Comments:

Re: CAN-SPAM Act Rulemaking, Project No. R411008 To the Commissioners, I am adding my own comments to those below. I am very much in favor of curbing unsolicited bulk email, and I appreciate how tough a job it is to deal with this issue. However, the way I understand some of the proposed regulations, it would require me as a small business person to keep track an impossible number of details due to affiliate programs that I, and my business colleagues, are mutually involved with. We all know that business relies a lot on word-of-mouth marketing,. Affiliate programs from reliable person to reliable person are one of the best ways to help consumers both get what they are looking for, and avoid falling into internet scams or email harvesting schemes. And, for a small business person like myself, I depend on people who trust me letting people know about my business, as any business does. Requiring me and my friends and affiliates to keep track of every single opt-out would place such an unnecessarily undue burden on myself and my colleagues, and severely affect our businesses, leaving each business person essentially operating in a void, without the warmth and support of connection and community which is so vital to a healthy economy. I ask you to continue doing what you are doing now- to consider this issue very carefully, and see that in the effort to curb unscrupulous people, you don't end up hurting those of us who are for a large part responsible for the health of the economy. The comments below, while from a form letter, are ones I wholly agree with. my best wishes to you, Mark Silver www.heartofbusiness.com I applaud your efforts to curb the problem of unsolicited bulk email. However, I am concerned about the proposed requirement for merchants to maintain suppression lists. There are so many problems and costs associated with this idea, and so much damage done to consumers and businesses alike, that I feel I must urge you to consider this matter most carefully. Requirement of the use of suppression lists will seriously damage many of the legitimate publications available on the net. My specific concern is for harm to publishers who require permission from the consumer prior to adding them to any list. They're not who CAN-SPAM was designed to put out of business, but this requirement will very likely have that effect. There's also the potential for significant harm to consumers, because of the problem of properly knowing their intent when they unsubscribe from a list. On top of that, these suppression lists could easily fall into the hands of spammers, leading to more spam instead of less. I was quite surprised at the potential problems this ruling could involve, and urge you in the strongest possible terms to reconsider its implementation in light of these problems, Respectfully, Mark Silver Portland, Oregon, USA