[kevincox]

I live in Canada and I find it ridiculous that email without consent is illegal, phone calls without consent is illegal, but sending physical mail is perfectly fine. It makes me sad the amount of trees that must be cut down, shipped to a factory, processed into paper (with some hash chemicals), shipped to the printer, printed then shipped to me. Only to be thrown into the recycling unopened to be shipped to the recycling plant, then reprocessed to start the cycle over. It is just disgusting waste.

[madsbuch]

This is just a clear indication that it should have some cost to send a message, otherwise people (mis)use it until the legislators need to stop it attention robbery.

[nitwit005]

This is a big reason why advertisers loved newspapers. Getting a newspaper subscription is paying to have ads delivered to your home.

[kevincox]

Well there is some cost to send a message. These are being sent via Canada Post. The problem is that the cost isn't high enough.

[madsbuch]

I think you misunderstood: The reason why modern societies need legislation on emails and not on traditional post is because there is a cost associated with traditional cost.

You'd probably see the same rules if you could send 20.000.000 letters via Canada Post in 30 seconds for the cost of the servers compute.

[kevincox]

But clearly cost isn't enough. People are getting spam that they don't want.

You could raise the cost, but that only reduces the problem and inflicts cost on legitimate mail sending. It is clear to me that society does need legislation on physical mail. So your correlation doesn't make sense.

[flowerbreeze]

I'm guessing the cost isn't enough, because it works. Maybe tax commercial letter stamps by 50%, but keep private letters as is?

[mig39]

Ironically, spam e-mail, phone, and SMS is perfectly legal if it comes from a politician or political party. No consent necessary.

It's literally the only spam I get on my phone.

[canadiantim]

phone calls without consent are illegal in Canada?