| Comment Number: | OL-103555 |
| Received: | 11/28/2004 12:25:45 PM |
| Organization: | |
| Commenter: | Alan Rateliff, II |
| State: | FL |
| Subject: | Trade Regulation Rule on Telemarketing Sales |
| Title: | Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Request for Comment |
| CFR Citation: | 16 CFR Part 310 |
| No Attachments |
Comments:
When I signed up for the DNC, it was because I did not want ANY telemarketers pestering me. If I am looking for a specific product or service, I am capable of performing my own research, or having someone perform it on my behalf. Then when I have selected a product, *I* will solicit the vendor(s). To be quite honest, the exclusion of non-profits, religious and political organizations is rather irksome. I pay for my phone line to be able to communicate with those whom I choose. Just as in a social situation, I only accept interaction with unknown people with whom I may have a personal interest. I do not accept commercial, political, or religious solicitations outside of my home, and I do not appreciate them inside of my home. I accept the fact that my newspaper, television, radio, and even my web browsing experience is slighted by commercial advertisements. I also accept that I have ways to avoid these interruptions -- mainly I have reduced my newspaper, television, and radio consumption to a bare minimum. A telephone ringing is far more intrusive than a passive medium (though Internet is more of an active medium) -- much the same as a knock at the door; both require that I stop what I am doing to decide if I want to interact with the person calling. I do not understand why there is such a big fuss over the DNC registry. We are now providing a list of people with whom telemarketers will be wasting their time by calling. This should help them narrow their targets down to those that may actually respond positively to their proposals. Telemarketers that call and waste my time find that I waste their time just as equally in whatever way I can. If I keep one on the phone for 30 minutes to result in no sale, that is 30 minutes wasted when the caller could have spent that time making two other customers. (Many times I will just lay my phone down on the desk and let the caller ramble on.) Bottom line, I do no want any of these calls. I am also adament that the cost of such a system not be levied upon the end customer. It is these companies in the business of recruiting my patronage, and therefore absorbtion of such costs should be that company's responsibility. I do not want their "free speech" (a truly garbage argument) exercised within my home. It is bad enough that I cannot even walk through a WalMart without having commercials blared into my skull, but I accept that now I am in their space, and I also choose not to frequent that space as much as before. I believe a lot of our problems is the definition of our personal space. My home is my personal space, even if the phone I use connects to a "public" network. My cellular phone, which I carry on my person at all times, is also part of my personal space. My email account, though the account itself may reside outside of my personal space, is USED wiithin the confines of my personal space. Therefore, none of the three methods of advertising mentioned are outside of the scope of my personal space, and therefore within the scope of limitations within my privacy.