Legislative Relief - was Re: Motion for a new POST NSF AUP
On 15 Oct 95 at 15:24, George Herbert wrote:
Just as a warning, some of us on the recieving end of more than our fair share of net abuse (the collected Usenet moderators) are starting to get more than a little short fuzed about this.
I would like to propose that we seek legislative relief from this ever-increasing problem. I have spoken with counsel and now understand what is required to support the enactment of federal legislation to prohibit the misuse of electronic mail and Usenet news by unprincipled "spammers." There is already law which prohibits marketing via facsimile and cellular telephone. My position is that e-mail and Usenet news are similar vehicles in the sense that there is a measurable cost on the receiver's end. I believe that this has the potential of being a high-visibility legal issue, and one that would be a "vote getter" as it speaks directly to an educated, active voting constituency. I plan on pursuing this with Sen. Edward Markey's office, as he is my local legislative representative and chairs the House Telecommunications Committee which is responsible for the facsimile law, as I understand it. To do this effectively, such an effort would require certain financial resources to support things like a state by state search for existing legislative and the creation of new draft legislation. I'll be providing information about this at our booth at Internet World at the end of the month and would like to see if there is enough support for this project to sponsor it at the grassroots. Please respond to me directly with your thoughts. </rr> Robert Raisch, Chief Scientist The Internet Company 96 Sherman Street Cambridge, MA 021040 617-547-3600 617-547-3300 FAX -- The Internet Company - info@internet.com We Bring Only Value to the Global Internet
I would like to propose that we seek legislative relief from this ever-increasing problem. I have spoken with counsel and now understand what is required to support the enactment of federal legislation to prohibit the misuse of electronic mail and Usenet news by unprincipled "spammers."
Eek. Do you _really_ want to get a bunch of shyster lawyers involved? I would think that there must be any number of more platable courses of action than this... My $.02. - paul
I would like to propose that we seek legislative relief from this ever-increasing problem. I have spoken with counsel and now understand what is required to support the enactment of federal legislation to prohibit the misuse of electronic mail and Usenet news by unprincipled "spammers."
Eek. Do you _really_ want to get a bunch of shyster lawyers involved? I would think that there must be any number of more platable courses of action than this...
My $.02.
- paul
Me thinks that this is yet one more short sighted view of the Internet. Surely Rob is aware that any federal legislation regarding "misuse" of Internet resources has only limited coverage... afterall, the Internet is global, and it is not clear how much weight US law carries in other juristictions. Think about it for a bit Rob.... Are you really going to advocate federal law control what companies do on their private networks? Or will the law be only applicable to US government funded networks and machines? --bill
On Mon, 16 Oct 1995, Paul Ferguson wrote:
I would like to propose that we seek legislative relief from this ever-increasing problem. I have spoken with counsel and now understand what is required to support the enactment of federal legislation to prohibit the misuse of electronic mail and Usenet news by unprincipled "spammers."
Eek. Do you _really_ want to get a bunch of shyster lawyers involved? I would think that there must be any number of more platable courses of action than this...
The problem is is that we are in the hands of the shyster lawyers already. Implementing /anything/ without some sort of legal protection is very very dangerous. IANAL, I am only speaking from my experiences with dealing with what happens when people sue you when there is no case law. I can tell you, it is awful. Our company currently is spending more on lawyers than on salaries, connection to the nert, telco charges, /anything/, because we /are/ the case law. That means no quick decision, no book that the lawyers can quickly pull a similar case from to use as the basis for your case, etc etc. It gets expensive. (Luckily our lawyers are letting us do a slow payoff of the expenses or we would be sunk) Please please please when you are thinking about these things think of the legal impact. As soon as you are either denying service based on anything, or cancelling anything ever you are opening up a huge can of worms you don't even know exists. As far as I can see you have a choice. Cancel everything that anyone questions even a little, or cancel nothing ever for any reason. Cancelling based on spam is still making a policy decision to cancel and you /may/ lose the protection you seek by saying you are an information carrier instead of a provider. By cancelling anything you are tacitly approving everything else. This can be expanded to other areas of your policy as well, but please be careful. Justin Newton * You have to change just to stay caught up. Vice President/ * System Administrator * Digital Gateway Systems *
On 15 Oct 95 at 15:24, George Herbert wrote:
Just as a warning, some of us on the recieving end of more than our fair share of net abuse (the collected Usenet moderators) are starting to get more than a little short fuzed about this.
I would like to propose that we seek legislative relief from this ever-increasing problem. I have spoken with counsel and now understand what is required to support the enactment of federal legislation to prohibit the misuse of electronic mail and Usenet news by unprincipled "spammers."
I think the cure would be worse than the disease. No lawyers please, Larry Plato
participants (5)
-
bmanning＠ISI.EDU -
Justin Newton -
Larry J. Plato -
Paul Ferguson -
Robert Raisch, The Internet Company