Stopping Spam (Californians READ THIS!!!) Re. SB 12

elvey · 21 Mar 2003, 07:40 AM

Hey,

There's a real opportunity to impact spam.
Call your State Senator/Assemblyman and ask them to support this bill.

It was discussed a bit already.

Here's what I wrote:

Hello. Glad to see some action on SB 12 in the last few days, and lots of co-authors. Hope it passes. Looking forward to the upcoming hearing! Any idea if it'll be on cable TV?

I'm VERY PLEASED to see that, as I suggested:
1. the complicated cascading effect of 17529.1 on 17529.2 and 17529.3 has been removed, AND
2. the respect for NO UBE type notifications is ordered (though the language is vague).

I'm DISAPPOINTED that due to the recent amendment, I can no longer expect my wishes to be respected if I request to not receive email from a company I have made an inquiry to or -more importantly- one that fabricates false evidence of such to avoid punishment)! (section k)

I'm also VERY DISAPPOINTED that out of state spam is not addressed, though it could be!
It calls for urgent remedy:
In some states it can prove difficult or impossible to bring action in
small claims court against a defendant that resides out of state. In
California for example, no one may sue in small claims court a defendant
that resides out-of-state, unless that defendant (for example a
corporation) has a agent for service of process in the state, the matter
relates to in-state real estate or an automobile altercation. (Cal. Code
Civ. Proc. Section 116.340(d).)
Include spam in the allowed exclusions of 116.340(d). The Wash. State law has shown that this can be effective and constitutional - it held up in supreme court.

Also, I never got a response to the email below. I followed up with a phone call, and that wasn't returned either. I'm VERY DISAPPOINTED.

Elvey wrote:

>
> *Hello, Senator Bowen and staff.
>
> I wrote on Xmas about SB 12, and spoke with the legislative aide to Senator Bowen handling SB 12, which she introduced last year.
>
> I'm writing to ask if you can provide an update on the bill, specifically: 1)It's been eligible for action for some time now, but no amendments or other visible action. 2)I suggested in that email and phone call two changes: regarding how to broaden its 'long arm' ability to reach out of state spammers and make it more palatable to those concerned about "frea speach" issues.
> 3)How is the bill doing? It it still getting a warm reception? Hope you recieved lots of supporting letters.
> Here's some text from federal judges that is likely to be quite effective with legislators:*
>
> US Federal Judge Stanley Sporkin:*
> "[Spammers] have come to court not because their freedom of speech is threatened but because their profits are; to dress up their complaints in First Amendment garb demeans the principles for which the First Amendment stands."
>
> *Chief Justice Berger, U.S. Supreme Court*
> "Nothing in the Constitution compels us to listen to or view any unwanted communication, whatever its merit. We categorically reject the argument that a vendor has a right under the Constitution or otherwise to send unwanted material into the home of another. If this prohibition operates to impede the flow of even valid ideas, the answer is that no one has a right to press even 'good' ideas on an unwilling recipient. The asserted right of a mailer, we repeat, stops at the outer boundary of every person's domain."
>
> Again, thanks for your work on this important issue.
>

The bill:
Initial version
Second (current) version

How can I obtain Legislators' e-mail addresses?
The U.S. Postal Service mailing address for each Legislator's Capitol and District Office as listed in the Daily File publication of each House is available by clicking the "Your Legislature" button on the home page of the site www.leginfo.ca.gov. If a Legislator chooses to have a listed e-mail address, it can be found on the home page of his/her website. You can contact Assembly members through the Assembly Web Site at www.assembly.ca.gov or State Senators through the Senate Web Site at www.sen.ca.gov

FromLine · 21 Mar 2003, 12:44 PM

Elvey,

Thanks for starting this thread and I think it's a good resource to discuss the way California is taking this matter seriously.

To others that participate in this thread, let's try to keep the following in perspective. For the most part, this thread is somewhat political, but it does focus on email matters and I find myself reading up about this in the major newspapers from time to time.

With that said, let's try to keep the thread focused solely on SF-12 and not try to stray about what we don't like about spam in general or make this a thread about spam or targeting politics. There might be some good feedback to provide her on feedback for this bill.

Also, Elvey, if this thread progresses with some good comments, feedback, and constructive critism about the bill itself, I may forward this to Senator Bowman's office. For this reason, it'll be especially important for posters of this thread to stay focused on the topic at hand.

FromLine · 21 Mar 2003, 12:47 PM

I have contacted Senator Bowmans office on SB-12 some time ago by both telephone and email. My main concern were the words stricken from the current CA law whereby the text:

ADV: must appear as the "first 4 characters in the subject line"
and
ADV:ADLT must appear as the "first 8 characters in the subject line" for adult postings.

I felt that that should remain.

What I do like about the bill is it seems that for those emails that can be traced to a sender, any individual may file in court.

What might be usesful is to also be able to sue the company or product being advertised within the email. That would provide leverage from email originating outside the U.S. that advertise for companies that do business within the U.S. - so even if the I.P. address cannot be served for court appearence, the company in the body of the email message may be sued for being connected with an email message that has violated California Law.

elvey · 22 Mar 2003, 07:47 AM

At first, the mandatory ADV: type headers seemed likely to cause the bill trouble, due to first amendment issues. But given that it only regulates first amendment speech, it's not such a big deal to have 'em in there. I don't feel strongly about it either way. I'd rather have a LAW without the ADV: stuff than no law (just a failed bill) with the ADV: stuff.

And FromLine, it's Bowen and SB 12, not Bowman and SF-12.

Did you contact your senator/assemblyman?
Anyone else do so or not do so?
I PM'd a few people to come here who I figured out are CA residents: Fmrocks, FromLine, admiralu, btn, dragon1, jessm, tickle, elvey (me). I'm sure there are lots more, but don't want to spam (I figure nearly Californian here would be interested, since spam is about email...), and besides the advanced search feature is disabled.

btn · 22 Mar 2003, 11:12 AM

It would be nice if there could be one federal anti-spam law to avoid keeping track of every state's law. If spam is going to be legislated, it makes sense to legislate it at the federal level.

***Edwin*** · 22 Mar 2003, 01:54 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by elvey
I PM'd a few people to come here who I figured out are CA residents: Fmrocks, FromLine, admiralu, btn, dragon1, jessm, tickle, elvey (me). I'm sure there are lots more, but don't want to spam (I figure nearly Californian here would be interested, since spam is about email...), and besides the advanced search feature is disabled.

Please do not use this board for any kind of political activism (yes, this issue IS political as well as email-related).

Besides that, I consider the mass-sending of PMs to people on a single subject to be spam.

elvey · 23 Mar 2003, 03:09 AM

Of course decent nationwide laws would be better, but congress won't pass one in the US. It's been tried.

Ok, Edwin.

I tried to find a way to take advantage of the WA law, but couldn't find one (short of moving there).

FromLine · 26 Mar 2003, 04:27 AM

here's an update on this matter:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...049EST0158.DTL

elvey · 26 Mar 2003, 10:06 AM

Interesting. Amazing. The AEA is a who's who of the tech world - people - your employers are supporting lobbying to be able to send you spam.

FYI, the main opponents of this bill are AOL, Microsoft, AEA, (all mentioned in the article) plus Yahoo, and the Internet Alliance.

http://www.internetalliance.org/ - Some current members : Topica, AOL Time Warner, E-Bay, IBM, Microsoft, and WorldCom.
I'm surprised ebay is in there; aren't they very anti-spam?
The alliance opposes any new laws to fight spam. They were purchaced by the DMA in 1999: http://www.internetalliance.org/news/990504.html
(See http://www.internetalliance.org/poli...sues.html#spam - it reads like the typical privacy policy that provides no privacy)

http://www.aeanet.org/ American Electronics Association
Members (http://www.aeanet.org/members/) include: 772 major companies - Cisco, Sun, Intel, SonicWall, Microsoft, stamps.com, Corel, Versant,
http://www.aeanet.org/PressRoom/gach...d%20March%2024

elvey · 26 Mar 2003, 10:17 AM

Anyone read up on SB 186?

Note the AEA link in the post above to their *ALERT* newsletter warning memebers that action was needed to defeat the bill! What scum!

Also, anyone know of a better forum for discussing this somewhat political issue? FromLine? Craigslist?

FromLine · 26 Mar 2003, 12:46 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by elvey
Also, anyone know of a better forum for discussing this somewhat political issue? FromLine? Craigslist?

Jeremey once pointed to a forum that discusses spam, however, these tend to get over-zealous with people posting spam emails, complaining, and going off-topic. That's pretty much why there's not a spam discussion section on EMD. This thread is a bit different because our goal here to to keep this thread dedicated to SB-12 and California's status of the bill.

By the way, that reminds me, did anyone email this thread to Senator Bowman's office?

As for as other forums or better forums, theres:

1) Craigslist Local Politics Forum:
http://forums.craigslist.org/?forumID=48

2) Craigslist Computer and Internet Forum:
http://forums.craigslist.org/?forumID=34

However, one of the main differenes about these forums are they are time-dependant. If the other participants are not online at the same time, the threads will move way down in less than 24 hours, they're not dynamic like vBulletin Forums where each time someone replies, the thread goes to the top again.

One thing you can do (and I do this a lot) is post on the Craigslist forums and point them to this thread here.

Frequently, I post on the Craigslist computer forum providing a link to a specific thread on EMD. I've actually brought many Craigslist users to EMD and posted about FastMail.FM there a lot also.

I've had some fun being the EMD historian from time to time. I'm very good at finding old threads and using the search feature here. It's fun to waking up threads that have been sleeping for a while.

Also, FromLine does not have a forum.

FromLine · 26 Mar 2003, 12:52 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by elvey
Note the AEA link in the post above to their *ALERT* newsletter warning memebers that action was needed to defeat the bill! What scum!

They're all spammers. It's just that they try to argue that they are the more ethical "email marketers".

The newspaper article above covered it quite well stating:

Quote:

But senators said most consumers don't want the e-mail, and argued it costs businesses billions of dollars in computer costs to receive it.

and that's the bottom line and the only thing that matters here.

The DMA is also lobbying hard against both the state and federal Do-Not-Call list. The fact is, 85%+ people don't want these calls (or these emails). But the DMA argues that even though they don't want them, some still listen and some still read them, and everyone would simply opt out hurting the telemarketing business.

Personally, I don't think lack of either email marketing or telemarketing will hurt the economy one bit. People will simply spend their disposable income elsewhere. And the minimum wage jobs where people are exploited cold-calling, they can find something else, and probably find something better to do.

elvey · 26 Mar 2003, 11:55 PM

I think I'll start up a conversation with the next telemarketer - talk about them.
Hi, how's your day going, where are you, how much do you make, what are your goals in life...

Amazing, these folks have their email addresses on their website, so I'm sure they get lots of spam themselves. John-Oliver's list candidates, IMO.

I got a very nice long email back from Bowen's office. I just wish I'd heard from them BEFORE the lousy amendments were made. They say they're working on improving 'long arm' interstate capabilities of the law.

hadaso · 27 Mar 2003, 06:08 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by FromLine
What might be usesful is to also be able to sue the company or product being advertised within the email...

IMO this is the single most important part that should be in any anti-spam law. Not because it would make it easier to sue in some additional cases, but because making the businesses that pay the spammers liable would force them to think carefully before they hire one, and requiring the spammer to follow some minimal guidelines. Spammers would have to find less violent ways to do their business, or no one will hire them. (Sorry for posting general spam remark here. I believe if you Californians can pass a good anti-spam law, it would then be a model to copy, so what's in this thread is interesting not just to Californians!)

elvey · 27 Mar 2003, 08:39 AM

I read it as partially doing that. IIRC, the languge was something like "caused to be".
So if you hire someone to spam for you, you're liable.
If you have a marketing program that indirectly encourages spamming though, it probably would slide. But it would depend on the judge. (IANAL...)
Happy to have you post here.
(175 views - yay - I'm getting some attention - hopefully more than a few readers have actually done something!)

21 Mar 2003, 07:40 AM	#1
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	Stopping Spam (Californians READ THIS!!!) Re. SB 12 Hey, There's a real opportunity to impact spam. Call your State Senator/Assemblyman and ask them to support this bill. It was discussed a bit already. Here's what I wrote: Hello. Glad to see some action on SB 12 in the last few days, and lots of co-authors. Hope it passes. Looking forward to the upcoming hearing! Any idea if it'll be on cable TV? I'm VERY PLEASED to see that, as I suggested: 1. the complicated cascading effect of 17529.1 on 17529.2 and 17529.3 has been removed, AND 2. the respect for NO UBE type notifications is ordered (though the language is vague). I'm DISAPPOINTED that due to the recent amendment, I can no longer expect my wishes to be respected if I request to not receive email from a company I have made an inquiry to or -more importantly- one that fabricates false evidence of such to avoid punishment)! (section k) I'm also VERY DISAPPOINTED that out of state spam is not addressed, though it could be! It calls for urgent remedy: In some states it can prove difficult or impossible to bring action in small claims court against a defendant that resides out of state. In California for example, no one may sue in small claims court a defendant that resides out-of-state, unless that defendant (for example a corporation) has a agent for service of process in the state, the matter relates to in-state real estate or an automobile altercation. (Cal. Code Civ. Proc. Section 116.340(d).) Include spam in the allowed exclusions of 116.340(d). The Wash. State law has shown that this can be effective and constitutional - it held up in supreme court. Also, I never got a response to the email below. I followed up with a phone call, and that wasn't returned either. I'm VERY DISAPPOINTED. Elvey wrote: > > Hello, Senator Bowen and staff. > > I wrote on Xmas about SB 12, and spoke with the legislative aide to Senator Bowen handling SB 12, which she introduced last year. > > I'm writing to ask if you can provide an update on the bill, specifically: 1)It's been eligible for action for some time now, but no amendments or other visible action. 2)I suggested in that email and phone call two changes: regarding how to broaden its 'long arm' ability to reach out of state spammers and make it more palatable to those concerned about "frea speach" issues. > 3)How is the bill doing? It it still getting a warm reception? Hope you recieved lots of supporting letters. > Here's some text from federal judges that is likely to be quite effective with legislators: > > US Federal Judge Stanley Sporkin:* > "[Spammers] have come to court not because their freedom of speech is threatened but because their profits are; to dress up their complaints in First Amendment garb demeans the principles for which the First Amendment stands." > > Chief Justice Berger, U.S. Supreme Court > "Nothing in the Constitution compels us to listen to or view any unwanted communication, whatever its merit. We categorically reject the argument that a vendor has a right under the Constitution or otherwise to send unwanted material into the home of another. If this prohibition operates to impede the flow of even valid ideas, the answer is that no one has a right to press even 'good' ideas on an unwilling recipient. The asserted right of a mailer, we repeat, stops at the outer boundary of every person's domain." > > Again, thanks for your work on this important issue. > The bill: Initial version Second (current) version How can I obtain Legislators' e-mail addresses? The U.S. Postal Service mailing address for each Legislator's Capitol and District Office as listed in the Daily File publication of each House is available by clicking the "Your Legislature" button on the home page of the site www.leginfo.ca.gov. If a Legislator chooses to have a listed e-mail address, it can be found on the home page of his/her website. You can contact Assembly members through the Assembly Web Site at www.assembly.ca.gov or State Senators through the Senate Web Site at www.sen.ca.gov Last edited by elvey : 21 Mar 2003 at 07:50 AM.

21 Mar 2003, 12:47 PM	#3
FromLine The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 2,619	FromLine Comment - San Francisco, CA I have contacted Senator Bowmans office on SB-12 some time ago by both telephone and email. My main concern were the words stricken from the current CA law whereby the text: ADV: must appear as the "first 4 characters in the subject line" and ADV:ADLT must appear as the "first 8 characters in the subject line" for adult postings. I felt that that should remain. What I do like about the bill is it seems that for those emails that can be traced to a sender, any individual may file in court. What might be usesful is to also be able to sue the company or product being advertised within the email. That would provide leverage from email originating outside the U.S. that advertise for companies that do business within the U.S. - so even if the I.P. address cannot be served for court appearence, the company in the body of the email message may be sued for being connected with an email message that has violated California Law.

22 Mar 2003, 07:47 AM	#4
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	At first, the mandatory ADV: type headers seemed likely to cause the bill trouble, due to first amendment issues. But given that it only regulates first amendment speech, it's not such a big deal to have 'em in there. I don't feel strongly about it either way. I'd rather have a LAW without the ADV: stuff than no law (just a failed bill) with the ADV: stuff. And FromLine, it's Bowen and SB 12, not Bowman and SF-12. Did you contact your senator/assemblyman? Anyone else do so or not do so? I PM'd a few people to come here who I figured out are CA residents: Fmrocks, FromLine, admiralu, btn, dragon1, jessm, tickle, elvey (me). I'm sure there are lots more, but don't want to spam (I figure nearly Californian here would be interested, since spam is about email...), and besides the advanced search feature is disabled. Last edited by elvey : 22 Mar 2003 at 09:11 AM.

21 Mar 2003, 12:44 PM	#2
FromLine The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 2,619	Elvey, Thanks for starting this thread and I think it's a good resource to discuss the way California is taking this matter seriously. To others that participate in this thread, let's try to keep the following in perspective. For the most part, this thread is somewhat political, but it does focus on email matters and I find myself reading up about this in the major newspapers from time to time. With that said, let's try to keep the thread focused solely on SF-12 and not try to stray about what we don't like about spam in general or make this a thread about spam or targeting politics. There might be some good feedback to provide her on feedback for this bill. Also, Elvey, if this thread progresses with some good comments, feedback, and constructive critism about the bill itself, I may forward this to Senator Bowman's office. For this reason, it'll be especially important for posters of this thread to stay focused on the topic at hand.

22 Mar 2003, 11:12 AM	#5
btn Cornerstone of the Community Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: San Jose, CA, US Posts: 688 Representative of: Everyone.net	It would be nice if there could be one federal anti-spam law to avoid keeping track of every state's law. If spam is going to be legislated, it makes sense to legislate it at the federal level.

23 Mar 2003, 03:09 AM	#7
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	Of course decent nationwide laws would be better, but congress won't pass one in the US. It's been tried. Ok, Edwin. I tried to find a way to take advantage of the WA law, but couldn't find one (short of moving there).

26 Mar 2003, 04:27 AM	#8
FromLine The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 2,619	here's an update on this matter: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cg...049EST0158.DTL

26 Mar 2003, 10:06 AM	#9
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	Interesting. Amazing. The AEA is a who's who of the tech world - people - your employers are supporting lobbying to be able to send you spam. FYI, the main opponents of this bill are AOL, Microsoft, AEA, (all mentioned in the article) plus Yahoo, and the Internet Alliance. http://www.internetalliance.org/ - Some current members : Topica, AOL Time Warner, E-Bay, IBM, Microsoft, and WorldCom. I'm surprised ebay is in there; aren't they very anti-spam? The alliance opposes any new laws to fight spam. They were purchaced by the DMA in 1999: http://www.internetalliance.org/news/990504.html (See http://www.internetalliance.org/poli...sues.html#spam - it reads like the typical privacy policy that provides no privacy) http://www.aeanet.org/ American Electronics Association Members (http://www.aeanet.org/members/) include: 772 major companies - Cisco, Sun, Intel, SonicWall, Microsoft, stamps.com, Corel, Versant, http://www.aeanet.org/PressRoom/gach...d%20March%2024

26 Mar 2003, 10:17 AM	#10
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	Anyone read up on SB 186? Note the AEA link in the post above to their ALERT newsletter warning memebers that action was needed to defeat the bill! What scum! Also, anyone know of a better forum for discussing this somewhat political issue? FromLine? Craigslist?

26 Mar 2003, 11:55 PM	#13
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	I think I'll start up a conversation with the next telemarketer - talk about them. Hi, how's your day going, where are you, how much do you make, what are your goals in life... Amazing, these folks have their email addresses on their website, so I'm sure they get lots of spam themselves. John-Oliver's list candidates, IMO. I got a very nice long email back from Bowen's office. I just wish I'd heard from them BEFORE the lousy amendments were made. They say they're working on improving 'long arm' interstate capabilities of the law.

27 Mar 2003, 08:39 AM	#15
elvey The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: San Francisco Posts: 2,458	I read it as partially doing that. IIRC, the languge was something like "caused to be". So if you hire someone to spam for you, you're liable. If you have a marketing program that indirectly encourages spamming though, it probably would slide. But it would depend on the judge. (IANAL...) Happy to have you post here. (175 views - yay - I'm getting some attention - hopefully more than a few readers have actually done something!)