Murkowski anti-spam bill could be a problem for ISPs

Tue May 27 15:31:07 UTC 1997

> From: Stephen Sprunk <spsprunk at paranet.com>

> Actually, the USPS is almost 100% postage-funded; the only "subsidy" they
> receive is that it's a felony to mess with US Mail (which courts will go
> crazy over), whereas messing with FedEx/UPS packages is barely a misdemeanor.

> 
> Stephen
> 

Don't forget their license plates all say U.S.Gov, which I think
makes then tax exempt. The USPS also provides passport services,
something VERY specific to the Fed.Gov functioning.

Now back to the issue of SPAM: Any law that requires the ISP on
the RECEIVING side to take action simply plays into the hands of
the spammers. There is already judicial precident (Earthlink vs. 
Cyberpromo) that the SENDER is responsible for theft of services
and such.

That precident, that someone is responsible for the email that
they send, needs to be expanded upon, not erased by legislative
fiat.

Curt-