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February 6, 2004
Spam mailing ethics addressed
Judaic principles can be used as a guide in modern business practises.
RABBI DR. ASHER MEIR SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
Targeted mailings are a legitimate selling technique according
to the principles of Judaism. But these mailings turn into unethical
harassment when no effort is made to target individuals who would
be expected to have some interest in learning about your product,
or if the message is misleading or sent in an illegal fashion.
Should someone take advantage of making a pitch through a "spam"
mailing to millions of individuals? In principle, Jewish tradition
does not frown on promotion. It is legitimate for sellers to try
and make their products known to potential buyers and to inform
buyers of the benefits of their wares. For example, the Mishnah
(at the end of fourth chapter of Bava Metzia) states that a storeowner
is allowed to give free gifts to buyers in order to induce them
to come to his store. And our ancient sages took special steps to
encourage door-to-door salesmen who sold important products, such
as cosmetics, which were not available in stores. (Bava Batra 22a)
However, we must take care that selling doesn't turn into harassment.
We can learn this principle from two laws of commerce that relate
to buyers and applying them to sellers as well.
The Mishnah states that a buyer shouldn't waste the time of a seller
by feigning interest in a purchase. (Bava Metzia) This is considered
a violation of the Torah prohibition of causing gratuitous torment
to others. The sellers devote their energy to the customer believing
they are being given a fair chance to make a sale; if in fact the
"customer" has no interest, then the sellers are being
imposed upon. Customers should take the time of a seller only if
they have at least some minimal interest in buying.
By the same token, a seller shouldn't waste the customer's time
by an offering when there is no particular basis for thinking that
the customer might be interested. There should be some rational
basis for assuming that the e-mail (or junk mail) recipients may
have some interest in your product or service. Otherwise, you are
imposing on the recipient.
There is another, complementary law that provides a complementary
insight. One of the Ten Commandments is "Don't covet"
what belongs to our neighbor. (Exodus 20:14) But we must admit that
giving a hard and fast definition of "coveting" is not
so easy. Our tradition tells us that the line is definitely crossed
when our desire is so great that we try to convince the owner to
sell us a personal possession with which he/she really has no interest
in parting. (Mechilta on Exodus 20:14) Such uninvited approaches
are again really just a form of harassment.
This law too can be extrapolated from buyer to seller. Someone who
tries to convince people to buy a product that they have shown no
interest in acquiring is engaging in exactly the same kind of harassment.
(Pitchei Choshen Geneiva 30:26) This is completely different from
a salesperson trying to persuade customers who have intentionally
come into the store or who have agreed to listen to a salesperson's
pitch.
It's hard to provide a clear definition of when targeted marketing
turns into spam, but the two sources from Jewish law can help provide
some context. In both cases, the criterion that makes the approach
permissible is not a desire to make a deal per se but rather the
existence of a basic interest. Customers who have some interest
in making a purchase are not wasting the salesperson's time, and
people who have expressed even a possible interest in selling their
property may be approached by someone with an interesting offer.
By the same token, recipients consider an e-mail to be "spam"
not because they don't want to buy the product but rather because
they are not interested in even learning about the product. It's
not only a waste of their time to read the message; it's even a
waste of time to go to the trouble of deleting it.
Based on this criterion, a mass mailing would be problematic if
it is for something that relatively few people are interested in
learning about and no efforts are made to target specifically those
individuals who would express interest.
It goes without saying that the message should not be misleading,
tricking the recipient into reading the message by camouflaging
it as a message which is of interest, such as a business or personal
communication, winning a contest, etc. This violates the prohibition
of geneivat da'at (misleading others).
It also goes without saying that the mailing should not violate
the law. Very often middlemen use illegal techniques to evade the
anti-spam efforts of Internet service providers. For example, they
use a false return address. When you use the services of such an
agent, Jewish law views you as an accomplice to the crime.
Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir is director of the Business Response
Forum at the Centre for Business Ethics, Jerusalem College of Technology
(JCT). He is also a senior lecturer in economics at the JCT and
has published several articles on the subjects of modern business
and economics and Jewish law. This article was published by the
JCT and distributed by the Kaddish Connection Network.
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