Chalk up a win for cellphone owners in the battle against unsolicited text ads sent to their handhelds. An Arizona appellate court has ruled that the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 prohibiting the use of autodialers to call cellphones does apply to the sending of e-mail or text messages with unsolicited advertisements. What makes this ruling so unique is that text messaging did not even exist in 1991, but the court said the law was written in a way that anticipated advances in automatic telephone dialing technology.

The ruling upholds a previous ruling in favor of a man who sued the Acacia Mortgage Corp. because he claimed they sent two unsolicited text messages to his cellphone. Acacia argued that it only sent an e-mail and did not "call" Joffe's cellphone, but the court said their claim does not entirely paint the picture of the actions they took when they sent e-mail to indirectly to Joffe's cellphone via his service provider's e-mail system.

Now some may say that the guy overreacted and should have just deleted the text ads and leave it at that. But the fact that the mortgage company got a hold of his cellphone number through his service provider's e-mail system does sound a bit chilling. People do have a right to be left alone, and the mortgage company could have found another way to market their services without going to this extreme. Will this ruling put a stop to unsolicited text ads? Of course not, but it may cause a few companies to think twice before clicking the "Send" key.

According to a new white paper from Seismicom, marketers would be wise to focus their efforts to reach consumers by opt-in, location-based content sponsorships via their cellphones and other mobile devices instead of traditional "push" marketing tactics. The study noted that marketers won't send consumers unsolicited text messages since they are costly to send and receive and because of the expected backlash. Instead, Seismicom thinks enterprises such as Starbucks would likely invest in an opt-in service to make it easier for consumers to locate the nearest store.

The Can-Spam Act passed by the FCC designed to reduce wireless spam go into effect today. Under the rules, marketers are prohibited from sending text-messages through the Internet to wireless devices, such as cell phones and PDAs. They don't apply to ads sent to e-mail addresses that are then forwarded to wireless devices such as BlackBerrys.

By a unanimous vote, the FCC has voted to outlaw spam sent to wireless devices. However, as you might expect, there are loopholes, including the fact that unsolicited text messages are not covered by the ban.

But the FCC's decision not to restrict unsolicited text messages sent through mechanisms like SMS, which stands for short message service, creates a potentially huge regulatory loophole affecting tens of millions of Americans. Wireless providers often charge a few pennies per text message received.

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The FCC's rules permit mobile providers to register their Internet domain names in a master database that spammers are supposed to honor. That database will include only domain names like attwireless.com and t-mobileusa.com, and not individual e-mail addresses of subscribers.

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Noncommercial messages sent by politicians, nonprofit groups or charities are not covered by the Can-Spam Act or the FCC's forthcoming rules. While anyone violating those rules by sending spam to a mobile device can be sued civilly by the Federal Trade Commission, it's not clear how spammers using text messages could be punished.