What is "Spam"?

Everyone who has an email account knows about something called "spam". You know, all that unwanted email you get advertising one thing or another. Many of us have said in the past, "Why doesn't someone do something about it?". Well, now your dreams are coming true! Our government is helping us out.

The House of Representatives and Senate have batted the Can Spam Act back and forth in recent months. On Nov. 25, the Senate made a minor revision to the House's Nov. 22 version. Sources say the House is expected to approve the bill within a week, propelling it to President George W. Bush's office before the end of the year.

Under the bill, mass e-mailers are held liable for civic fines of up to $250 per e-mail if they hide their identities. It also allows the Federal Trade Commission to create a "do not e-mail" registry, similar to the popular list intended to block unwanted telemarketing calls.

Well, we all know how well the "do not call" list is working. I'm still getting calls I don't want, and you don't even want to know how many emails I get telling me that they can grow my penis longer. I'm beginning to think they are trying to tell me something.

The law is unenforceable. Now only that, and I'm not being cute here, but one person's spam is another person's valuable email, so who's to say that it's really spam? What if someone actually does want to grow his penis larger? That email could be very valuable to him. I don't have the answers, and this is making my head hurt....