The situation is all too common: At 8 a.m. on a Saturday, a mere four hours after finishing your burrito at La Bamba, your phone rings. You freak out because something must be wrong if someone's calling you at this hour. Well, something is wrong -- you don't own Time-Life's "Sounds of the Seventies," and the guy on the other end wants to remedy that by giving you the first two CDs in the set for only $19.99. Fear not, the Federal Trade Commission has taken steps to ensure you can sleep without interruption by instituting the National Do Not Call Registry, which allows people nationwide to register their phone numbers to block telemarketing calls. While we feel that allowing phone owners to make the choice to limit telemarketing calls is extremely desirable, we caution citizens to examine all of the ramifications before registering.\nFirst, it is important to note that not all telemarketing will be stopped by registering your number on the Do Not Call Registry. Political organizations, charities, telephone surveyors and companies with which you have an existing business relationship will still be allowed to call you. However, if you register, you still will be able to get that call from the Indiana State Police, allowing you to donate $12.50 to get that little sticker for your car that says you support them. \nOn the other hand, you won't have to be bothered by insurance companies, long distance companies or companies that for some reason want to give you a free trip to Disney World. If your number is on the list, they can be fined up to $11,000 for calling you. However, if you have bought something from a company within the last 18 months, that company will be able to call you unless you specifically tell them not to.\nWhile all of this might seem like the best thing since A.J. Moye blocking Carlos Boozer, consider that the FTC expects 60 million people to register eventually. This could have a huge impact on jobs and industries that rely heavily on telemarketing. A representative from a large Bloomington telemarketing firm said he thought this registry would not necessarily have much of an impact on larger telemarketing companies, because often these companies have existing business relationships with many of the people they call, and they usually do more than just commercial telemarketing. However, he said smaller telemarketing companies -- especially those that only do commercial calls -- probably will be affected substantially by the Do Not Call Registry. Also, he said he felt many of the industries that rely heavily on the relatively cheap advertising and solicitation associated with telemarketing will have to spend more money to advertise, which likely would result in the cost being passed on to consumers.\nIf you're not sure about the registry, there are other alternatives. Even if you register your number, you always can give companies written permission to keep your number on their list. Alternatively, if you don't want to be on the registry, you can ask individual callers to take you off of their list. Before registering your number, we ask simply that you take into account the entire picture and choose the alternative that best suits you.
-- Andrew LeMar for the Editorial Board
