[Asrg] attention bonds, was Email Postage

[Seth]

Barry Shein <bzs at world.std.com> wrote:

> I don't particularly care if it was solicited or not.

I do.  That's what matters.

> If I call Sears and ask them to send me a catalogue that doesn't
> compel the post office to bring it to me for free (I don't think
> Sears has a catalogue any longer, but whatever.)

There is no "the post office" in email.

If Sears pays The Delivery Company to carry stuff around for Sears,
and The Delivery Company hands it to the front desk of my condo (since
the building is private property, that's as far as they can go), then
I _do_ expect my condo manager to deliver it to me (hold it for me,
whatever I've asked them to do) for "free" (actually, as part of the
services I pay them for every month).

That seems a lot more analogous to email.

> It also removes most of the judgement. Who really wants to argue
> whether something is "solicited" or not?

I don't care whether the local Chinese restaurants pay somebody or not
to slip menus under my door, *I don't want those menus*.

> It's a rathole. For example, subsidiaries, partners, etc. Ebay owns
> paypal, so if you told ebay to send you updates does that mean paypal
> can also send you "updates"?

You should be specific in what you tell them.  If eBay pays $X/month
to have their email delivered, does that cover PayPal?  Same rathole.

> Also, I bought like one or two little things from Amazon a while
> back and to this day they send me email every single day pitching
> something, often trying to relate it back to the book I bought in
> some way but often not, just random, or very general (buy anything
> over $XX by Friday and shipping is FREE!)
>
> Is that spam?

What did you _tell_ Amazon when you bought those things?  What have
you told them since?

> I don't really care. I just think if they had to pay for delivery
> maybe they wouldn't pelt me and everyone else daily.

So if I _want to_ receive their ads, you would prevent that from
happening (because neither Amazon nor I am willing to make whatever
payments you want to require)?

> Right now the only thing which limits Amazon (et al) is what volume
> they imagine will really piss me off at them and they try to stay on
> the safe side of that, it's purely PR and marketing.

Plus laws, so apparently you haven't told Amazon to stop mailing you
(or you could sue them as an ISP).

> Apparently that's once per day except sometimes when it's twice a day
> because there's something really, really important coming up like
> Christmas, or Tuesday.

Strange how I buy stuff from Amazon a lot more than you do, have their
credit card (two, actually), and still get an order of magnitude less
mail from them than you're claiming.

Seth