Search Salon

- - - - - - - - - - - -

View From the Top

Full list of profiles

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Recently in Salon Technology

Reactions to stock carnage: "The bubble has burst"
Believers in a prosperous "new economy" weigh in on the market's relentless decline.
Salon Technology staff report
[04/14/00]

The insta-business plan re-strategizer!
The market is skittish and IPOs are being postponed: Time to rejigger your B-plan! Our foolproof guide shows you the way.
By Scott Kirsner
[04/14/00]

Twilight of the crypto-geeks
Lone-wolf digital libertarians are beginning to abandon their faith in technology uber alles and espouse suspiciously socialist-sounding ideas.
By Ellen Ullman
[04/13/00]

Column
The Ralph Reed-Redmond connection
Microsoft's attempt to play presidential politics lands it in hot water.
By Scott Rosenberg
[04/12/00]

Can't buy Linux love
The stumbles of a Kleiner Perkins-funded Linux start-up prove that money isn't everything in the world of free software.
By Andrew Leonard
[04/11/00]

Complete archives for Technology

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

I do believe that the onus should be on the marketer to ensure that the customer understands the terms. There should be a "Check here if you agree to the terms" -- so the customer actively says, "Yeah, I know what's going on." There's a big difference between positive opt-in and negative opt-out. You could argue that negative opt-out, as some sites do today -- where you have to uncheck a box to not receive stuff -- isn't really giving the consumer easy choice. You'd want something in place to make it harder for companies to do that.

And, by the way, I have the numbers to prove to companies that they're better off if they use positive opt-in. They might have slightly fewer names in the database, but the total economic return of positive opt-in is way better.

So should positive opt-in be not only for e-mail but for other types of targeted promotions, like banner ads?

That one I'm less concerned about. I think the DoubleClick thing was, frankly, blown out of proportion. [DoubleClick was planning to merge users' names and purchasing history with their surfing profiles until privacy advocates blew the whistle.] What DoubleClick was saying that they would do is no different from what marketers have been doing for decades: collecting information from different sources and combining them into one profile.

Now, of course, you have even more information online. Say you went to a site to investigate a story on child pornography, and 17 years later you're running for mayor of Chicago and someone digs up your profile -- you get the drift. So clearly there are some implications. However, if you buy child pornography by mail, these companies will keep lists, and that information will get consolidated into other databases.

Now you could argue that all of that is wrong, but I think singling out what has happened online is a little alarmist. If I can go to DoubleClick, or any Web site, and click on a link that says "Check my profile" and see what they have on me -- this kind of full disclosure will alleviate some of people's concerns.

Post clients may be good marketing citizens, but there are all these other companies who aren't and are flooding people with e-mail right now. What can the industry do to stop this?

I believe that there should be federally mandated privacy legislation. I don't believe this industry self-regulation stuff is going to go anywhere. What's happening is that because there's no real federal regulation, every state is coming up with its own mishmash of laws. The marketers are doing themselves a disservice because it's going to be so hard to navigate all 50 states' and the European initiatives -- you're going to get to the point where you have to send different e-mails to every state with different disclaimers if you're going to remain legal.

But would this stop spam?

When you get spam today and you respond by saying "unsubscribe," you don't know what is actually going to happen. They might be checking to see if your account is a valid address. But if you own your own data, then nobody can use it if you tell them not to; if you instruct the company not to do something, then they're legally obligated to do that.

That could be tricky to enforce.

Somebody could set up "complaints@us.gov" and if you cc'ed them when you unsubscribed, they could keep a record. Then you could turn around and file a complaint. It would give anti-spam organizations legal recourse to pursue. It's not that spam wouldn't happen -- the spammers could go offshore or something -- but if you relegate spammers to doing something illegal it makes it more difficult for them.

Is there an industry group that could have a lot of impact if it came out with best practices -- "Do not bombard your customers with more than X number of e-mails a month?"

I don't believe there is. This is the problem I have with self-regulation. All it takes is one big guy to break the rules, and you've got a problem. If there are no penalties involved, then it isn't going to be long-term effective. If someone sees a reason to break the rules, they will -- even if it is shortsighted and the whole industry will suffer for it.
salon.com | April 17, 2000

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

  Get a printer-friendly version

  E-mail a friend about this article

  Backflip this article to find it again

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Search Salon