Comments:

Re: CAN-SPAM Act Rulemaking, Project No. R411008 To the Commissioners, I agree spam has become a problem and support the Commission in its efforts to eradicate it. However, I am strongly opposed to the introduction of suppression lists. Contrary to the image email marketing has, thanks in most part to the irresponsible actions of a handful of thoughtless spammers, most of us are legitimate entities who vigorously promote responsible, legal and ethical email practices. I know that I speak for a great many of my colleagues when I say that the introduction of suppression lists are not the answer to this problem and stands to harm an industry we are trying very hard to improve from the inside. The outcome of this measure will be that spammers, who have shown already they have little respect for anti-spamming legislation, will continue to spam while legitimate email marketers will lose income and subscribers will have less opportunity to receive informative and helpful information. While the overall number of emails may be reduced, the proportionality of spam will actually increase. I urge the Commission to keep in mind the primary objective of any attempts to control the problem of spam should not be to reduce the outright number of emails received every day but to reduce the number of spam received every day. As a responsible and legitimate marketer, I have spent literally tens of thousands of dollars building a 2004 Can-Spam compliant opt-in mailing list through ONLY legal and ethical practices. The damage to me financially will be severe (as I've not yet recouped my investment) and a poor response to my efforts to practice and promote legal email practices. While on the other hand, the email addresses used by spammers have usually been illegally harvested with software at little to no cost. Finally and in summary, I believe the major accomplishments of the introduction of suppression lists will be to endanger the livelihood of legitimate marketers, despite their history of vigorous support of responsible email marketing, while doing little to discourage nor penalize the main core of spam marketers. I very strongly voice my opposition to the introduction of suppression lists. With Regards, Murray Hughes B. Sc. Shizuoka, Japan.