FC: Weekly column: "Want to stop spammers? Charge 'em"

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

http://news.com.com/2010-1071_3-999561.html

   Want to stop spammers? Charge 'em
   By Declan McCullagh
   May 5, 2003, 4:00 AM PT

   WASHINGTON--I spent last week at the Federal Trade Commission's
   three-day spam summit where hundreds of people, fed up with the
   skyrocketing amount of unsolicited bulk e-mail, gathered to figure out
   how to stop it. 
   
   The suggestions were predictable: As they have each year since 1997,
   with nothing to show for it so far, members of Congress vowed to enact
   a law restricting spam. People selling spam blockers touted their
   products, and so-called e-mail marketers complained that their bulk
   messages were being unfairly tossed in the trash. Poor things.
   
   On Friday morning, though, FTC Commissioner Orson Swindle said
   something that made a lot of sense. "I don't care if it's commercial,
   religious or entertainment (spam). It's all pollution," he said.
   
   That's exactly right, and it's how we need to start thinking about
   spam. Spam is not primarily a technological or legal problem: It's an
   economic one.
   
   From an economic perspective, spam is just another form of pollution,
   an activity that imposes costs on people without their permission.
   Like all polluters, spammers impose these costs because of the
   benefits to them--in this case, the profits they make from sales,
   however few.

   [...]



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