NONE: Re: email or quality information?
Re: email or quality information?
Donna Dolezal Zelzer (djz_at_efn.org)
Sat, 6 Jul 1996 11:57:28 -0700
At 12:16 PM 7/6/96, S. Finer wrote:
> I am very bored with the current thread, and hope it dies soon. It is the
> least valuable set of messages I have had this week,....my definition of
> junk.
I think it's extremely valuable to discuss the different forms of internet
advertising, including the pros and cons and the possible ethical
implications. One of the big problems with advertising today (at least in
the US, where i am) is that, for the most part for most companies, anything
goes, as long as it brings in money.
> This list is about advertising, right? But some people who
> practice one form of advertising keep trying to intimidate others into not
> using a form that they object to. This type of conduct is hatefully
> undemocratic.
As a consumer, there are certain forms of advertising that
upset/irritate/anger me, for one reason or another. Spam e-mail and
telemarketing are the top two on my list, esp. when untargeted.
As a marketer, I would not use the forms and techinques of
advertising/marketing that I personally find offensive. It also concerns me
when other marketers do use them, because I'm probably not the only
consumer to get upset and their techniques are giving all of us a bad name.
The whole concept of "junk mail" for example. Direct mail has gotten this
name because so much of it is so untargeted that *is* junk to most of the
recipients. And with e-mail, where the sender doesn't have the $$
constraints of paper mail, the situation has the potential of getting even
worse.
> >
> > There are significant differences, IMHO.
> >
> > 1. Most people are charged for their connection based on time.
>
> In the US this is not true.....most people have access to flat-rate access
> if they want it.
In the first place, the US is not the only country on the internet and we
have to stop thinking like it is.
In the second place, spammers send their spam to everyone -- they don't
pick the addresses that are most likely to be flat rate. In fact, I get
most of my spam mail on my AOL and CIS accounts, which are not flat-rate.
It still comes down to the fact that spammers are passing the costs of
their mailings on to others: to the recipients who don't have flat rate, or
who are charged a communication tax or whatever and to the internet
population in general, because of the bandwidth use.
Donna
---------------------
Donna Dolezal Zelzer (djz_at_efn.org)
Starlady's Home Page: http://www.efn.org/~djz/index.html
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