[10679] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
RE: Unsolicited Advertising - A Proposal
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Noel Chiappa)
Sat Mar 5 04:28:49 1994
Date: Fri, 4 Mar 94 09:33:05 -0500
From: jnc@ginger.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
To: ietf@cnri.reston.va.us
Cc: com-priv@psi.com, comp-privacy@uwm.edu, jnc@ginger.lcs.mit.edu,
It's only junk mail if you have no interest in the material at all. ...
Adversising is only "junk" if its concerning things that you don't want.
I think there is a "signal/noise" ratio issue. Lists like the IETF list have a
definite purpose in mind, and once we start to allow non-IETF related traffic
on it, we could get a lot of traffic to it. If there's only one IETF related
message in 100, we'd lose a lot of people we need to have on. (I got off
TCP-IP because the S/N ratio fell too far.)
I don't *know* this will happen; advertisers seem to be working on technology
to be more selective, and there's no reason to think it won'tbe true on the
Internet too. However, I don't want to chance it, by allowing advertising on
the IETF list.
This seems to imply that there is *no place at all* for advertising on the
Internet. I think this statement in and of itself to be false on its face.
I don't think that those of us who don't like advertising posts are saying
this. We just object to "anything goes" rules, which would allow forums with a
general good, like the IETF list, to be effectively destroyed by people who
are out for individual return. Not that individual return is bad, mind you;
far from it! It's just there are times and places when it's appropriate, and
times and places when it's not.
the question which needs to be asked is: what is the standard by which you
say that 'this activity is wrong' but 'this activity isn't'? ... is ALL
unsolicited E-Mail wrong?
We all know advertising when we see it. Just because it may be hard to exactly
define it ("unsolicited communications whose principle and immediate purpose
is to make money for the sender by speading knowledge of their commercial
activity" isn't bad, but there are bugs with it) doesn't change that.
But let's define under what circumstances it is and is not acceptable for
someone to be sending out unsolicited mail to another person, before we
exclude the class of 'advertisement.' What about advertisements posted to
mailing lists or news groups?
I think it's up to each mailing-list/news-group. The IETF community has
repeatedly expressed the opinion that *no* advertising is acceptable on this
list.
The problem may be in part that there is an "anti-commercial" bias with
many of the people on the Internet, and with people in general.
Balderdash. I had a lot of fun, and made a lot of money, at Proteon, as have
many others on this list with similar stories. We aren't being hypocritical in
rejecting commercial activity in the IETF; we just recognize that there are
times and places for commercial activity, and the IETF isn't one of them.
almost everything they own they obtained as a result of advertising
telling them about it or raising a desire they were unaware of
Speak for yourself... most of the contents of this room, looking around, are
a result of deliberate searches for outlets (e.g. yellow pages, which are a
*very* different form of advertising from unsolicited personal communication),
or information gained from other sources.
But (in the given example) we have a precisely targeted audience (bicyle
enthusiasts) being targeted for something related to them.
So what, if that group of people has made clear that their community channel
is *not* to be used for advertising?
While courts have given some leeway to banning the distribution of pure
advertisements, an advertisement attached to an editorial becomes material
protected under the 1st Amendment.
So what? Last time I looked, the 1st Amendment didn't allow you entry to
private clubs to post whatever ads (or editorials) you saw fit. Anyway, the
IETF list is not a solely US entity (although it's current primary distributor
is in the US, but this could be changed), so please stop appealing to US law.
the implied threat of having an organization whose charter is the
examination of Criminal activities ...keeping lists of people because some
other people don't like their messages
Clearly, the suggestion of involving the CERT was way off base.
Noel
