Over on Deliverability.com Krzysztof posts about discussions going on over on the URIBL list about using “confirmed opt-in” to describe a subscription process versus using “double opt-in” to describe the same subscription process. I do not even need to read the list to know what is being said. This is a disagreement that has been going on since the first usage of “double opt-in” over 10 years ago.
To better explain the vitriol, a little history of the two terms might help.
My personal recollection and experience is that the term “confirmed opt-in” was coined by posters in the newsgroup news.admin.net-abuse.email around 1997 or 1998. There was some discussion about marketers / spammers (a lot of the posters did not distinguish between the two) trying to use the term “double opt-in” instead of “confirmed opt-in.” Many posters believed (and many still do) that this was a deliberate attempt by marketers to make the process seem overly burdensome and unworkable.
During the 2003 FTC spam hearings, Rebecca Lieb shared formal definitions for 5 different subscription types including “Confirmed opt-in” and “double opt-in”. These definitions are still up on ClickZ.
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