A U.S. District Court judge turned down a request by Harris Interactive for a temporary restraining order that would have required the company to be removed from a list of e-mail spammers while a suit it filed is heard. [Computerworld]

Jupiter Communications released a report on Monday predicting that worldwide direct e-mail marketing will balloon from $164 million (US$) in 1999 to $7.3 billion in 2005. [E-Commerce Times]

A man who spammed millions of AOL subscribers with pornography and get-rich-quick schemes has pleaded guilty to second-degree forgery in a US District court. [The Register]

Major American ISP and Gargantuan telecomms generalist Verizon was deluged with so much spam last week that its servers were unable to function at times, and left customers with something like a 24-hour e-mail delivery delay. [The Register]

A US District Court in Denver has issued a temporary restraining order on behalf of online marketing gurus, 24/7, against the Mail Abuse Prevention System . [The Register]

Responding to complaints that the Microsoft Network is allowing spammers to relay junk e-mail through MSN servers, the Mail Abuse Prevention System has added several MSN systems to its notorious anti-spam blacklist. The action could potentially disrupt emails from thousands of legitimate MSN subscribers. [InternetNews]

Stumbling ISP PSINet has owned up to a contract with a sender of bulk unsolicited commercial email - known to you and me as spam. It has long been a suspicion that some ISPs have had illicit contracts with spammers, despite a publicly stated policy against such practices. [The Register]

The U.S. House of Representatives voted almost unanimously Tuesday that spam should be unlawful. [E-Commerce Times]

A group of 15 companies has announced that they will form a coalition to design e-mail standards to limit spam. Among the companies involved in the Responsible Electronic Communication. [PC World]

Article about the "viral marketing" technique used by AllAdvantage.com. [InfoWorld]

No one will admit to liking spam -- the canned pseudo-meat or the unsolicited e-mail that bears its name. But despite the current efforts of governments in North America and Europe to get it back into the can, spam is destined to be, and should be, a fact of Internet life -- just like junk mail is in the real world. [E-Commerce Times]

eBay, Inc. said it will get $1.2 million (US$) under a lawsuit settlement with ReverseAuction.com, Inc., which had been accused of illegally obtaining eBay user IDs and addresses in order to send them unwanted and misleading e-mail. [E-Commerce Times]

As a result of intense pressure from anti-spam activists, major ISPs are taking steps to ensure their salespeople do not sign contracts with companies that send unsolicited commercial e-mail. [E-Commerce Times]

AT&T acknowledged Thursday that it had violated its own spam policy by providing Web-hosting services to a purported sender of unsolicited commercial email.

In a bid to ward off U.S. government regulation, a coalition of online marketing heavyweights announced plans Monday to propose standards meant to ease consumer concerns about spam and online privacy. [E-Commerce Times]