I don’t actually read every spam, but I did notice the footer on one which slipped past my McAfee SpamKiller software. I love the nerve:

“No longer wish to receive our newsletters? please go to this site and enter your address. If you’d like to call me, please do so at 1-808-347-1880. My name is David and if I am at my desk I will take your call. Please note that local and long distance charges apply. Extra charges include a $5 per minute service charge automatically debited to your phone bill.”

It’s the $5 a minute cost to have my name taken off their list. Not only do they spam me, they CHARGE ME to stop!!!

And yes, I firmly believe there is a man named David just waiting to take my call 🙂

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.

Can’t resist this one:

“An Austrian trade union has claimed the repetitive playing of Christmas Carols in department stores is nothing short of “psycho-terrorism” for salespeople.”

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/12/03/1070351620873.html

Well it’s all happening in the anti-spam utopia of the Australian Government. They pushed through their new anti-spam legislation, which means, as of early 2004, it will be illegal to send commercial emails without the recipient’s prior consent, and an unsubscribe function. They’ve also banned email address ‘harvesting’ software.

But of course there’s an exemption – for POLITICANS! Yup, political parties (and churches and charities) are exempt. So politics, god and fundraising are ok spam topics. All the while little businesses around the country sweat over their email lists (you know how techno-literate they’ll be!) and the threat of a $1million fine for a breach.

Content companies living in the 19th century, grimly hanging on to archaic constructs of content, and suing IT savvy teenagers.

Plus

Just about most expensive broadband access costs in the developed world.

Equals

A damn good reason why Australia ranks 29th on a table of 30 countries in terms of broadband subscribers per 100 inhabitants. Ah the ‘clever country’.

Johansen’s explots (below) remind me of my favourite copyright-breaking story from 2002 – the notorious black marker. Sony’s “Key2Audio” anti-copying system is included on millions of audio CDs. It was based around a special security track around the outer edge of the disk. Til some enterprising person discovered you could just cover the track using a black marker. Worked like a treat.

But, if you fail, perservere. Sony is now releasing it’s next generation of protection. Apparently it ‘blocks ripping but allows tracks to be transferred to “authorised” portable music players.’ EG They don’t mind if you play it on your Sony digital player, but they do mind you uploading to Kazaa.

“The technology uses the established method of offering two versions of the record on the same CD: one that can be played in regular players and another intended for computer use.”

A 20-year-old Norwegian hacker Jon Johansen has created a program that circumvents Apple iTunes’ anti-copying program. And thus renders copyright protection useless. Jon’s the same guy who cracked the DVD region coding stuff a while back. I saw some good commentary somewhere which noted that Apple would have been mad not to figure such an occurence into the business plan for iTunes. I’d agree, pretty silly not to include a business risk which potentially jeopardises the whole enterprise.

And yet they keep trying – Australia’s ninemsn network has today announced it’s launching a paid music download service. The same article says Apple is looking to launch iTunes in Australia in 2004. Presumably it’s all part of ninemsn trying to stem its losses, and pursue the introduction of subscription services – something Microsoft’s management told them to do a couple of years ago, and which the local management seemed to strenuously resist for a time.

Why is that, despite taking legal action against hundred of scared teenagers across the globe for supposed music piracy via file swapping networks, many of the big music companies pay for market research information from a company which specialises in monitoring the popularity of songs on those networks? Apparently they find it invaluable intelligence when mapped with other statistics such as airplay. So if a particular song is played on the radio, they can then check the ratings on the networks like Kazaa. Just supporting the notion that at the end of the day this is all about money, and when money is the focus, as always, all is fair in love and war.

Scientists in England have created an equation which documents the perfect piece of toast. Now, if they could just hypothesise a forumla to remove Nutella (hazelnut spread) from the hair of my 3 year old son… that would be an advancement for mankind.

Something I posted this week in a mailing list for arts marketing in response to a comment from another listee.

> There are serious security risks accepting sales by credit
> card over the
> internet. This is not a secure method of transacting monies even for
> large corporations and banks. Ask anyone in the IT industry.
> The recent
> Bpay scam illustrates this.

This is a perpetuation of the media-bashed misconception that credit card transactions on the net are more dangerous. It’s just plain wrong. Ask anyone whose had their card skimmed at an ATM, or at a restaurant.

Fact 1. There is no documented example of a credit card number being stolen in transit across the net. EG as it travels between a customer and the site they are shopping from. It is technically and logistically nigh on impossible (although there is a rumour the CIA has capable technology installed in some ISPs in the USA because of 9/11). Apart from anything else, presuming the web site uses standard SSL secure technology (and I wouldn’t shop if it didn’t) you’d need a super computer to break the encryption (one presumes the CIA has access to such a beast).

Fact 2. A high proportion of fraud is perpetrated as a result of card numbers being stolen offline, then used to purchase online. Russian mafia are big on this apparently.

Fact 3. A high proportion of fraud occurs as a result of either a) an employee of a business stealing the information from the business; or b) a hacker breaking an insecure system to steal card numbers. Ergo, irrelevant re online. Just bad management by the company.

Fact 4. The PayPal fraud (and others targeting things like Westpac’s online banking customers) don’t have anything to do with credit cards per se, they rely on conning the gullable and mis-informed to hand over login details to enable the naughty people to access bank accounts etc. This is about education. Which is not helped by a hysterical media who lock onto any instance of fraud, yet ignore the literally billions of transactions which occur everyday without incident.

Fact 5. Yes, some shopping sites have experienced levels of credit card fraud perpetuated by naughty customers. So does every bricks and mortar shop. And with the introduction of significantly enhanced security preautions and check systems by companies such as Visa and Mastercard, the world continues to battle crime. Just like we do car theft. Reputable card transaction providers such as WorldPay (who we use for our UK site) go to enormous lengths to protect their merchants.

Fact 6. Taking into account 1 – 5, shopping online with a reputable company, such as Amazon, ABC Online (or dare I say, Arts Hub) is probably safer than handing over your credit card in your local restaurant. I shop online constantly, and have done so for years. The only time I’ve had a problem with a credit card was offline – a waiter in a restaurant in St Kilda skimmed my Amex and spent $1,200 on a surf board.

Fact 7. At Arts Hub we’ve conducted more than 10,000 online credit card transactions in the last 24 months. We’ve had one case of fraud perpetuated against us. A 12 year old girl who ‘borrowed’ her aunty’s card, in her enthusiasm to research an arts project.

Marketing on the net is not new. It’s just another distribution channel, with its own particular characteristics, like any other channel.