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NewsvineJoe Wagner has found a new way to put an end to world hunger: by taking illegal spammers to court.
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He’s garnered over $40,000, in settlements and court-awarded damages, for charities like Second Harvest and the Darfur Stove Project from merchants who hired spammers to advertise for them.
Wagner, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, has had his email address online since the earliest days of the Web. His webpage, a forum on developing technologies, was one of the very first. And what does this Internet pioneer have to show for it?
A place on every spammer’s list, an inbox overwhelmed with junk mail, and now: the motivation to fight back.
“Spam is more than an annoyance,” insists Wagner. “It is the systematic destruction of a medium and community, the interplay of ideas. It’s worse than disruptive; it’s destructive.”
Early this year, Wagner found his Stanford account flooded with more than 2,000 emails, all of which appeared to be from the same spammer. When he subpoenaed Stanford’s IT department, he discovered that hundreds of thousands of similar emails had been sent to the Stanford community. That’s when he enlisted the help of fellow grad student David Cannon, and the two decided to try the case in small claims court.
There was only one problem: small claims courts — courts that settle only minor disputes — require that defendants be served within California. Most of the offending spammers were based out-of-state. A little detective work, however, revealed that all the companies planned to attend AdTech, an advertising conference held annually in San Francisco.
“So we just went around and we served them papers,” said Wagner. “Getting on to the exhibit floor is free. We didn’t make a big deal, because the whole point was just to hand them the packet of papers. We weren’t there to make a scene.”
This summer, Wagner and Cannon presented their case in Palo Alto Small Claims Court. Before the trial, though they offered to dismiss the charges, on the condition that the defendants would donate the money at issue to charity. All but four — Valueclick, WorldAvenue, SubscriberBASE, and Azoogle — agreed.
“Many times what happens is merchants can’t admit to themselves — much less to someone else — that what they’re doing is wrong,” explains Wagner. “Once you have to write a check, though, you stop and examine what you’re doing. This way, the message still gets there; you’re stopping spam and helping charity. It’s pretty much a win-win situation.”
Wagner encourages spammers to donate to the Darfur Stove Project as well as local food banks. The Stove Project works to provide refugee camps with more efficient stoves. Firewood is scarce near these areas, so Darfurians must venture far beyond the safety of the camps to find fuel.
“It’s a very worthy goal, where a small amount of seed money can make a huge difference,” said Wagner.
Ultimately, the small claims court judge ruled that the four spammers would have to pay maximum damages. The defendants demanded that their case be retried, a right guaranteed by California small claims procedure. This time, they had a team of lawyers on hand.
The appeal was held last Thursday at San Jose Superior Court, but the judge’s decision may take up to three weeks. Even as he waits for the verdict, Wagner is developing a website — spamwall.stanford.edu — to help Stanford students organize against spam.
“If Stanford students and faculty start suing, the word will get out,” said Wagner. “Don’t screw with Stanford.”
So what lies ahead for the Robin Hood of the Internet era?
“Well,” laughs Wagner, “My immediate goal is to finish my dissertation.”