Just as Hong Kong is considering laws to control our $10 billion a year spam plague, the problem has become dramatically worse. I blame the government.
When the United States passed its anti-spam legislation in December, the only people smiling were the spammers themselves.
The Can-Spam act ought to have been a victory for everyone who is sick of trawling through pornographic junk mail every day. It should have made it harder for spammers to operate and helped drive some of the worst offenders out of business.
Before the act, US legislation had been handled on a local basis, with California criticised for virtually banning e-mail marketing and Florida frequently cited as a spam haven.
The new law could have enforced nationwide standards so a spammer could no longer simply cross state lines to send his penis-enlargement ads.
Unfortunately, legislators gave more ear time to marketers than anti-spam lobbyists, and as a result the law is popularly known as You-Can-Spam.