> I think this is a myth. The unsubscribe link, from everything I've seen since CAN-SPAM a decade ago, almost always works.
Define "works"? Does clicking "unsubscribe" for advertiser A stop mails from advertiser A? Yes, probably. But what stops advertiser A from sharing his unsubscribe list with advertiser B? Well, nothing -- it's legal and an advantage if advertiser B reciprocates by sharing his list right back.
There's nothing to keep an advertiser from sharing his "unsubscribe" list with any number of other advertisers -- the only legal requirement is that he not mail you again.
A list of people who unsubscribe from mailing lists would be the least valuable list in the world. I can't imagine anyone knowingly paying money for that. What you describe is possible, but I really don't think it's at all common.
You aren't thinking like a spammer. A spammer only cares that the addresses on his list are read by humans. And the possible uses for a list of live human readers isn't limited to spam -- there's also phishing to consider. Someone who recognizes spam and clicks "unsubscribe", after a few days might react differently to an e-mail apparently from Microsoft's security department alerting the user that, since Windows XP is about to drop dead, Microsoft has decided to protect the user with a special security update -- just click the handy link.
Spammers might be deplorable and slimy, but they're not stupid.
> What you describe is possible, but I really don't think it's at all common.
If it can be done, spammers will do it. I can see you're having a hard time thinking like a bottom-feeder, perfectly understandable, so to help your comprehension, I offer the Miracle Man scam:
It is becoming less common, but quite a few mailers would have that link take you to a website where you either need to login or type something to confirm the unsubscribe.
In those cases I would always just hit the back button and then hit gmail's report as spam button, because fuck that. If any emailer's unsubscribe system is significantly more work for me than reporting as spam, I'm going to report it as spam and not feel the least bit of guilt about it.
The one exception to anything other than an immediate single-click unsubscribe IMO is a confirmation button, prominently displaying the e-mail address that is being unsubscribed, just to deal with the case where someone unsubscribes from a forwarded e-mail.
> I think this is a myth. The unsubscribe link, from everything I've seen since CAN-SPAM a decade ago, almost always works.
The unsubscribe link on "legitimate" marketing emails almost always works. The unsubscribe link on marketing emails that are scams is still used to confirm that the target address is read by a live human and target further scams.
The safe assumption is that any unwanted and unexpected commercial email is, in fact, a scam and treat it as such, as the receiver does not suffer from flagging it as spam.
Obviously, this isn't good for "legitimate" email marketers, but then again, legitimate or not, their emails tend to be a waste of the receivers time and resources, just less actively harmful than the scammers. So, frustrating them as a side effect of an overvigorous defense against scammers is, even if not intended, not something that most users would weigh on the opposite side of the balance from the intended effect.
I can only offer my own experience, but I've been involved in email marketing for a while now and I've neither bought nor sold a list of email addresses.
Have you ever closed down one list, but kept the DB of subscriber emails, and then started a new list, months later, that the 'subscriber' would have to unsubscribe from again?
I've never done that, no. That's not very nice, but it's also bad business. People who unsubscribe have already told you they aren't interested. Email them again and you're far more likely to provoke an angry response than a useful click/open.
