An online notebook
Much planning is being done over at Palimpsest for the second Big Day Out, which we have all been looking forward to after the success of last year’s.
It seems like a few new Palimpers will be coming along, which will be nice. So far, 11 have signed up, with 2 maybes.
Am staying over in the local Travel Lodge this time, so as to make an evening of it. As it isn’t until 24 May, I got a family room for £10, which I can share with amner. A fiver each! Excellent.
My local council has a forum which no one uses. Well, I thought I would give it a go, largely because I was so annoyed at how long it took me to find out my local councillors’ names and contact info (I want to find out what is happening to the park in our village, which is beset by vandals and where the play equipment is, frankly, lethal)!
Anyway, my post was suitably pompous, and after submitting it I was all sent to c&p it into here, but the bloody thing needs to be moderated. Presumably that means every post has to be… cue eyes rolling dramatically.
Interesting story from the BBC:
Businessman wins e-mail spam caseA businessman has won what is believed to be the first victory of its kind by claiming damages from a company which sent him e-mail spam.
Nigel Roberts, who lives in Alderney in the Channel Islands, took action against Media Logistics UK over junk e-mails in his personal account.
Under new European laws, companies can be sued for sending unwanted e-mails.
The Stirlingshire-based firm has agreed to pay £270 compensation to Mr Roberts, who runs an internet business.
‘Tiny victory’
Three years ago the EU passed an anti-spam law, the directive on privacy and telecommunications, which gave individuals the right to fight the growing tide of unwanted e-mail by allowing them to claim damages.
Mr Roberts received unwanted e-mail adverts for a contract car firm and a fax broadcasting business and decided to take action against the company.
The company filed an acknowledgement of the claim at Colchester County Court but did not defend it and a judge ruled in favour of Mr Roberts.
In an out-of-court agreement Media Logistics agreed to pay Mr Roberts damages of £270 plus his £30 filing fee.
Mr Roberts said he had limited his claim to a maximum of £300 in order to qualify to file it as a small claim.
He said: “This may be a tiny victory but perhaps now spammers will begin to realise that people don’t have to put up with their e-mail inboxes being filled with unwanted junk.”
No-one from Media Logistics UK was available for comment.
A spokesman for the Information Commissioner’s Office, the watchdog who oversees the Data Protection Act, said it was the first case of its kind he had heard of.
He said: “What I can say is that I haven’t heard of anyone doing so and we haven’t taken a case under that legislation.”
