🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <Pine.LNX.3.91.980105160925.26948G-100000@sake.bais.com>, Rich Cook <rcook@sake.bais.com> writes:
|>On 5 Jan 1998, Russell Leach {78830} wrote:
|>
|>> 
|>> In article <rcook-3112971856320001@ppp06.bais.com>, rcook@bais.com (Rich Cook) writes:
|>> |>
|>> |>I just wanted to second this and even go one stop further.  I would not be
|>> |>in favor of legislation to ban spam on the net.  We have to respect the
|>> |>spammer's right to free speech, even if it's repugnant or uninvited.  The
|>> |>delete key is really not *that* hard to press, after all....  ;-)
|>> 
|>> And what does the word "uninvited" mean in your language?
|>
|>"uninvited," means "not invited."  :-|
|>
|>> The right to free speech extends only to the limits of the speaker's forum.
|>
|>This seems like a circular and peculiarly noninformative statement.  A 
|>forum is an area wherein a speaker may be heard, no?  

And which I can bypass, at _my_ choosing.

I guess I was too subtle for you.  By "the speaker's" forum, I meant, for 
example, a web page, which I can choose to visit or not.  _My_ resources,
my connect time, my ISP charges are under my control.  When the spammer 
blasts my mailbox full of crap, he/she is inflicting upon me, and the 
resources for which I pay, the burden of handling that junk.  My email address
is not an open invitation to "come on in, waste my time & money".

By your logic, a speaker would be simply exercising his/her freedom by 
kidnapping an audience, tying them down, & forcing them to listen.  That's
not freedom, it's assault.

|>
|>> Speech that invades my forum (in this case my email account) is not, and
|>> should not be, protected.
|>
|>Why, then, we should be suing junk mailer, including the U.S. senate for 
|>sending us their insipid mass mailings.  Sound nonsensical?  It is, and 
|>I'll tell you why.  When you get an email address, you are by implication 
|>assenting to receive all messages sent their, regardless of who sends 
|>them.  Your email account, like your postal address, is a publicly 
|>addressible but only privately accessible portal to the world.  If 
|>someone sends you a message to your mailbox, it is protected by their 
|>rights to free speech, whether you like it or not.  Please forgive my 
|>bluntness.

Utterly, totally wrong.

Your postal service example demonstrates a real ignorance of the economics of
the net.  Don't you get an ISP bill each month?  Do you pay a monthly bill
for your mailbox?  Do you put a stamp on each email?  Junk mailers pay for the
services of the Postal Service.  Spammers are subsidized by each individual
who owns an account.  Get it?


-- 
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There's nothing right in my left brain.
There's nothing left in my right brain.
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*  Russ Leach  * awhfy@tiac.net * rfl@swl.msd.ray.com