FC: Weekly column: Be wary of Washington's solutions to spam

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

http://news.com.com/2010-1074-957024.html?tag=politech

   Be wary of Washington's spam solution
   By Declan McCullagh
   September 9, 2002, 4:00 AM PT

   WASHINGTON--About three dozen high-level lobbyists met quietly last
   Friday afternoon at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to concoct a way to
   drastically reduce the deluge of unsolicited e-mail.

   The invitation-only lunch meeting, which lasted about two hours,
   started a process that could result in an industry agreement on new
   laws or self-regulation.

   Lobbyists for AOL Time Warner, Verizon, the National Cable and
   Telecommunications Association, and the Direct Marketing Association
   were among the attendees. According to the invitation, the group met
   to discuss "approaches to addressing problems arising from abusive
   electronic mail practices."

   All that sounds pretty good, right? After all, who could be against
   efforts to reduce the heaps of spam that are snarling mail servers,
   clogging connections and making our in-boxes approximately as useful
   as a 10MB hard drive? One of my News.com colleagues estimates that
   spam soon will make up the majority of message traffic on the
   Internet.

   But Washington rarely has the best solution. When you dump a passel of
   lawyers and lobbyists in a room, dub them a working group and close
   the door, they end up crafting new laws and regulations. And new laws
   and regulations from Washington simply won't stop spam.

   [...]




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