Re: American Billl

[Ted Gavin <[e-mail]>]

------Original Message------
From: Maurizio Codogno <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]
Sent: June 16, 2000 8:32:47 AM GMT
Subject: American Bill

> On the ietf@ietf mailing list there is talk about a (U.S.)
> bill regarding unsolicited email:
> http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c106:H.R.3113:
> Did you check it? judgement on that list are mixed.

I read the bill and have been watching the conversation. I've decided
that I'm not going to say anything in the IETF list conversation just
yet, mostly because Keith Moore is pretty much echoing a lot of the
pessimism I have about a bill like this ever working in Real Life[tm].

On the other hand, any legislation that at least sets up a framework
which can be ammended after its shown that it doesn't go far enough,
could be a Good Thing. It is important to remember that, in a global
perspective, the bills drafted by the US House of Representatives
carry the legitimacy of the scrawlings of a group of young children in
a sandbox (that must be the ISTF'er in me speaking :).

As Jonathan pointed out several months ago, when a Frenchman receives
spam, if it states that it complies with a "Bill in the US Senate",
the potential effectiveness of that legislation loses is eliminated by
the context. On a positive note, what we do here can be adopted by
ISPs, which will enforce a "higher standard" than the aforementioned
legislation. Especially with all of the concern about privacy that the
press has discovered is popular for scaring their readership into
consuming of late.

Regards;

Ted