Google Class Action Settlement: SPAM Or Conspiracy?

Whilst checking my email, I made a rare visit to the SPAM filter that’s doing a bang-up job and keeping my INBOX clear of mourning Nigerian’s and information about the “vacation cruise of a lifetime” It’s a rare occasion because I put a profound degree of trust in the Google/GMAIL system. And more recently, I looped in my Yahoo account which means those incoming emails are now subject to the rock-solid GMAIL filters. If it seems like I’m gushing about GMAIL, I am.

So how is it that the system that serves me so well made such an odd error by flagging a recent incoming message as SPAM? I mean it was addressed to me (not that it matters). In fact it was addressed to my dedicated GMAIL account vs. the Google Apps route that allows me to run my domain branded email.

The email in question was regarding a class action lawsuit levied against Google. CLRB HANSON INDUSTRIES, LLC d/b/a INDUSTRIAL PRINTING, and HOWARD STERN vs. Google Inc. As a Google AdWords client, I was included in the official notification. The email was simple version of the official court documentation and included a unsubscribe link at the bottom (good for them!).

This of course begs the question as to how and why was this email marked for death and relegated to my SPAM folder. While it’s content was lengthy, it didn’t promise length. While it promised the opportunity of money, it wasn’t coming from an African nation. It had no images…and so on…none of the traditional trappings of SPAM. Yet somehow, the unflappable GMAIL filter denied it entry.

Quite honestly I’m not a conspiracy theorist so I’m happy with the idea that it was a simple, automated action that over-reached. Above and beyond that, let’s not lose site of the fact that Google is a company created in a free market economy with no legal obligation to dispense what it most certainly considers slanderous and bad for business.

Nevertheless, the coincidence was an amusing and the $20,000,000 (the proposed settlement) is…how many other SPAM folders are littered with this same legal announcement.