Kudos to the Daily Show’s Rob Corddry (pronounced Cordrey) for his deft segment in which he interviews notorious U.S. spammer Scott Richter.
For those of you unfamiliar with Scott Richter and his history, he is, among other things, a self-described Spam King who has been around, as a font of spam, for many years. He also considers himself a legitimate businessman, which in a very limited viewing may be true, as he is also the original owner of Great Scott’s Eatery, a small chain of restaurants in the Denver, Colorado area.
In this clip on Comedy Central from Corddry’s interview with Richter, they say that “Rob Corddry investigates the case of spammer Scott Richter, who is being terrorized by anti-spammer terrorist groups and “wildcat” Colorado State Senator Joan Fitz-Gerald,” so you can see already in what direction the interview goes.
Speaking of interviews, we have our own, exclusive interview with Scott Richter, which, in addition to the main article, has dozens of interesting and entertaining follow-up comments, including by Mr. Richter, answering questions that have been put to him.
Much of the discussion revolves around our Federal anti-spam law, CAN-SPAM, and whether complying with CAN-SPAM is sufficient to keep the commercial email that organizations send to you from being labeled as spam. The general consensus among most of the email industry, and consumers is that it isn’t.
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The generally accepted definition of spam (which our Anne P. Mitchell, attorney at law, helped to write) is as follows:
“An electronic message is “spam” IF:
(1) the recipient’s personal identity and context are
irrelevant because the message is equally applicable to many other potential recipients;
AND (2) the recipient has not verifiably granted deliberate, explicit, and still-revocable
permission for it to be sent; AND (3) the transmission and reception of the message
appears to the recipient to give a disproportionate benefit to the sender.”
If you receive email that meets the above definition (and these days who doesn’t?) and would like to learn how to report the spammer to their Internet providers, see our article on how to deal with and report spam and spammers.
Although we of course don’t condone the offering online of proprietary content, we have it on good authority that .mov and .wmv files of the full show in which Rob Corddry interviewed Mr. Richter can be readily found on the Internet via a search of ” ‘Daily Show’ Scott Richter”. Perhaps you know someone who recorded it who might share it with you. However you obtain it – do so, and be prepared to laugh until you cry.
The Internet Patrol is completely free, and reader-supported. Your tips via CashApp, Venmo, or Paypal are appreciated! Receipts will come from ISIPP.