With all the hoopla about “Do Not Call” lists, spam email legislation and messenger popup window advertising has anyone taken the time to compare it to the tons and tons of “Resident” junk mail that ends up in your mailbox at home daily?

Thinking that I represent the norm when it comes to junk mail I decided to create a little study of my own that compares all of the direct advertising methods that have come under close scrutiny as of late along with the “accepted” methods. Compared in this study are the following items: Junk Mail, Spam Email, Telemarketing Calls, Fax Advertising, and Messenger Popup Ads.

Qualifiers:
Junk Mail: Addressed to Current Resident, Resident, Neighbor or Other Generic Terms that were not requested in anyway for the sole purpose of selling a service or product.

Spam: Email delivered to a personal email address that was not requested in any way for the sole purpose of selling a service or product.

Telemarketing: Calls from any sources that were not requested in any way for the sole purpose of selling a service or product.

Fax: Faxes delivered from any sources that were not requested in any way for the sole purpose of selling a service or product.

Popups: Messenger ads that appeared on one specific PC that were not requested in any way for the sole purpose of selling a service or product.

General:
Time Frame: Month of August 2003
Phone: One personal phone line
Fax: One personal fax line
PC: One personal computer
Email: One personal email address
Mail: One personal address

General Statistics:
Junk Mail: 72 units, 3.4 pounds of paper
Spam Email: 114 emails, 11 real headers, 103 masked or modified headers
Telemarketing: 4 calls, 3 automated, 1 live human.
Faxes: 3 faxes
Popups: 6 Messenger ads

Beneficiaries:
Junk Mail: USPS (postage revenue), Direct Mail Service Providers (ad revenue), and/or Advertiser (sale of product or service)

Spam Email: Spammer (per mailing or commission revenue), Advertiser (sale of product or service)

Telemarketing: Telemarketing Service (per contact or commission revenue), Advertiser (sale of product or service), Phone Company (line usage/toll revenue)

Faxes: Faxing Service (per contact or commission revenue), Advertiser (sale of product or service), Phone Company (line usage/toll revenue)

Popups: Popup Provider Service (per contact or commission revenue), Advertiser (sale of product or service)

Drawbacks:
Junk Mail: Increased load on USPS carriers which in turn reduces the number of addresses that can be serviced per carrier per day as well as handling within the post offices themselves. Increased load on garbage handling companies by 3.4 pounds per household per month, increased landfill usage, increased use of paper products as well as processing energy costs associated with recycling if recycling has been used.

Spam Email: Increased use of bandwidth on the internet. Email mailbox sizes over quota or requiring size increases. Productivity losses at work and home sorting spam emails out.

Telemarketing: Calls are heavy during times when they know you are at home. Dinner time being of primary interest to telemarketers.

Faxes: Increased use of paper products, ink and wear and tear on fax equipment.

Popups: Seriously annoying system that slows productivity.

Conclusion:
With all these forms of direct advertising pounding and permeating our very being on a minute by minute basis the very best way to handle it is to make them all “Opt In” and “Opt Out” in the same way that a responsible online service handles its marketing and newsletters. Federal and State intervention should be limited or not applicable. There is no solid reason for our tax dollars to be spent to prevent telemarketing calls, faxes, and spam email when the same does not apply to bulk mailings that inundate your home mailbox daily. Making junk mail “opt out” as the default setting for all residences will of course have a very serious economic impact on bulk mailing companies and the USPS revenues but it will also have a significant positive impact on our landfills, energy use and deforestation.

While businesses need means to advertise their products and services we also have to control it in a manner that is fiscally and environmentally responsible and friendly.

So the next time that someone sends you a spam email, makes a sales call to you during dinner, or runs you out of ink in your fax machine think about how that small inconvenience compares to the negative environmental impact that hits your mailbox each and every mail delivery day. At 3.4 pounds per month per household and 106,261,000 occupied households nationally (per http://www.census.gov) we are creating 361,287,400 pounds of landfill monthly. And at 30 pounds per trash can at the curb that works out to 12,049,913 trash cans. That works out to be 24,085,827 feet of trash cans in a row. That’s 4562 miles of trashcans that when placed in a row would wrap the moon over two times.

I don’t know about you but that is a lot of trash in my book!

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