using email? > I recognize that the facts here aren't exactly that, you had > messages from some fellow in Florida who got email addresses from a > California gubernatorial candidate; plus you have the problem of > routing through the Korean spamgates. > > But doesn't anybody see political messages as different? Fundamentally, no. I see no difference. But, being a realist, I know politicans aren't going to outlaw political spam because they believe their messages are important and because they want the ability to force US (and, in this specific case, non-US) citizens to pay for their political campaigns. Laura Atkins -- Laura Atkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 13:57:39 -0500 From: "Paul Levy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer 1. And, on the other hand, if it were a question of using the USPS nobody needs your permission to get into your mail slot. What is troubling about email is that (1) it costs much less to use, so the disincentives to useless mailing are reduced, and (2) if the amount gets to be too great, the recipient could bear some costs (you know, talking about how you are "subsidizing" a candidate by receiving a single email message from him is a bit much, true in theory but the subsidy is infinitesimal; you subsidize a candidate by paying taxes for the sidewalk where he campaigns, too). Similarly, nobody needs you permission to call you on the telephone. Telephoning also costs the sender, but it is different from snail mailing because it can be much more intrusive (if, for example, they call at dinner time, or when you are in bed or the shower, and you head to the phone anyway thinking it might be that important call that you have been waiting for...) 2. You can say that unsolicited political messages are different only because politicians don't want to limit themselves and it is pure self-interest. But there is another difference. In our democracy, we have traditionally regarded political messages and political speech as qualitatively DIFFERENT than commercial messages and speech. This difference is one that has constitutional dimension (pace Clarence Thomas). So there is a First Amendment limit on the restrictions that can be placed on political speech 3. The objection to the "personal " intrusion only gets you so far, it seems to me. When you are heading up out of the subway or the grocery store on your way home and some candidate approaches you and asks for your vote, that is also an intrusion, even if you quickly excuse yourself, but dealing with those intrusions is part of the cost of living in a democratic society. Similarly, maybe hitting the delete button when you see a political message that doesn't interest you is another part of that cost. 4. So, I would propose that the question WRT political emailers ought to be, how careful are they in tailoring their lists to be sure that it is at least the relevant audience to whom they are sending messages. Just because it is difficult and inexact is no reason to say nobody should be allowed to try. It appears that Jones was indiscriminate .... or, maybe he tried to be careful and the few people who wrote to Declan are the exceptions :-) 5. Maybe the Jones campaign will enlighten us all with a thoughtful response (although, if they have tanked as badly as people say, maybe they have other things to worry about right now). 6. The idea of the "permission" step is an interesting one. But is this that different from sending a single substantive email to a particular address, and then not sending any more to that address? Paul Alan Levy Public Citizen Litigation Group 1600 - 20th Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20009 (202) 588-1000 http://www.citizen.org/litigation/litigation.html ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 11:23:40 -0800 From: Laura Atkins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Paul Levy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer On Thu, Feb 28, 2002 at 01:57:39PM -0500, Paul Levy wrote: > 1. And, on the other hand, if it were a question of using the USPS > nobody needs your permission to get into your mail slot. I don't own my postal mailbox, the USPS does. And, senders *DO* need the permission of the box owner (ie, the USPS) to put mail in the slot. They must prove they have permission by placing a stamp on the letter. I'm sure you are aware that using a mail slot without paying postage is a crime. So, yes, permission is relevant in terms of the Postal Service. Politicians know this and get the permission (ie, buy postage) of the box owner before sending mail. > What is > troubling about email is that (1) it costs much less to use, so the > disincentives to useless mailing are reduced, and (2) if the amount > gets to be too great, the recipient could bear some costs (you know, > talking about how you are "subsidizing" a candidate by receiving a > single email message from him is a bit much, true in theory but the > subsidy is infinitesimal; you subsidize a candidate by paying taxes > for the sidewalk where he campaigns, too). In some cases, the subsidy is infinitesimal. In other cases (ie, they scraped the email off my webpage, which forwards to my cell phone) it is less infinitesimal. A text message on my cell phone can cost $2 - $3 per message. It is illegal to telemarket to cell phones because the cost is borne by the sender. Why is it different if the "telemarketing call" happened by email? > Similarly, nobody needs you permission to call you on the telephone. > Telephoning also costs the sender, but it is different from snail > mailing because it can be much more intrusive (if, for example, they > call at dinner time, or when you are in bed or the shower, and you > head to the phone anyway thinking it might be that important call > that you have been waiting for...) No, but I can hang up the phone and stop the call. I can demand to be put on their do-not-call list. If they persist in calling after that, I can take them to court and get them to pay me for violating the Telemarketing laws. I have no such remedies for email. > 2. You can say that unsolicited political messages are different > only because politicians don't want to limit themselves and it is pure > self-interest. But there is another difference. In our democracy, we > have traditionally regarded political messages and political speech as > qualitatively DIFFERENT than commercial messages and speech. This > difference is one that has constitutional dimension (pace Clarence > Thomas). So there is a First Amendment limit on the restrictions that > can be placed on political speech The first amendement argument is a strawman. There is no first amendment right to be heard. The court has ruled, repeatedly, that private property owners can restrict political messages on their property. > 3. The objection to the "personal " intrusion only gets you so far, > it seems to me. When you are heading up out of the subway or the > grocery store on your way home and some candidate approaches you and > asks for your vote, that is also an intrusion, even if you quickly > excuse yourself, but dealing with those intrusions is part of the cost > of living in a democratic society. Similarly, maybe hitting the > delete button when you see a political message that doesn't interest > you is another part of that cost. How many times must I hit the delete button? For the record, my mailserver is not a public street. It is *mine*. I own the hardware. It is physically located in my living room. I pay for the bandwidth coming into my house. It is not public property, it is private. The "public street" argument is a strawman. The majority of mailservers on the internet are privately owned and are not the equivalent of a public street. The best analogy would be a gated community. If you don't live in the gated community and you are not an invited guest, then you are guilty of trespass. > 4. So, I would propose that the question WRT political emailers > ought to be, how careful are they in tailoring their lists to be sure > that it is at least the relevant audience to whom they are sending > messages. Just because it is difficult and inexact is no reason to > say nobody should be allowed to try. It appears that Jones was > indiscriminate .... or, maybe he tried to be careful and the few > people who wrote to Declan are the exceptions :-) The tailoring is simple, actually. Send mail only to those people who have asked for it, and confirmed that the email address they have given you is correct. > 6. The idea of the "permission" step is an interesting one. But is > this that different from sending a single substantive email to a > particular address, and then not sending any more to that address? Another strawman. If I have asked for a message, I have given my permission to receive mail from that sender. But, every day I get hundreds, yes hundreds, of "one time only" emails. "One bite of the apple" does not scale and overwhelms both the recipient and the mail system. laura -- Laura Atkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 14:45:24 -0500 From: "Paul Levy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivist spammer 1. Your legal points are not well taken: a. People put things in mail slots and mailboxes all the time without being prosecuted. I have known campaign activists to worry about this issue, but I have never known one to be prosecuted. The physical slot and box does not belong to the USPS, but to the homeowner. b. The First Amendment regulates government action. What you do on your own server to block email you do not want is up to you. But a law forbidding unsolicited POLITICAL communications would undoubtedly encounter stiff challenge under the first amendment. All of the statutes that you describe apply to commercial solicitation. 3. Your point about text messages to your cell phone is a good one. The difference with email, as you implicitly acknowledge when you emphaisze the high cost of the text message on your cell, is that the cost of a single message is tiny. 4. Hanging up the phone to stop the call is quite similar to pressing the delete button. Paul Alan Levy Public Citizen Litigation Group 1600 - 20th Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20009 (202) 588-1000 http://www.citizen.org/litigation/litigation.html ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 11:57:13 -0800 From: Laura Atkins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Paul Levy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer On Thu, Feb 28, 2002 at 02:45:24PM -0500, Paul Levy wrote: > 1. Your legal points are not well taken: > > a. People put things in mail slots and mailboxes all the time > without being prosecuted. I have known campaign activists to worry > about this issue, but I have never known one to be prosecuted. The > physical slot and box does not belong to the USPS, but to the > homeowner. So what you're saying is that it's OK to break the law if you're not prosecuted. I think that sums it all up. You basically only care about "being caught" not about what is legal, let alone what is ethical. > b. The First Amendment regulates government action. What you do on > your own server to block email you do not want is up to you. But a > law forbidding unsolicited POLITICAL communications would undoubtedly > encounter stiff challenge under the first amendment. All of the > statutes that you describe apply to commercial solicitation. Politicians claiming they can steal from me and it's legal does not make it right. > 3. Your point about text messages to your cell phone is a good one. > The difference with email, as you implicitly acknowledge when you > emphaisze the high cost of the text message on your cell, is that the > cost of a single message is tiny. But spam is not sent as a single message, it's sent in bulk. While the individual may only have to subsidize a small fraction of the message, but the subsidy itself is huge. Say 1,000,000 recipients, the total subsidy received by the politician, even at 0.1/recipient is 10,000. What politician would say that a $10,000 donation is tiny or infintesimal? > 4. Hanging up the phone to stop the call is quite similar to > pressing the delete button. If you'd read my message you would have seen that I do not simply hang up the phone. I actively discourage future calls to the extent of filing suit against those who break the law. Same as I am doing about the political spam. Making a point so as to discourage further trespass on my property. Given your stated policy of breaking the law when you can get away with it, I believe we have nothing more to say to one another. laura -- Laura Atkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] ************ Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2002 15:09:41 -0500 From: "Paul Levy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: FC: Confirmed: Calif. gov wannabe Bill Jones is a recidivistspammer You have misstated my point. Apart from the fact that your understanding of the postal rules and the ownership of the mailbox is incorrect, this is an alleged "crime" that is never prosecuted. In other words, the idea that this is against the law is an "urban myth". It has nothing to do with not getting caught, The leaflets are all signed (unlike many emails, right?), if the authorities wanted to prosecute they could do so. But, they don't. Paul Alan Levy Public Citizen Litigation Group 1600 - 20th Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20009 (202) 588-1000 http://www.citizen.org/litigation/litigation.html ************ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- Declan McCullagh's politics and technology mailing list You may redistribute this message freely if you include this notice. Declan McCullagh's photographs are at http://www.mccullagh.org/ To subscribe to Politech: http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------
