The DMA Announces Support For Spam Legislation
SAN FRANCISCO, October 20, 2002 – The Direct Marketing Association (The DMA) announced today that it would pursue legislation as the latest tactic in the battle against the rising volume of spam inundating consumers’ e-mailboxes.
Today’s action is another proactive step by The DMA to control the growth of spam, which hurts consumers and legitimate marketers alike. Earlier this year, The DMA promulgated groundbreaking online marketing guidelines to assist consumers in identifying legitimate commercial e-mail from spam and promote higher ethical standards among marketers.
"The need to stop the growth of spam from cluttering up consumers’ mailboxes must be a priority if we are to preserve the promise of e-mail as the next great marketing channel," said H. Robert Wientzen, president & CEO, The DMA. "Without a solution that includes legislation, legitimate marketers who use e-mail to communicate with consumers will continue to suffer at the hands of spammers."
"Spam must be stopped, and we will take every step necessary to ensure that e-mail is not lost as a marketing channel to the likes of Nigerian widows and unseemly and illegitimate come-ons," said Wientzen.
Over the next few weeks and months, The DMA will pursue its agenda to preserve e-mail as a marketing channel by supporting legislative efforts to control the growth of spam at the state and federal level. The DMA will also continue to provide consumer education, industry best practices as well as technological solutions to spam so that industry self-regulation continues to be one of the pillars on which the success of e-mail will be supported.
The DMA is the leading trade association for businesses interested in interactive and database marketing, with nearly 4,700 member companies from the United States and 53 other nations. Founded in 1917, its members include direct marketers from every business segment as well as the nonprofit and electronic marketing sectors. Included are catalogers, Internet retailers and service providers, financial services providers, book and magazine publishers, book and music clubs, retail stores, industrial manufacturers and a host of other vertical segments, including the service industries that support them. According to a DMA-commissioned study, direct and interactive marketing sales in the United States is projected to surpass $2 trillion in 2002, including $125 billion in catalog sales and $33 billion in sales generated by the Internet. The DMA's Web site is
www.the-dma.org, and its consumer Web site is www.shopthenet.org.
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