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Guest Blog: Consumers Cautiously Optimistic about the Future

22 October 2009

Today, we have a guest blog from the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE). CAUCE has been heavily involved in crafting a worthy anti-spam law in Canada, so I reached out to them to see if they would like to guest blog here. Neil Schwartzman, CAUCE’s Executive Director, wrote back with the following:

Are things about to get notably better for Internet end-users? This week, it appears to be the case; some noteworthy events took place in the past few days potentially providing several breathes of fresh air: Net neutrality concerns were addressed in Canada, the DMA is coming to its senses, and an important piece of anti-spam legislation is moving slowly forward.

CANADIAN ANTI-SPAM LEGISLATION
Bill C-27, the Electronic Commerce Protection Act has been wending its way through the legislative process in Canada. CAUCE has been an active participant in the process going back a decade and with our membership on the Federal Task Force on Spam back in 2004

On Wednesday, October 22, 2009 as part of process for the House of Parliament, the bill was given a clause-by-clause reading in the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology.

There has been very intense lobbying by opponents to the bill, many of whom are, to my mind, ill-informed about current industry best practices.

For example, a committee member made a suggestion that unsubscribing recipients could take as long as 30 days, based on the rationale that ‘senders take vacations’. Happily, the committee stuck to the original proposal, 10 business days, which is coherent with America’s CAN-SPAM Act, and entirely reasonable.

Another issue, the so-called “grandfather clause” was also discussed at some length.

In essence, this clause allows for a period, starting with the adoption of the law, wherein senders who have an active business relationship with a recipient can send mail to a recipient. The original proposal was 18 months, a very long time in anybody’s book, except one special interest group, who lobbied for a six-year time frame. Happily, that was ignored, but the period was extended to two years.

Other key clauses such as private right of action, something CAUCE pushed for were accepted.

Committee adjourned until Monday, October 26, when the clause-by-clause review will continue, and should the bill pass, it will move back to the house for a third and final vote. After which, it faces the same process (three rounds of votes and referral to committee) in the Senate. Sources say the government is focused on having C-27 become law before the end of the year, and there is still plenty of time for things to go right, or go wrong.

Powerful lobbyists representing special interest groups continue their attempts to water down or kill the bill entirely.

On the other hand, industry leaders such as Return Path. Eloqua, Thin Data Inc., and Exact Target as well as many others have publicly voiced their support for C-27.

CAUCE has put up a petition at http://ipetitions.com/petition/SupportC27

We encourage you to sign it, and if you are Canadian, please pick up the telephone, and call your member of parliament and voice your support directly! Their contact information can be found here.

MARKETER ASSOCIATION REVAMP
Matt Blumberg, CEO of Return Path (and in the interests of full disclosure, my employer) was elected earlier this week as part of the Reform Block to the board of the Direct Marketing Association.

Blumberg was blunt about his agenda:

The DMA could be stronger in fighting for consumers’ interests.

“Why? Because what’s good for consumers is great for direct marketers. Marketing is not what it used to be, the lines between good and bad actors have been blurred, and the consumer is now in charge. … The DMA’s best practices and guidelines take too long to produce and usually end up too watered down to be meaningful”

Read the rest of the Blumberg manifesto.

All in all some tangible, encouraging signs are beginning to be seen on the stark Internet landscape, let’s hope that they are actual oases, and not mirages.

CANADIAN NET NEUTRALITY
In Canada, net neutrality advocates and consumers had something to celebrate, when the Canadian Radio-Television Commission issued their report yesterday.

Prof. Michael Geist (a law professor at the University of Ottawa where he holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law) had this to say:

Though (the report) does not go as far as some advocates might hope, it unquestionably advances the ball forward on several important fronts. When considering the decision, it is important to remember that 12 months ago, there was virtually no ISP disclosure of traffic management practices and even an unwillingness to acknowledge that there was an issue. Today’s CRTC decision signifies that traffic management is not a free-for-all and the days of ISPs arguing that they can do whatever they please on their networks is over.

All in all some tangible encouraging signs are beginning to be seen on the stark Internet landscape, let’s hope that they are actual oases, and not mirages. It’s been a pretty good week!

Neil Schwartzman is the Executive Director of CAUCE North America – The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email, and the Director of Standards & Security for Return Path’s Certification Services.

Mickey Chandler
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