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MS Speaks Out Against New Zealand's Anti Spam Bill 334
out_sp0k1n writes "Ryan Hamlin, head of Microsoft's Technology Care and Safety Group spoke out against New Zealand's proposed anti-spam legislation, warning that it could impinge on 'the amazing vehicle of e-mail marketing'. He also suggests that CAN-SPAM has been effective in deterring spammers. From The Article: 'Though often criticized as too meek, US anti-spam legislation - which relies on people opting out of spam - has proved effective in supporting prosecutions and deterring spammers.' Anyone else think that one message doesn't count as spam?"
oh, so that's why (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, so that's why I don't get any spam any more...
Well, off to clean my Inbox of spam.
Tom
Re:oh, so that's why (Score:5, Funny)
>
> Oh, so that's why I don't get any spam any more...
>
> Well, off to clean my Inbox of spam.
That's not spam, those are amazing offers to which you just haven't opted out yet! Haven't you listened to Gator, uh, Claria, uh, the new Microsoft Secure Safety Technology that gives you access to the Amazing Vehicle of E-Mail Marketing?
In other news today, Microsoft executives report that dipping your balls in sweet cream and squatting in a kitchen full of kittens may be hazardous to your health.
Re:oh, so that's why (Score:5, Funny)
Phew. I was just about to do that...good thing you stopped me.
Re:oh, so that's why (Score:2)
The bill's in the (e)-mail. We expect payment promptly.
Once I signed up for Hot Mail... got spam instead. (Score:2, Interesting)
I once signed up for a Hot Mail Account, years ago and never used it, never told a sole about it, never shared the email address with anyone, not one person or other... guess what? Within days my inbox was loaded full of Porn and other spam... my guess is that Microsoft fed them my email address and got paid for it.
You can never trust Microsoft. Too greedy. Computers users to them are just cash machines and not private citizens.
Re:Once I signed up for Hot Mail... got spam inste (Score:3, Insightful)
I've had that happen with email accounts on private mailservers. It's from spammers sending to a@hotmail.com, b@hotmail.com, c@hotmail.com, etc, etc.
Re:Once I signed up for Hot Mail... got spam inste (Score:3, Informative)
Too meek... (Score:4, Funny)
Well the first draft, which involved a carving knife and a band-aid, would have been more effective.
That's the idea. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's the idea. (Score:5, Interesting)
Couple that with their need for your name and personal details with every product registration, and the default settings of those forms to permit them to advertise at you, and we're seeing a company geared up for bulk marketing under the excuse of "customer notices".
Microsoft follows the money? (Score:5, Insightful)
Mailinator [mailinator.com] lets me avoid getting spam in the first place. Good luck microsoft.
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:5, Insightful)
The cleverer ones do understand this, which is why they're trying to poison word-of-mouth recommendations as well (see: astroturfing).
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:2)
Better ways to present check boxes (Score:5, Interesting)
I think one of the problems with this method at the moment is that most organisations don't provide clear information about exactly what someone can expect by checking the box. Often it's buried somewhere deep within the privacy policy, but it's not exactly obvious.
Before I check such a box, I like to be confident that I understand basic things like:
Most boxes don't actually do this. They just say inane things like "Click here to receive great deals from us and our partners in your email." I'd rather they said something like:
I guess it's a bit more verbose, but to me it's a hell of a lot clearer and more trustworthy. Then again, I realise that most people don't seem to think/care about this type of thing as much as I do. I'm sure I'm not the main target of many marketing people... I just get annoyed as collateral damage.
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:2)
Whenever (although this doesn't happen much tbh) the spammy address starts to get too much SPAM, or I don't want people who know this address contacting me anymore, or whatever, I
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:2)
Whenever I give out my email address to a new company, I just create an allias of company_name@my_domain.net If one of those addresses become a source of spam, I simply remove the alias. All of the aliases point to the same inbox, so there is no mess of checking different boxes, and having a client side rule which filters email bas
Re:Microsoft follows the money? (Score:5, Interesting)
What about junk mail? (Score:2)
Spam is spam (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't care if they send me 'just one' or a million, either way it is infintley more than I want.
Re:Spam is spam (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Spam is spam (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's a big clue, IF YOU DON'T MAKE SPAMMING DIFFICULT IT WON'T STOP.
Re:Spam is spam (Score:3, Informative)
As someone else in this discussion mentioned, time is your most valuable resource. You can't get it back, end of story. Thinking about who you may have forgotten to opt out of takes a bit of time and is, generally speaking, irritating. Remove the thinking and use a website like sneakemail.com [sneakemail.com] and save yourself some time. By creating a new disposable e-mail address every time you
Re:Spam is spam (Score:5, Insightful)
There are roughly 25 million businesses in the US alone. Let's say each of them sent just one spam per year. Let's also assume that your software automatically junks any further mail from someone who has spammed you already. That would be 68,493 emails hitting you per day.
Let's say you could opt out at the rate of one every 5 seconds. That would be 12 per minute, 720 per hour, or 28,800 per 40-hour work week.
Assuming you take a couple of weeks vacation a year, in 50 weeks you can deal with 1,440,000 out of the 25,000,000 spam emails you got this year.
At that rate, it will take you 17.36 years to opt out of just the first year's spam.
But wait! There's more! New businesses open up every year. Just pulling a number out of the air here, let's say that they are established (and send out their annual spam) at a rate of 1 million per year. So by the time you've cleaned out your first year's spam, you have 17,360,000 more to go.
That's another 12 years of opting out
So, 53 years from the date every business in the USA sent you one single spam, you've finally opted out of all of their lists.
You're still getting new ones, of course, at a rate of 2,740 per day, or 4,000 per working day. The first five and a half hours of every working day -- 70% of your workday -- you spend cleaning that day's spam out of your work email account. When you get home, you spend another 3.8 hours cleaning your home account.
And that's assuming ONLY spam from US-based spammers, and ONLY one from each, and ALL of them honor opt-out instructions (which are, of course, usually just verification of a live address)
53 years to opt out of all of it.
If you start work at age 18, you'll be 71
The Yes-You-Can-Spam act was a Bad Thing.
I want to be able to use my emailbox for EMAIL. Not to provide free advertising services for companies I want nothing whatsoever to do with.
Re:Spam is spam (Score:2)
Hell, I don't even like it when a family member get's ahold of my address and adds it to their inane ('joke of the day'/sappy inspirational message) cc list.
Re:Spam is spam (Score:5, Interesting)
Agreed. I've lost contact with friends after telling them to stop sending me worthless crap because they're too lazy to understand why they may need an e-mail list of people that want to receiver their worthless crap, rather than just sending it to everyone in their address book. I actually send nasty replies now, especially for 'warnings' that almost always a hoax, and usually 3 or 4 years old at that.
Re:Spam is spam (Score:5, Insightful)
can't can spam (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, right. And there's this swamp land you might want to buy.
Re:can't can spam (Score:2)
Not that I disagree with you about the effectiveness of the CAN-SPAM Act, but Florida, which just so happens to be one giant fucking swamp, is supposedly the second hottest real-estate market in the United States.
Do Not Call List (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Do Not Call List (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Do Not Call List (Score:2)
The main reason why spam is so persistent is because they're making money from it, even with the legislatio
Not...really. (Score:2)
Except it's not. DNC is opt-out, ie you get phone spam unless you join the list. And we sure as hell don't want email to have a centralized list, because that's basically going to be the uber spam list.
The difference is that foreign phone spammers would incur pretty significant charges to phone spam, w
It's not Law Yet, But M$ Lost (Score:3, Informative)
Re:It's not Law Yet, But M$ Lost (Score:3, Insightful)
Sale of their list(s) to other companies would be illegal unless you "opt in."
"Unsolicited" e-mails about your product and possible defects do not count, as you expect the company to notify you of recalls, usability issues, etc.
I, like an earlier poster, can't ima
Impinging for fun and profit! (Score:2, Funny)
What follows is my train of thought:
Impinge? Are they making things up now?
Correction: Impinge is a cromulent word.
Baring the sarcasm, I'm also concerned that laws outlawing murder will impinge (I'm learning new vocab!) on the amazing industry of selective human elimination services.
Re:Impinging for fun and profit! (Score:2)
Re:Impinging for fun and profit! (Score:2)
Google afrees [google.com]
It's not cromulent at all.
Re:Impinging for fun and profit! (Score:2)
No, you are simply ignorant.
impinge Pronunciation Key (m-pnj)
v. impinged, impinging, impinges
v. intr.
CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:5, Interesting)
Can anybody point to any research (or, frankly pundit or blogger) that has concluded that CAN-SPAM has had any effect at all? So far, it sounds like CAN-SPAM has bene "toothless", made "zero impact", etc.
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:5, Insightful)
Are you sure it hasn't actually "made the problem worse" by giving spam an air of legitimacy?
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:2, Insightful)
And TV, Billboard, Radio , Film and Hommy Tilfiger Logos on cloths don't have exactly the same effect?
I'm not saying I support spam, just that spam is another form of advertising. If other forms of advertising come unsolicited from companies.
Why is spam any worse than someone wearing a krappa t-shirt, drinking a can of Koke and eating a MukDonalds, why is spam any worse than traditional junk mail?
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:2)
I filter spam for my entire organization, we get about 30,000 emails a day and about 25,000 of them are spam. Imagine receiving 25,000 coupons in your mail everyday, and ten times that twice a year.
I agree with what I believe was your underlying point in that advertising in all forms has gotten way out of control. I would be curious about measuring the average television show to commericial rat
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:2)
Of course if I am a customer of the company then they have a legitimate reason to be able to contact me although for obvious reasons a simple banning of the sale of mailing lists will not solve everything. I could see companies with large customer bases
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:2)
And TV, Billboard, Radio , Film and Hommy Tilfiger Logos on cloths don't have exactly the same effect?
I'm not saying I support spam, just that spam is another form of advertising. If other forms of advertising come unsolicited from companies. Why is spam any worse than someone wearing a krappa t-shirt, drinking a can of Koke and eating a MukDonalds, why is spam any worse than traditional junk mail?"
Fundamentally, spam is the same as junk mail. It intrudes upon your p
Re:CAN-SPAM effective? (Score:3, Insightful)
What's up with his title? (Score:5, Funny)
Is it just me or does his title sound like the Microsoft equivalent of an airline stewardess? And how come everyone we hear from Microsoft is the head of something? Were they all promised head to come work at Microsoft?
Re:What's up with his title? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's how I read it. (Score:5, Insightful)
He also suggests that his product has been effective in enlarging members from 100% to 200%.
From The Article: 'Though often criticized as too meek, click here for a free IPod - which relies on people starting their own home business - has proved effective in supporting the former great king of Nimbabwatsu' through verification of you PayPal account.
So I wont' be receiving XP patches by mail again? (Score:2, Informative)
Wonderful Spam (Score:3, Interesting)
Translation: If MSFT doesn't make money on it (Score:2, Insightful)
The "support" services sector to "stop spam" is very lucrative, just as the "anti-piracy" services sector to "stop virii and worms" is very lucrative.
If someone did something about spam, people might not buy the planned Microsoft Anti-Spyware product that's in beta now, when they'll be made to pay for it on release.
And thus, MSFT can't support a bill that might harm their market share.
Sigh.
Re:Translation: If MSFT doesn't make money on it (Score:4, Insightful)
Why does it matter what M$ thinks about a proposed new anti-spam bill - or any bill, for that matter? Shouldn't the only thing that matters be what the *people* of New Zealand think?
Re:Translation: If MSFT doesn't make money on it (Score:2)
Just ask e.g. the peoples of Denmark, Poland and the Netherlands [nosoftwarepatents.com].
It's actually just disturbing, or sad - (except for utter sarcasm [nosoftwarepatents.com]) there is no fun in these affairs whatsoever.
As a kiwi (Score:5, Insightful)
"Mr Cunliffe says Microsoft's proposed "opt out" approach is too weak and has been rejected.
"We decided it's going to be opt-in. End of story. Why should you have to opt out of spam?"
And that common sense is prevailing over US law.
*duck*
Simon
Re:As a kiwi (Score:2)
The U.S. government doesn't really lack common sense; just backbone.
For a lot of elected officials its a question of who can pay more for their services, the average Joe, or corporate America?
M$ is now an arbiter of the democratic process? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:M$ is now an arbiter of the democratic process? (Score:3, Informative)
For what it's worth, Microsoft is (also) a New Zealand company. It was registered at the NZ Companies Office [companies.govt.nz] on 29 May 1991. It really is an American company, but I guess they at least have a claim to comment on New Zealand law.
Yeah? Well as an American (Score:4, Insightful)
How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:5, Interesting)
1) Someone registers your email at ACME's web site.
2) ACME wants to know if you are legit or not, so they send you a "please click on this link if you really requested this" email.
3) You didn't request email from ACME, but now you have an "are you you?" email from ACME.
Is the "please click on this link" email spam?
If so, what should ACME do to verify you are you instead?
If not, what's to stop a spammer from sending their advert along with the "click to confirm" email? (I know, they already do.)
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2, Insightful)
"We are checking that you want to receive e-mail from , about their super product . For more info on , click here"
would be spam.
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:5, Interesting)
When I followed up with SpamCop they weren't helpful at all, they would not tell me why it happened, who was involved or how I could stop it from happening again. They just labeled my company as one that bought an email list and said to hell with us.
Naturally this wasn't acceptable to me so I moved to their parent company where I actually got some help. I explained to them exactly how we got the email addresses we used and that we understood there was some abuse of the system, so we asked them how to proceed without making the problem worse.The solution was to send out an email blast asking everyone to confirm their wish to be on the list. This would be the only thing we were allowed to ask in the email. No advertising, not even any logos, just a simple plain email with a link to our website. Yes this shrunk our list a little bit but the majority of people on it were customers of ours and wanted to be there.
So yes, if I had mod points I'd mod you up. Its very important not promoting any products. That is the difference between spam and legitimate messaging.Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
The idea is to make companies scared to death of the concept of using e-mail for advertising.
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
Ah yes, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" strikes again.
How, pray tell, do you suggest someone grant "prior approval"?
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
Having an ad would define it as SPAM.
In my opinion, tt should be be ok to send confirmation emails. However, the legislation should specify that the email contain no ads, is limited to one per registration request, and include an opt-out from any future registration requests.
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
If, on the other hand, they include advertisements or send e-mails claiming to be verification e-mails but that are r
Re:How would you handle this under anti-spam? (Score:2)
There's a better idea... (Score:5, Interesting)
Why not create legislation requiring all commercial e-mail to have HOW they got your e-mail address in the first place, under penalty of a huge fine. This would be in addition to any other laws in place. So if someone doesn't say, at the bottom of the e-mail, how or where your e-mail address was obtained, it would be illegal. Also, lying about where they got it would be illegal too.
Or is this just a stupid idea?
Re:There's a better idea... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:There's a better idea... (Score:2, Insightful)
What prevents the person sending spam from lying about where the spammer got the email address from?
The problem I see is enforcement.
A variation on a theme is to use disposable email addresses
Re:There's a better idea... (Score:5, Insightful)
Send spam in your own name. Blatently lie about where you got the addresses. Someone objects? Their word against yours.
Send spam from offshore. Don't bother with the legally required trailer. How's it going to get enforced?
Can live without it (Score:2)
I can live without this amazing invention -- especially because I'm not making any money from it -- just aggravation.
Some people just truly don't have a clue.
Duh! (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't get it. (Score:2)
What does Microsoft have to gain by crippling anti-spam regulation? They don't spam, and as far as I know they don't actively partner with those who do. Wouldn't it be in their own best interest to push for *more* aggressive anti spam tactics?
It would be naive to assume a rational basis for most business decisions, but when an otherwise publicity-savvy company steps forward to fight for something which is not only stupid but also w
Re:I don't get it. (Score:5, Insightful)
How about: Microsoft has plans to sell an anti-spam serivce.
Lots of people don't think one message is spam (Score:2)
This is in fact however an issue of much debate, with many people on both sides, sometimes called the UBE side and the UCE side. I'm on the UBE side (in fact I think the best and simplest definition for spam is 'bulk mail from a stranger') and there are many on that side.
T
Lots of people don't think one message is spam? (Score:2)
Well, as someone who has some pages that show up in Chinese and Taiwanese and Hong Kong and Russian search engines, I can say that when you think of only 25 million people bei
I want.... (Score:2)
Microsoft serious about squashing SPAM? (Score:5, Insightful)
i.e. So that businesses could continue to SPAM.
"He also wants definitions in the bill changed so that companies would be able to e-mail information about new products and services to customers, even if they had opted out of receiving e-mail about other services they had bought from the company in the past."
So if I tell a company that I don't want their penis enlargement ads they can SPAM me with an ad for their latest p0rn and so on and so on and. .
"Though often criticised as too meek, US anti-spam legislation - which relies on people opting out of spam - has proved effective in supporting prosecutions and deterring spammers, he says."
Right, that's why my filters catch move SPAM every month than the previous. It's only the filtering technology that keeps email usable.
Is Microsoft really serious about squashing SPAM or just in finding another cow to milk? What was this I heard about Microsoft wanting to buy the company that use to be called Gator? Seems to me that SPAM and AD ware go hand in hand.
Re:Microsoft serious about squashing SPAM? (Score:4, Informative)
Think about it. It doesn't say new _categories_, so it doesn't even have to mean they'd have drop penis enlargement pills once you've opted out. They can make you opt out of _one_ _product_ at a time, then rename it or call it a new version, and spam you some more.
E.g., spam advertising porn, could spam you with a different combination of web site and category in each batch of mails, and opting out of one wouldn't prevent them from sending the next batch. They could just make a bogus "hosted site" for each batch, which just redirects to the main one, but hey, it's for a "new" service (site) you haven't yet opted out of. So they're allowed.
In fact, it makes it worse than no opt-out at all. To actually unsubscribe from all that, you'd have to actually open the message and look for the unsubscribe link for that product, then email the spammer. From a spammer's perspective it's actually better: they made you open and read his spam instead of just looking at the message and deleting it.
So seeing MS back such a license to spam with impunity, makes me really worry.
One e-mail = SPAM? (Score:2)
but what if 10,000 companies send you ONLY ONE e-mail each?
We have to be strict, gentlemen. ONE rat might not be a plague, but...
One message isn't spam, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
If they send one message to 100,000 people, that's not one message any more. That's 100,000 messages.
If 100,000 people send one message back to Microsoft saying "take me off your list" that's still not one message, that's 100,000 messages.
No, one message isn't spam. But I don't think that they really mean "one message". Do you?
Re:One message isn't spam, but... (Score:2)
Well, there goes your email account
The Russian Method (Score:2, Funny)
CANSPAM law effective my ass (Score:3, Informative)
It has steadily increased, as it has been doing for years.
Conspiracy (Score:3, Insightful)
Audio interview w/ Hamlin on this topic (Score:2)
Coralcached link [nyud.net] (3Mb)
Opt Out (Score:4, Funny)
How to stay relatively spam free (Score:4, Interesting)
Tools Required:
1. A domain that you administer mail accounts for
2. The ability to define a catch-all account for mail
The method:
I have defined my "regular" email address as the catch-all. Whenever a website requests an email address, I use something unique to that site. The account does not exist, but mail from them will still get delivered to me via the catch-all account.
Example:
I sign up for email for my Hilton account with hilton@mydomain.com. The account is not defined but the catch-all will deliver the mail to me nonetheless.
The benefit:
If I start getting spam to that email address, I now have several options. First, I know who sold or gave out my address so I can hammer them if I choose. Second, I can simply begin filtering everything from that address into a "known spam folder" and never have to deal with it other than to delete the contents of that folder. Third, I can setup nasty autoresponders that mimic bounce messages or something on that account if I wish (I know, this may not be doing much good but it's fun).
By doing this I keep the spam in my inbox down to 2 or 3 messages a day.
Denny
Re:FUCK YOU MICRO$OFT! (Score:2)
You can trust corporations... to be corporations.
If anything, M$ speaking out against something in foreign countries is more likely to have the opposite apparently desired effect.
Re:Just Curious... (Score:2)
How many do you think they have to sell to be profitable?
Spam is virtually free to send, and their overhead is practically nil.
Sure, there's only a small chance that someone might buy their product... but I bet they'll be able to sell their list of valid addresses to spammers that have 'real' products, such as marketing surveys,
Re:Just Curious... (Score:2)
Now, I don't like to make comments about the intelligence of the Slashdot crowd, as some of them can appear to be pretty stupid at times, all in all, they're smarter than the average e-mail recipient. The Slashdot crowd is, amazingly enough, too smart to click on shit-mail.
Re:In other news, Microsoft sues 235 spammers (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Let technology kill spam, not the government (Score:2)
The profit incentive (on both sides of the fence, both marketing and anti-spam tech) is to allow Spam to occur, so it will continue if allowed.
This comes at a loss of productivity (economic standpoint) and quality of life (social standpoint), which are bad.
The issue of free speech, however, is quite different. I completely agree with you, that the government should not be allowed to impinge on our right to email what we want.
Re:Let technology kill spam, not the government (Score:2)
So, while waiting for a Deus ex machina, I'm all for pursuing other avenues, as well.
Re:Let technology kill spam, not the government (Score:2)
Re:Let technology kill spam, not the government (Score:2)
To the grand-parent: Why shouldn't NZ have a law against it?
Anyway, here in NZ we've got elections coming up soon, so it's anyones guess as to what the next parliament do with respect to this bill..
Re:I for one welcome our Spam Overlords (Score:2)