> Do I:
>
YOu have pointed out a key several times, but seemingly missed it.
These people are amatuers and newbies to the web. Quite possibly they are
doing this whole thing themselves from a "web foe dummies" book. Almost
certainly they got the idea of a web site from some customer suggesting that
they should have one; they probably never actually USED the web themselves.
Amazing as it may seem to most of us, there are still A LOT of people that
don't use the web, and don't even use email. I know a dozen or so
personally. These people will have at best a second-hand knowlwdge of the
concept of spam, and not have the slightest idea how annoying it is.
The solution here is not ire, it is education. Go to the place, get your
hair cut, observe that they did a good job for a reasonable price, and
perhaps suggest (AFTER the haircut, so YOU don't get upset while having your
hair cut) that you might be able to help them understand the web better.
Maybe they will take you up on that, maybe not.
If they have some time before the next customer you can certainly explain
about how to get people off mailing lists, and why you should, and such
like. Just remember, and keep telling yourself, that these people aren't
completely deliberately obtuse - they simply have no clue what you are
talking about, so you will have to walk them through the process slowly, a
step at a time, and NOT EXPECT them to get it on the first attempt.
Now, besides all that, you DO have "an established business relationship"
with them, so they were within their rights sending you stuff the first
time. Of course it should have had an opt-out link which would have worked.
But they are newbies, and honestly DIDN'T KNOW that. Thsy probably don't
understand "opt out", nor why it is so important. Again, education, not
ire, is the solution.
As for the screwup after talking with them and their promising to "do
something" about it: They *did* "do something" about it. It just wan't the
right thing. This was probably from ignorance rather than malfeasance on
their part. Here you can help them by explaining how all this should be
done. You could even suggest that you would be happy to HELP THEM get their
stuff working right. This might cost you 3-4 hours work at some point. But
you are helping *yourself*, by making sure you won't get spam from them
again. And you are fighting spam for others, since others that want to out
put will have an effective solution.
Make sense?
Loren
