Re: Anyone else get TXT Message Spam from Cingular lately?

Mary wrote:
> Remember also that you have business relationship with Cingular and
> that they have a right to contact you with sales pitches UNTIL you say
> no.

One of the following is true:

1. One day I woke up, tripped over my slippers, and went tumbling into the
Do Not Call List. There's no way out, I'm trapped forever.
2. I went out of my way to find out about the Do Not Call List, made a
special effort to contact the list, and deliberately entered my phone
number, in order to tell telemarketers not to contact me by phone.

If the first is true, you may have a valid point. If the second is true,
then anyone who telemarkets to me by phone is going out of his way to
countermand my wishes. Whether that entity has a right to do so is
irrelevant.

You sound like someone who thinks it's okay to walk up and start beating
another person until and unless they say "uncle". You could make a really
good living walking up to private conversations and giving those involved
a good sales pitch in the middle of their chat.

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Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote in
news:8q7bc4-7pg.ln1@remote.clifto.com:

> Mary wrote:
>> Remember also that you have business relationship with Cingular and
>> that they have a right to contact you with sales pitches UNTIL you
>> say no.
>
> One of the following is true:
>
> 1. One day I woke up, tripped over my slippers, and went tumbling into
> the Do Not Call List. There's no way out, I'm trapped forever.
> 2. I went out of my way to find out about the Do Not Call List, made a
> special effort to contact the list, and deliberately entered my phone
> number, in order to tell telemarketers not to contact me by phone.
>
> If the first is true, you may have a valid point. If the second is
> true, then anyone who telemarkets to me by phone is going out of his
> way to countermand my wishes. Whether that entity has a right to do so
> is irrelevant.
>

Except that the law was not written that way. Your intended outcome would
not supercede the regulation. The law allows exceptions- the do-not-call
list is not the end all, be all that many people wrongly think it is.

Scott wrote:
> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Whether that entity has a right to do so
>> is irrelevant.
>
> Except that the law was not written that way. Your intended outcome would
> not supercede the regulation. The law allows exceptions- the do-not-call
> list is not the end all, be all that many people wrongly think it is.

You may have missed my last sentence.

The fact that I am able to fart loudly in church, and probably not even
get kicked out for it, doesn't mean it's not excessively annoying and
downright rude. The same goes for the telesleaze.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote in
news:l8qbc4-rgi.ln1@remote.clifto.com:

> Scott wrote:
>> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Whether that entity has a right to do so
>>> is irrelevant.
>>
>> Except that the law was not written that way. Your intended outcome
>> would not supercede the regulation. The law allows exceptions- the
>> do-not-call list is not the end all, be all that many people wrongly
>> think it is.
>
> You may have missed my last sentence.
>
> The fact that I am able to fart loudly in church, and probably not
> even get kicked out for it, doesn't mean it's not excessively annoying
> and downright rude. The same goes for the telesleaze.
>

Understood, but legislating annoying and rude behavior would require
another new arm of the government to handle the volume.

Mary wrote:
> Did you flunk reading comprehension in school.

All right, since you can't comprehend what I wrote, we'll settle on the
ad-hominems instead. Unlike you, I do remember the rules of punctuation
they taught me in second grade, and third grade, and fourth grade, and
fifth grade, and sixth grade, and so on for many years. Specifically,
I remember the rule that says that one punctuates a question with a
question mark.

Just a little reminder to go back and actually pass second grade.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

<karlkrandall@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message
news:lgk3v2pigvo1kht5f86gvni2g0jbl1mfek@4ax.com...
> Particularly annoying since my account shows as having txt messaging
> turned off.
>
> Received this spam today suggesting I go to cingular.com/msg

Mine has some "wappush" (text spam) buried in the message and it is from
some Yahoo! ad ingrate. The words Cingular appear so you thinik it from
them, but it isn't on mine. If you click to find out or to unsubscribe, it
calls the ingrate and then you get free phone text spam you pay for life.
Don't reply to the message if you see wappush. You've been warned!

B~

Scott wrote:
> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Scott wrote:
>>> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Whether that entity has a right to do so
>>>> is irrelevant.
>>>
>>> Except that the law was not written that way. Your intended outcome
>>> would not supercede the regulation. The law allows exceptions- the
>>> do-not-call list is not the end all, be all that many people wrongly
>>> think it is.
>>
>> You may have missed my last sentence.
>>
>> The fact that I am able to fart loudly in church, and probably not
>> even get kicked out for it, doesn't mean it's not excessively annoying
>> and downright rude. The same goes for the telesleaze.
>
> Understood, but legislating annoying and rude behavior would require
> another new arm of the government to handle the volume.

While they were writing the TCPA, they had to go out of their way to
include language exempting bozos from the rules. They put deliberation
and hard work into giving them permission to abuse their relationships
with their customers. This is not a case of needing special legislation
to make them conform to the rules, which your comment might address,
but one of going out of their way to please the telesleaze operations.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote in
news:b0fec4-05e.ln1@remote.clifto.com:

> Scott wrote:
>> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Scott wrote:
>>>> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> Whether that entity has a right to do so
>>>>> is irrelevant.
>>>>
>>>> Except that the law was not written that way. Your intended
>>>> outcome would not supercede the regulation. The law allows
>>>> exceptions- the do-not-call list is not the end all, be all that
>>>> many people wrongly think it is.
>>>
>>> You may have missed my last sentence.
>>>
>>> The fact that I am able to fart loudly in church, and probably not
>>> even get kicked out for it, doesn't mean it's not excessively
>>> annoying and downright rude. The same goes for the telesleaze.
>>
>> Understood, but legislating annoying and rude behavior would require
>> another new arm of the government to handle the volume.
>
> While they were writing the TCPA, they had to go out of their way to
> include language exempting bozos from the rules. They put deliberation
> and hard work into giving them permission to abuse their relationships
> with their customers. This is not a case of needing special
> legislation to make them conform to the rules, which your comment
> might address, but one of going out of their way to please the
> telesleaze operations.
>

Again understood, but I don't see how the "Telesleaze operators" were
pleased by this. There are only a few exceptions to the DNC:

- non-profit organizations
- political calls (you don't actually expect them to cut off their own
noses, do you?) - companies with which you have had a working business
relationship in the last ? years (I don't remember the timeframe)

Most companies (Cingular included) do give you the ability to opt-out of
scenario three, which is interestingly enough the only exception that
you can opt to exclude. Personally, I find the "public service calls"
from G Dubya and Babs Streisand around election time to be much more
obnoxious and intrusive, and yet I can't tell them not to call.

I fail to see where the telemarketers were given any slack. If you're
getting calls from someone who doesn't meet one of the exclusions above,
reprt them to the FCC. There were some big and well publicized fines
handed out when the national DNC was first instituted. As time went on,
people stopped reporting telemarketers as much.

I have yet to get any calls from anyone but the local ARC store and a
ton of politicians at election time (and I've been on the list since its
inception). I don't get any calls from any of my service providers
because I did request them to take me off thier calling lists. I
haven't had to tell anyone twice.

Does this 'spam' look something like what is described in this thread: Ad From 40040200 - CngFreeIdolMsg

Scott wrote:
> There are only a few exceptions to the DNC:
>
> - non-profit organizations
> - political calls (you don't actually expect them to cut off their own
> noses, do you?) - companies with which you have had a working business
> relationship in the last ? years (I don't remember the timeframe)
>
> Most companies (Cingular included) do give you the ability to opt-out of
> scenario three, which is interestingly enough the only exception that
> you can opt to exclude.

I believe that's required by law. I do NOT believe they'd do it if it
wasn't required by law. A lot of these companies will NOT do so if you
use the wrong language, e.g. "take me off your list", "quit calling me";
holding exactly to the letter of the law, they will blast you with
calls until you precisely ask to be put *onto* their do-not-call list.

> Personally, I find the "public service calls"
> from G Dubya and Babs Streisand around election time to be much more
> obnoxious and intrusive, and yet I can't tell them not to call.

I agree this is a travesty. I have resolved to vote against any
candidate for any office who spams my phone, regardless of how much
I might have wanted that person in office. So far I have done that.

> I fail to see where the telemarketers were given any slack. If you're
> getting calls from someone who doesn't meet one of the exclusions above,
> reprt them to the FCC.

The few who've called me without legal permission were very, very good
at hiding the origins of their calls. Believe me, if I thought I had
enough on any one of them to take them into small claims court, I'd
be there in a flash for my $500.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

John Navas wrote:
> clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>While they were writing the TCPA, they had to go out of their way to
>>include language exempting bozos from the rules. They put deliberation
>>and hard work into giving them permission to abuse their relationships
>>with their customers. This is not a case of needing special legislation
>>to make them conform to the rules, which your comment might address,
>>but one of going out of their way to please the telesleaze operations.
>
> I disagree -- the TCPA is reasonable and balanced.

It's heavily weighted against the person who does not want to receive
calls. It was deliberately made so by the efforts of the Direct
Marketing Association and others.

"Reasonable" would be "call me only if you have permission, or your
call is urgent to me." Unreasonable is "my phone is every bozo's
dedicated advertising medium." TCPA enacted the latter into law.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>

John Navas wrote:
> Me too. And now I've cut the landline cord, which has dropped my
> telemarketing calls to zero, yet another reason to do that.

There's something very comforting about 48 volts on a twisted pair,
especially when disaster strikes and cell networks are all but unusable.

--
Martians drive SUVs! <http://oregonmag.com/MarsWarm307.html>