E-mail advertiser Amir Gans claims that Microsoft's (Nasdaq:MSFT) lawsuit against him is baseless and fantastic. He said he had not violated any legal obligation or current Israeli law regarding advertising by e-mail.
In its lawsuit against Gans, Microsoft estimates it is entitled to $50 million in compensation for at least ten million pieces of junk mail sent by Gans to Hotmail subscribers. However, for the purpose of the court fee and chances of collection, Microsoft is suing Gans for NIS 2.5 million.
In his statement of defense, Gans claims that Microsoft is a competitor in e-mail advertising. He says that Microsoft is cynically abusing an expensive and time-consuming legal procedure to drive him out of the e-mail advertising market.
Gans says that Microsoft's lawsuit should be dismissed because there is no opponancy and because the evidence is inadmissible and not credible. He says he has not deviated from the activities and ideas of Bill Gates outlined in his book "Business @ the Speed of Thought".
Gans says that Microsoft is trying to collect fees from online commercial activity in general and e-mail in particular by means of a project called "black penny", which will levy a tax on sending e-mail. Gans says that Microsoft plans to collect royalties on the use of this new tax method it had devised.
Gans says that he advertises legitimate goods and services that do not break Israeli law. He does not send banned content, such as viruses, fraudulent messages or pornography.
Gans regularly attends meetings of the Knesset Committee for Scientific and Technological Research and Development, which is preparing a bill to deal with junk mail. Gans emphasizes that Israel has not yet passed any law regarding e-mail advertising, which means that he has not broken any existing Israeli law.
Gans says that e-mail advertising (junk mail) is not necessarily parasitic, nor does it necessarily harm its host. His e-mails do not overload hosts' computers, certainly no more than the services that Microsoft itself provides, such as downloading videos and music to users' computers.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on March 22, 2005