<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>Yahoo and America Online?s plan to charge businesses for guaranteed delivery of their commercial email could potentially leave the Internet giants exposed to lawsuits for invasion of consumer privacy, industry experts said Tuesday. Yahoo and AOL have said that they plan to charge businesses anywhere from a penny to a quarter of a cent as a fee to deliver bulk messages to their email subscribers (see AOL, Yahoo to Charge for Email). The fee is being labeled as an electronic postage stamp that guarantees compliance with anti-spam legislation. It would also certify the sender's email as authentic. But industry experts said the plan is ?dangerous? and ?dead on arrival? because it violates the democratic principles of the Internet and will have little impact on spam, the biggest problem that email users face right now. What?s more, it?s likely to prompt a huge consumer backlash as users wouldn?t be able to control what kind of emails they receive. ?AOL?s proposal is dead on arrival,? said David Hughes, chief executive officer of Reflexion Network Solutions, an anti-spam and email security company. ?It violates the democratic principles of the Internet and many people will see this as a transparent attempt to develop a new revenue stream despite the company's fa?ade of good intentions.? Yahoo and AOL were not immediately available for comment. No Change in SpamPostini, a managed email service provider, agreed Yahoo and AOL?s attempt ?badly misses the mark? because it will lead to more spam in user inboxes. ?It guarantees delivery of paid-for bulk email based on the sender paying, not based on users? preferences,? said Andrew Lochart, senior director of marketing for Postini. ?In other words, it will allow more, not less, unwanted email through to users.? Yahoo and AOL have said that as part of the initiative, they will ask only legitimate companies to pay. But industry experts said that the source of the vast majority of spam doesn?t come from legitimate businesses, and the latest idea is unlikely to stop these spammers. ?AOL and Yahoo plans don?t actually prevent spam, and they ask legitimate senders to pay for the sins of the real spammers,? said Mr. Lochart. The idea of allowing only legitimate businesses to pay to send email also raises questions about who will play the role of deciding what?s legitimate and what?s not, said industry experts. ?Who is going to play the role of the censor?? asked Reflexion?s Mr. Hughes. ?Who?s going to decide if the incoming mail is truly high value? It may be high value for AOL but is it high value for someone else?? It?s also a system that?s ripe for abuse, he said. ?AOL could simply tune its filters to create more false positives, creating a stronger incentive for legitimate emailers to pay for delivery.? Potential for LawsuitsYahoo and AOL?s decision could make some users very angry, said Des Cahill, CEO of Habeas, an email certification company. ?Today they have control over their inboxes and when they give permission to someone to send them an email, they trust that it won?t be altered by their ISP [Internet Service Provider],? said Mr. Cahill. ?This undercuts that.? It also violates the democratic principles of the Internet as it favors wealthy larger enterprises over smaller upstarts who might not have the money to pay for sending emails to users, said Reflexion?s Mr. Hughes. The move could leave Yahoo and AOL also open to lawsuits from angry users. ?We live in a very litigious society and we could imagine a class-action lawsuit by users who feel that their rights are being trampled upon,? said Mr. Cahill. Even if users aren?t angry enough to take the two Internet giants to court, they are likely to express their displeasure by switching to another email service. Experts said many users could switch to the Gmail service from Google, or to another email service provider. If the plans succeed, then users could also end up potentially demanding a piece of the pie. Currently, users pay AOL a subscription fee for the service and also view ads on their browser. But if AOL or Yahoo can make money in the process of delivering emails, some users might demand a cut in fees or even a small stake in the revenue earned. ?If access to a user?s inbox will go to the highest bidder then some of the money may have to be shared with them,? said Mr. Hughes.</div>Linkthis is BS it just ruins the whole point basically
Yeah...Not to mention theres so many free email services now anyway that it would hardly make a difference.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (AdropOFvenom @ Feb 8 2006, 03:14 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Yeah...Not to mention theres so many free email services now anyway that it would hardly make a difference.</div>thats true GMAIL!
