From the pathetic-on-multiple-levels file comes news that Kodak last week agreed to pay $26,331 to settle charges by the FTC that it violated the federal Can-Spam Act.
Turns out Kodak’s photo-sharing unit sent 2 million of its customers e-mails that failed to contain an opt-out mechanism or instructions on how to avoid getting e-mail from Kodak in the future.
A spokeswoman blamed the error on a technical glitch.
The entire e-mail marketing world has been waiting for months for the FTC to issue some rules concerning the Can-Spam Act, such as—marketers hope—defining “sender” in such a way that multiple advertisers in a single e-mail aren’t all required to include their postal addresses, and ensuring the 10-day opt-out provision isn’t shortened to the three days the FTC is reportedly considering.
And now we find out they’ve been spending their time on a simple technical mistake by Kodak? This should have been settled with a phone call.
On a separate note, the announcement sheds some embarrassing light on Kodak’s e-mail marketing. According to the FTC, the $26,331 settlement represents “100% disgorgement of the gross proceeds from the offending e-mail campaign.”
Now let’s see… $26,331 divided by 2 million … That’s 1.3 cents per e-mail. Ouch. We know someone else who needs to find better ways to spend their time, as well.
