Anti-AOL ‘email tax’ demo
p2p news / p2pnet: An unlikely mix of left and right non-profit groups, small businesses and Net advocacy organizations are staging a national telephone news conference call in a combined campaign against AOL’s new "pay-to-send" email proposal.
They say it amounts to an "email tax."
"Under AOL’s recently announced "certified email" proposal, large emailers willing to pay an "email tax" can bypass spam filters and get guaranteed access to people’s inboxes – with their messages having a preferential high-priority designation," says the EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation), one of the protesters.
"Charities, small businesses, civic organizing groups, and even families with mailing lists will have no guarantee that their email will be delivered unless they are willing to pay the ‘email tax’ to AOL," it declares.
"AOL’s proposed pay-to-send system is the first step down the slippery slope toward dividing the Internet into two classes of users – those who get preferential treatment and those who are left behind."
Tuesday’s 1pm EST conference call will be co-hosted by the EFF and media policy group Free Press. Those taking part will include Craig Newmark of Craiglist and spokespersons from the Gun Owners of America (Yup), MoveOn.org Civic Action, and the Association of Cancer Online Resources.
"Dozens of other concerned groups will be announced," says the EFF.
If you’re interested, email Alex@Fenton.com or rebecca@eff.org.
February 24th, 2006 at 7:31 pm
So will people be able to delete these messages from their inboxes without reading them? I summarilly delete spam if I don’t recongize the sender or the subject, without viewing it.
February 26th, 2006 at 2:38 pm
I’m for it.
People will either run to AOL to get away from Spam or will run away from AOL because the service has degraded.
This is a good free market device.
It might even bury a few spam makers because they suddenly lose access to millions of e-mail adddresses.
February 27th, 2006 at 7:02 pm
As if AOL didn’t have enough money….How about paying off a security official (bad example) to let illegal aliens in?
OR: paying the police to allow a pedophile into your childs grade school whenever they want to go there. (good example)
OR: Paying to have “Scholastic News” or “The Christian Science Monitor” print ads for drug dealers and escort services without their permission.
jeffrok4@msn.com