Comments:

Re: CAN-SPAM Act Rulemaking, Project No. R411008<p> To the Commissioners,<p> Thank you for your efforts to curb the problem of unsolicited bulk email. We do help. <p> But, I am concerned about some issues. <p> 1) The proposed requirement for merchants to mainta<p>in suppression lists. <p> 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. <p> Requirement of the use of suppression lists will seriously damage many of the legitimate publications available on the net. It would create a never-ending loop of information and follow-up that would be impossible to implement. <p> Frankly, your rules are really harsh and excessive for legitimate newsletters and publications. And small entities really couldn't afford to survive in this environment. Do you really want to kill small business? <p> 2) Your issue about 10 days to opt-out? <p> Most decent lists have automated tools that let the member opt-out by simply clicking on a link. All my lists do. So the opt-out is instantenous. However, many subscribers are too lazy to click. They insist on sending an e-mail that gets lost in my spam. And they often don't tell me what address they subsribed under - nor do they remember. And since they are having their e-mail forwarded, they don't know the original address they used to subscribe. So without getting another issue, I have no way of knowing who to unsubscribe. That might take another week or two. CAN-SPAM wasn't intended shut small businesses down, but the way you've structured your proposed regulations will effectively do that. 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, Please, before passing this law - try running an informative newsletter to your friends, team-members or staff for just one month and see what happens. Respectfully, Eva Rosenberg TaxMama.com California, USA