Thank you, Eric, for taking the time to explain why L-Soft has chosen to use
terminology that has become familiar to legislators and regulators. Under the
circumstances, I understand the reason for the decision, and I offer my apology
for the tone of the original "flame" that started this thread.

I would, however, respectfully disagree with your statement that "confirmed
opt-in" is "inherently unclear". The meaning of the phrase may have been twisted
by special interests who want to ensure that, when anti-spam laws are passed,
they can still spam us legally, whether we asked for it or not, but there is
no inherent ambiguity in the words themselves.

The word "opt-in" does not appear in the ancient dictionary on my desk, however,
as a noun, it means "subscription" or "request". In this context, the word
"confirmed" means "verified". So, "confirmed opt-in" means that the recipient
of a subscription request has taken steps to explicitly verify that the request
came from the apparent sender, and that the submission of the request was an
intentional act by the sender. A list configuration which allows open
subscription, but does not require confirmation by the apparent sender of the
subscription request is not a "confirmed opt-in" configuration.

I view this situation as one more example of the manner in which the meanings of
words and phrases are corrupted, sometimes even reversed, through repeated and
intentional misuse by individuals or organizations in a position to influence,
either directly or indirectly, public perception of an issue. At some point in
time, the rest of us have no choice but to accept the new meanings.

--
Paul Russell
Senior Systems Administrator
University of Notre Dame