Laura Betterly - Bulk Mail or Spam?

Bulk Mail or Spam?

At Data Resource Consulting, on a typical day, her firm would send out 8-10 million emails daily, charging clients $600–$1,000 per million emails and about half that amount for a sending a second time. She also charged clients for lead responses to emails. Unlike other mailers, Betterly said she did not forge headers, route messages through outside servers without permission, or use any of the other tricks that have drawn criticism of the spamming community. She also refused to send messages advertising adult products or services, or anything she believed to be illegal. She said that she only possessed the addresses of people who had expressed a desire to know more when signing up to other online services, and that she would honor any requests from recipients to unsubscribe from further mail.

Estimates indicate she may have earned at least US$200,000 per year. She said that she was "just trying to make a living like everyone else." Betterly publicly attacked those who were critical of her practices, “I have a beef against what I consider hate groups that are trying to shut down commercial e-mail” and referred to what she did as "a win-win situation". To those who objected to what she did for a living she said, "I don't really care. As long as I'm not breaking any laws, you don't have to love me or like what I do for a living."

Data Resource Consulting lost a legal case in Kansas small claims court on 9 September 2003 for failing to follow the spam laws in that state.