Randy: AOL and Yahoo raised a ruckus when they announced their plans to fight spam by charging mass-mailers half a penny per message for guaranteed delivery to AOL and Yahoo customers. Non-profits, politicos and other mass-mailing orgs threw aside their differences in unified opposition.

Phillip Raymond, CEO of Vanquish, Inc., thinks charging for spam makes sense, but only spammers should have to pay, and the money should go to the recipients. Under his plan, senders would post a 5-cent bond per email. If the recipient accepts the email, the nickel goes back to the sender. Or, the recipient can reject the email and keep the nickel. Vanquish software running on the respective ISP’s email servers oversees everything.

Raymond plans to unveil the plan at the annual antispam conference on March 28 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Opposition to the Yahoo/AOL plan stems from sender organizations’ inability to afford the extra cost. Though the Vanquish system promises to return the nickel for each email that’s accepted. the plan calls for an initial investment 5 or 10 times larger than the AOL/Yahoo per message cost.

Will organizations opposing AOL/Yahoo have the up-front cash, or the willingness to part with it, in the hope they’ll get it back?

Will e-pubs who charge for advertising based on circulation be willing to risk having their actual readership known?

Will we see folks trying to get spammed so they can make a nickel each rejecting them? After all, it would be easier than collecting bottles and cans.

Email Battles Backgrounder:

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