Now us lucky little Australians have anti-spam legislation protecting us, it’s pretty apparent some companies will find a way around it. For example, ninemsn Hotmail constantly sends me emails imploring me to upgrade to a paid account (to get more storage space etc).

I went to try and turn this promos off, and lo and behold it says:

“Please note that this choice does not apply to some MSN websites that send out periodic e-mails informing you of technical service issues, new feature announcements, and news about MSN products and services, which are considered essential to the provision of the service you have requested. You will not be able to stop receiving or unsubscribe to these mailings as they are considered a part of the service you have chosen. “

Obvious query is just how is sending me promotional emails for paid products ‘essential to the provision of the service’?

I seems to me these promotions fall under the definition of commercial email in the new law. But I can’t opt out. Which appears to me to be a contravention of the act.

Be interesting to see how companies like ninemsn deal with this.

One of the interesting angles specifically about something like Hotmail is that although it’s branded by an Australian company – ninemsn, I suspect as a user my legal agreement is with Microsoft in the USA, thus easily circumventing the legislation.