{"id":1342,"date":"2002-01-22T15:24:27","date_gmt":"2002-01-22T20:24:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=1342"},"modified":"2002-01-22T15:24:27","modified_gmt":"2002-01-22T20:24:27","slug":"wow_a_federal_i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/01\/22\/wow_a_federal_i.html","title":{"rendered":"Wow — a federal initiative that makes business unhappy?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Echoing the efforts of many states, the FTC is proposing setting up a national no-call list<\/a> where people could register to keep telemarketers from calling them, with violators liable to $11K fines per pop.<\/p>\n

The Direct Marketing Association (a\/k\/a the Evil Overlords of the Telemarketing Demon Realm) claims this will restrict free speech (nonsense, since private individuals are simply able to opt out; the government is restricting nobody’s speech), and will cause grievous harm to an industry that employs 6 million people (!) and generates $668 billion (!!) of revenue nationwide every year.<\/p>\n

(I note that works out to about $110,000 per employee — wanna bet that’s not what the average hapless sweatshop caller actually makes? The other fallacy of this latter argument is that it assumes that consumers will simply not buy anything if they aren’t called, which is a goofy assumption. Either they will still spend just as much, only through other avenues, or telemarketing calls are somehow coercing people to buy more than they really want to.)<\/p>\n

The regulations would not apply to banking and telecommunications calls (since those fall under other federal departments’ control), nor to political groups or non-profits. Annoyingly enough, intrastate calls would also not be covered (since, arguably, the FTC only covers interstate calls), which means that all those state laws would still be necessary.<\/p>\n

(By the by, did you know that current FTC regulations prevent telemarketers from calling before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m., and require them to honor consumer requests not be called back? Neither did I.)<\/p>\n

Bill Barrol has his own commentary<\/a> on the proposed regulation:<\/p>\n

I suppose it’s a good idea, considering that my proposal will probably never fly: outfitting every phone in America with technology to send a debilitating electrical shock back down the line, fusing the auto-dialing machine and sending the caller into convulsions, followed by the immediate dispatch of Ninja-trained rabid howler monkeys to attack the telemarketers’ still-twitching bodies, plucking the eyes from their sockets and garroting them with lengths of cayenne-rubbed monofilament.<\/p>\n

Now there’s<\/i> a proposal I could get behind, if the FTC one gets quashed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Echoing the efforts of many states, the FTC is proposing setting up a national no-call list where people could register to keep telemarketers from calling them, with violators liable to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hi-tech"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":550,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2001\/09\/21\/i_missed_it.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":0},"title":"I missed it","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 21-Sep-01 6:09pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm actually sorry I missed Bush's speech last night. Evidently it was -- well, not spectacular, but a lot better of a speech than most people thought him capable of....","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":43581,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/07\/15\/license-plates-and-free-speech.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":1},"title":"License plates and free speech","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 15-Jul-14 9:47am","format":false,"excerpt":"Interesting (split) ruling from the 5th Circuit, confirming the idea that license plates with messages, symbols, etc., are personal speech by the person displaying them\u00a0(not state speech by the government issuing them), and therefore Texas cannot block\u00a0license plates by the Sons of Confederate Veterans, including the Confederate flag.Aside from the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":32265,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/01\/21\/i-have-a-dream-of-big-media.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":2},"title":"I Have a Dream … of Big Media","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 21-Jan-13 10:09pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A great example of copyright gone wrong. And, yes, the monies go to the King Foundation, presumably a worthy cause, but ...I would not, by the bye, call this censorship, which implies a legal suppression\u00a0of material for moral or political reasons. Rather, it's simply theft from the public domain --\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":42375,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/06\/06\/money-as-speech.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":3},"title":"Money as speech","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 6-Jun-14 9:17am","format":false,"excerpt":"A fine question. If I walk up to a woman on the street and talk her into having sex with me, that's considered harmless (except for what harm Margie would do to me when she found out). If I walk up to a woman on the street and pay her\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":26850,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/03\/05\/the-aclu-on-holders-targeted-killing-program-speech.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":4},"title":"The ACLU on Holder's "Targeted Killing Program" speech","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 5-Mar-12 3:51pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Money graf: \"Few things are as dangerous to American liberty as the proposition that the government should be able to kill citizens anywhere in the world on the basis of legal standards and evidence that are never submitted to a court, either before or after the fact. Anyone willing to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5167,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/10\/22\/technical_diffi.html","url_meta":{"origin":1342,"position":5},"title":"Technical Difficulties (update)","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 22-Oct-03 6:54am","format":false,"excerpt":"Here's some discussion of the DoS attack on HM, and who was affected, who was behind the attack, including some chortling over it (be sure and check the charming subject...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1342"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1342\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}