[PLUG] Spam law update

Rich Shepard rshepard at appl-ecosys.com
Sun Oct 20 00:25:08 UTC 2002


  I've decided to put off lobbying for an Oregon anti-spam law until after
the elections. No sense lobbying someone who may not be in a position to
help. Depending on who wins, I think that we can get 3-4 sponsors of an
anti-spamming law; house and senate.

  What encourages me is the article in today's Oregonian reporting that
Washington has successfully procecuted its first spammer under its law. This
is a 28-year-old from Salem who sent about 300,000 spam mails soliciting
sales of his $40 book on how to make money on the Internet. Under Washington
law, each incident can result in a fine of $20,000 plus the cost of
procecution. The judge dropped the conviction to a single incident and
lopped a third off the restitution of costs. The defendent now owes the
state of Washington $96,000.

  With precedent set across the river, it will be easier to garner support
among the legislators. I look forward to getting gowing on this next month.

Rich





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