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by mullingitover 896 days ago
If unsubscribing requires even two clicks I always flag it as spam. The rule is one-click to unsubscribe and I ruthlessly enforce it. Make it their problem.
2 comments

Huh, I am an individual who is a scientist, not a web dev.

I paid some company to do my email.

I email 3 times per year and get 'spam' warnings from AWS every time despite everyone subscribing through a: "SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER"

No bait, just an email field and submit.

I wonder if its your type that makes it so I have to be Amazon for forgiveness. Or at least that is how it used to be, now I sell addicting clicking casino games. No emails needed. I make way more money than back when I was giving away free content via email.

I tried that once with Nextdoor. They will group their mailings into different lists. The unsubscribe button only removes you from that list. To disable them all is 30+ clicks on the site once logged in. It's horrible.
For this kind, my 'unsubscribe' button is labelled 'report spam'
Facebook too, unsubscribe is just a single of one of their hundred marketing emails.
My rule is I unsubscribe once. Then I block the sender or in the case of places like nextdoor, the entire domain.
I just went through this with Nextdoor in October. Well, I personally didn't do all 50 clicks, but I asked their customer service to do it and they confirmed I was unsubscribed.

Of course, I got a new message from them yesterday because they've added a dozen different lists since then and automatically opted everyone into them.

Is this technically permitted behavior under CANSPAM? Seems like a company could just create a new "newsletter / list" for every new marketing email they send.
It'd be up to a judge and/or jury to decide. If one can establish that the intent was to ignore one's attempts to unsubscribe, it'd be a pretty clear-cut violation. Most reputable senders have an "opt out of all further communications" checkbox (with some fine print about legally required and transactional emails). Pretty much the only way to bring a private action under CAN-SPAM though is to be an ISP and show "actual damages".