How To Convince My Boss Not To Spam?

An anonymous reader writes "The small travel agent that I work for recently received an email from one of our competitors with several thousand of their potential customers in the 'To:' and 'Cc:' fields. My boss now wants to use these addresses to send unsolicited advertisements. I would like to convince him not to do this, as I believe that this practice is morally wrong and legally dubious. However, morals don't go very far in the business world, so I'm asking Slashdot: what business-oriented arguments can I use to dissuade my boss from spamming?"

Re:my $0.02

[bhima]

I think you left out the most obvious. Post his private mail address here and the Slashdot mob will tell him.

Subscribe him

[Yetihehe]

Subscribe him to some spamming sites. And shut down his spam filter. Spammers typically have small dicks, so maybe he could use some "medicine"

Re:my $0.02

[tomalpha]

I was trying to be as constructive as possible. That said - I do like your style.

Re:Business is war,weakling ! The business Gods RA

[assemblerex]

So, ehmm, would you tell us a little more about your business so we all know who to avoid?

You'll figure it out when you get the email.

Re:my $0.02

[shri]

Given the number of dumbarse "reply all" mails I get, I doubt there is any legislation which prevents you from doing a reply all. "Dear Competitor, Not sure why you sent us an email. We happen to be a similar business as you and offer far better services and cheaper rates than your business. Please unsubscribe us from your mailing list, as the specials that you've offered had us rolling in the aisles. Signed, Pointy Haired Boss"

Re:Business is war,weakling ! The business Gods RA

[Opportunist]

I find your argument interesting, and I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter. Care to tell us your email address? :)

Re:my $0.02

[Xaositecte]

/./ is not your personal army!

Re:my $0.02

[somersault]

PS here is something 'funny' that has been doing the rounds for 15 years, if you do not pass it on to 1000 more people in the next 2 hours then wild dogs will chew off your testicles.

Re:my $0.02

[Anonymous Coward]

I do believe you meant '//./'

also, get out

Re:Point out the negative effects

[Tuoqui]

Tell him the information in your company WHOIS means that he could end up the target of a mob hit because the mafia doesnt like people honing in on their territory (they're behind alot of the penis enlargement and drug spam stuff)

Re:Teach him

[erikina]

Hey, cool site. I added a few addresses. Then after some consideration, I added my email address (to see how much spam, and how good my filtering is), and got this message:

That email address has already been submitted!

I guess I'm not too popular.. (Luckily I use gmail for my domain, and out of ~2000 monthly spam, only 2 hit my inbox. And only 1 false positive to date)

SPAM THEM ALL!

[Foo2rama]

Spam them all and let god sort them out!

If you cannot beat them then join them!

ENLARGE YOUR PENIS TODAY MAKE MORE MONEY NOW

[Anonymous Coward]

You should tell him to GO FOR GOLD!

Spam is proven to:

  * Enlarge your penis!
  * Earn you money WHILE you browse the web!
  * Get YOU laid NOW!

visit http://cashforbigdickaction.biz/ [cashforbigdickaction.biz] for more info!
(the 1000th visitor wins a free Rolex!)

Re:Subscribe him

[thermian]

better still, post your question to slashdot with enough information that anyone with half a brain could know you were talking about them, and get fired.

Problem solved....

Re:my $0.02

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but it's a pretty good militia. :)

Re:Use a sex / romance analogy

[thermian]

In the rare event of success the result is more likely to be ... a less than satisfactory arrangement (e.g. ugly woman, one night stand, STDs, etc.)

So you're saying there's a chance it might work?

Hmmm..

Re:Point out the negative effects

[Gordonjcp]

Let him send the spam, and then:

* Your mail server will be added to blacklists.

Make sure this happens

* Complaints may reach your web site's hosting provider, who may take it offline.

Make sure this happens

* Some recipients are likely to be annoyed and may decide to never do business with your company.

Make sure he receives some email telling him why customers are upset

* Depending on where you're based, this could be illegal under either protection of privacy laws (e.g. the UK's Data Protection Act) or anti-spam laws (e.g. several state laws in the U.S.). Your company may receive a hefty fine because of it.


Make sure someone grasses him up to the appropriate authorities.

Oh, and make sure your CV is up to date.

Re:my $0.02

[zeromorph]

Aren't we the personal swiss army knife of social engineered DoS attacks? (Post it, we slash it down.)

Re:ENLARGE YOUR PENIS TODAY MAKE MORE MONEY NOW

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn, slashdotted already =(

Re:Teach him

[FatAlb3rt]

Only 380? *snicker*

Re:my $0.02

[indifferent children]

Try this: send exactly one unsolicited, 'promotional' email for your business to a friend of yours that your boss doesn't know about. Have that friend file a lawsuit against your business for spamming him. Your boss will certainly notice that one lawsuit, assume that a non-negligible portion of all people spammed do this, and ask himself if he really wants to deal with 10,000 lawsuits.

Re:Subscribe him

[vikstar]

better still, post your question to slashdot with enough information that anyone with half a brain could know you were talking about them, and get fired.

Manager with half a brain? He's safe.

What an opportunity

[paj1234]

What a wonderful opportunity to advance yourself at your bosses' expense.

1. Tell everybody that it will be bad for the business. Except him.

2. Go ahead and do as you're told.

3. Wait with barely surpressed excitement for the backlash. After it arrives, sneak back in the night and shovel some dog poo through the letterbox. In the morning, smoothly explain it must have been the angry customers. You'll look brilliant for sagely predicting disaster from the sidelines. When your boss inevitably fails, you might be able to take his job.

Re:my $0.02

[Manfre]

I did this to a mortgage lender who wouldn't let me get off of his spam list. He switched companies and brought the contact list with him. Sadly, his IT people didn't know how to properly configure mailman, so I replied to the list.

Re:my $0.02

[Anonymous Coward]

gb2 4chan newfag

Re:my $0.02

[Toad-san]

That being said .. it _is_ more polite than my immediate inclination to hunt him down and shoot him for the dog he is.

Just saying ...

Get it right!

[an.echte.trilingue]

I believe he meant:
'/\/\./'

Re:my $0.02

[MillionthMonkey]

Not very "well-regulated" though.

Even better

[DoctorNathaniel]

Send your boss exactly one unsolicited, 'promotional' email for something you know he's interested in. Ask him the next day if he noticed it, or whether it pissed him off.

This could backfire, of course: he could be that one guy who likes his spam, in which case you should simply try to distract him my signing him up for as many viagra-related websites as possible.

Re:my $0.02

[Fujisawa Sensei]

I have yet to we a well constructed targeted email from a spammer.

Re:my $0.02

[nacturation]

I was trying to be as constructive as possible. That said - I do like your style.

... and would like to subscribe to your newsletter? :)
 

Mod parent up, humourous

[Progman3K]

Hear Hear! Army of dorkness unite! ;)

Hmmm... I hate to say it, but if slashdot ever did form a vigilante mob, the only fitting name for it would be Army of Dorkness.