March 9, 2006 | Read Time: 4 minutes
This article was updated from the version that appeared in the print issue of
The Chronicle to incorporate news that occurred after the newspaper’s press deadline.
A coalition of more than 50 nonprofit organizations, political groups, labor unions, and small businesses have banded together to fight an AOL plan to allow marketers who send bulk e-mail messages to pay a fee to bypass the company’s spam filters and ensure that those messages are delivered to AOL customers.
The diverse collection of organizations — which includes Defenders of Wildlife, Gun Owners of America, the Human Rights Campaign, MoveOn.org Civic Action, Oxfam America, and RightMarch.com — worries that the plan will divide the Internet between those who can afford to pay to guarantee delivery of their e-mail messages and those who cannot.
The groups fear that such a system will put the cost of reliable e-mail communication with supporters out of reach for many nonprofit groups.
“It’s the first step onto a slippery slope that will dismantle the Net freedoms that Americans have come to know,” says Timothy Karr, campaign director, of Free Press, an advocacy organization in Northampton, Mass. “Those especially hard hit are many of the not-for-profit organizations that rely on e-mail to communicate on a regular basis to their members. For all of us, e-mail communication is the lifeblood of our work.”
The coalition protesting AOL’s certified e-mail plan has posted an open letter to AOL on the Internet, which participating organizations are asking their combined 15 million members to sign. The campaign is also asking its supporters to call the company to express opposition to the plan.
In a strongly worded statement issued in response to the campaign, AOL says that the “‘Chicken Littles’ of many advocacy groups” have been saying for years that companies are trying to create a “two-tier” system on the Internet, and that the charge is false.
“We believe more choices, and more alternatives, for safety and e-mail authentication is a good thing for the Internet, not bad,” Nicholas J. Graham, a spokesman for AOL, said in the statement.
He added: “Everything that AOL has in place today free for e-mail senders remains — and will only improve.”
GoodmailSystems, the Mountain View, Calif., company whose certification system AOL would be adopting, says that its service will not prevent charity e-mail from being delivered.
Instead, it says, the service will show recipients that certified e-mail messages really are from the person or organization that the messages say they are from.
“Some nonprofits, like the American Red Cross, whose brands are targets of online fraud and ‘phishing,’ will choose CertifiedEmail. Those who have had no issues with fraud and are satisfied with their current practices, will not need the service,” the company said in a statement on its Web site. “Be assured, the service is not required to get ‘good’ mail through.”
GoodmailSystems says it will offer its service free to charities in 2006 and at a reduced rate after that.
Three days after the coalition started its protest campaign, AOL announced two new delivery options for nonprofit organizations to ensure that their e-mail messages will reach their supporters.
The company said that nonprofit groups that follow its anti-spam and e-mail policies may qualify for AOL’s Enhanced White List, which provides delivery, including images and Web links, equivalent to the certified e-mail program that will be run by Goodmail. The program will be provided directly by AOL to nonprofit organizations free.
The second option will allow nonprofit organizations to use one of several third-party e-mail accreditation services to authenticate their e-mail messages. AOL will pay the fees associated with using the service.
The company said that the programs will allow nonprofit organizations to ensure that their e-mail messages will “be delivered on comparable terms to commercial e-mail senders while also providing their constituents a way of being able to trust that the email they receive is authentic.” AOL said it would announce details of the new programs in the next 30 to 60 days.
In response, the coalition protesting AOL’s certified e-mail program said that the company’s new programs acknowledge that the certified e-mail program will create a “two-tiered Internet with one standard of e-mail reliability for the big guy and an inferior standard for the little guy.”
It questioned how nonprofit groups would selected for the new delivery programs, and said that the proposal doesn’t address the larger issue of maintaining a “level playing field” on the Internet.
For more information: Go to http://www.dearaol.com for the coalition’s letter and to http://media.aoltimewarner.com/media/newmedia/cb_press_view.cfm?release_num=55254538 for information on AOL’s new e-mail delivery programs for nonprofit organizations.
