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An arizona law firm that provoked a storm by sending out a flood of
advertising messages on the Internet has negotiated a temporary truce in
its use of the global network. This could eventually lead to more formal
rules about what can and cannot be broadcast over the Internet.

Canter & Siegel of Phoenix whipped up an electronic storm on 12
April when it posted a notice offering its services on over 5000 different
online discussion groups, known as Usenet newsgroups. Now it has agreed
with the company that provides it with Internet access that it will not
post any more messages in this way, at least for the present. Meanwhile
the Internet Society, an international group of 100 service providers and
4000 individuals, meeting in Prague last month, began considering a formal
code of conduct. Trustees will receive a draft in December, says Tony Rutkowski,
the group’s executive director.

Informal rules of ‘netiquette’ frown on posting any message as broadly
and indiscriminately as the law firm did, and tempers flared when the lawyers
insisted they had the right to do so again. After a barrage of protests,
electronic ‘mail bombs’ that clogged its e-mail box, telephone threats,
and the cancellation of two Internet accounts, Canter & Siegel agreed
late last month to refrain from further mass postings on Usenet discussion
groups ‘until the issue is resolved’, according to Martha Siegel, a partner
in the firm.

The conflict centres on two related issues: what should be published
on the network, and who should decide. Technically, Usenet and the Internet
are distinct: Usenet is a collection of thousands of online discussion groups,
while the Internet is the ‘network of networks’ that links computers around
the world. Internet services usually provide access to Usenet newsgroups.

There is no central authority for either, so an informal code of conduct
has grown up among users. Many Usenet groups alow commercial messages, but
only if they relate to the group’s topic. A key guideline limits postings
on a Usenet newsgroup to the topic it has been set up to cover; messages
may be posted to several topics, but not across the board. Posting irrelevant
ads ‘is a theft of other people’s resources because they have to pay to
read messages’, says Daniel Dern, author of The Internet Guide for New Users.

Others have broadcast messages widely before, but stopped or apologised
when users complained. However, Canter & Siegel was unrepentant, and
insisted that it should be able to publish unsolicited ads over Usenet groups.

The firm trademarked the name Cybersell, and circulated proposed guidelines
for network advertising to replace what it called the ‘outdated philosophy’
of a ‘vocal Internet minority’ of technical specialists and academics. This
ignited the fury of many people who had hoped the network would be a refuge
from unsolicited advertising.

Siegel says that her firm received over 20 000 inquiries in response
to its 12 April ad, which offered help in entering a forthcoming lottery
for the ‘green cards’ which foreigners must have before they can live and
work permanently in the US. ‘A little less than a thousand actually became
clients,’ she claims. The firm also received about 20 000 complaints and
other ‘negative responses’, according to Siegel. ‘We didn’t come close to
offending everybody,’ she insists. ‘The overwhelming majority of people
said nothing at all.’

Some would-be protesters asked Canter & Siegel to send them information,
hoping to add to their costs, and this may have inflated the law firm’s
count of positive responses. Others turned to what Siegel calls ‘electronic
vandalism’. Some sent large files of useless data that filled the company’s
e-mail box. However, these ‘mail bombs’ also damaged third parties by taking
up storage space on the host computer through which the law firm makes its
Internet connection.

The truce may prove transitory. Siegel says that if companies providing
Internet access jointly decide what can be placed on the network, ‘they’ll
find themselves in very hot water. They could be sued for restraint of trade
and free speech.’