Hundreds of unsuspecting AT&T wireless subscribers in April protested when spam trickled from their PCs to cellular phones.
AT&T customers with cellphones equipped for text messages became irate when they assumed the three loud beeps made by their cellphones was to alert them of a family emergency -- not a promotion for cellphone accessories.
"I got three beeps, and it said 'text message,'" said Robb Watters, a lobbyist for the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE). "I thought it was my office looking for me and it was an ad for new products.
"It was intrusive, unwelcome, and unwanted."
One state representative was so ticked by the wireless email ad that he is calling for the permanent ban on cellphone spam.
Although members of the wireless industry say advertising in the wireless future is inevitable and will help subsidize cellphone use, Representative Rush Holt (D-New Jersey) is currently drafting a bill similar to a law prohibiting unsolicited junk mail on fax machines.
Folks who break the anti-junk mail fax law can be slapped with a $500 fine for each piece of unsolicited mail.
"A cellphone is something personal and the last thing you want is inconvenience and solicitations," said Holt spokesman Steve Maviglio. "They (advertisers have) got your mailbox, they've got your email account. They can stay away from your phone."
Still, even if cellphone ads are annoying, they may someday subsidize the time you spend yakking on your cellphone.
Rudy Temiz, CEO of Plugout.com, predicts stores will someday employ Bluetooth -- or short radio link -- appliances to send ads to nearby cell phones. He expressed surprise at Holt's letter asking the company to "immediately suspend this telemarketing practice."
"First of all, the phones don't ring," Temiz said. "Even in the subject line we put 'adv: for plugout.com.' We didn't want to make it look like it was an urgent message you had to read.
"Definitely in the near future carriers will end up selling that type of advertising and that will drop rates of cellular phone users. I don't think anyone minds getting their rates dropped."
AT&T Wireless spokesman Ritch Blasi said his company has increased the number of filters for its wireless service to combat spam. He said the company did not have a contract or business partnership with Plugout.com.
"This is something the industry is trying to control on the wireless side and wired-line side," he said. "Whether you want to legislate everything, that might not be the perfect solution. It might work, but it's too soon to tell."
This isn't Holt's first campaign to combat spam. He was the lead co-sponsor of the "Can Spam Act," which would fine email spammers up to $50,000 for sending unsolicited junk mail illegally. Provisions of this bill made it to a more comprehensive measure authored by Representative Heather Wilson (R-New Mexico), the Unsolicited Commercial Electronic Mail Act of 1999.
The bill, expected to pass the House of Representatives on Wednesday, mandates the accurate return address be posted on unsolicited commercial email and makes it illegal for spammers to continue sending unsolicited junk mail after they've been warned by irked recipients or Internet service providers.
