The AOL Goodmail announcement exploded onto the national landscape today. I am pleasantly surprised to see the mainstream media paying attention to this issue. Check out the articles in the NY Times and USA Today. It seems that the outcry over this is much stronger than I would have guessed.

In fact, the concern over pay-for-delivery is so great that MarketingSherpa's Anne Holland has changed her anti-RSS position and now sees RSS as a potential savior as ISPs start charging for delivery. As my blog readers know, I am a big advocate of RSS - in particular, Individualized RSS products (like Silverpop's RSSDirect) not only have all the functionality inherent in targeted email but they can't be taxed by ISPs, they most likely fall outside the recent state email laws and they most certainly prevent spam and phishing.

So, in the end, consumers will get what they want, the way they want it and on whatever terms they demand - that is the magic of the internet. Even in the unlikely world where email becomes too cumbersome, new technologies like IRSS will pop up to fill the need. Long live the Internet.