The following is exerpted from a Yahoo! News article:

Michigan and Utah have until Friday to create and operate registries of e-mail addresses similar to "do-not-call" lists. Businesses will have to buy copies of the registries and face prison time and fines if they send e-mail to any addresses that parents submit. The registries also can include instant-message addresses, cell phones and pager numbers.

This particular legislation comes with a whole laundry list of flaws. A "do not spam" list of children basically gives anyone with the time and/or inclination to hack into the database a ready made list of names of potential victims. No longer will latent sex offenders have to fear that the email address they have might be that of an undercover police officer, but they will rather be unable to obtain a "pure" list of children straight from their parents themselves. It has as much lucrative potential as the AOL/Yahoo "kids only" chat rooms (a potential of which I would have remained blissfully unaware without greywar's excellent articles on the subject). Not to mention, fear of jail time and/or fines is not a deterrent to someone operating out of a country where such laws have no effect.

I really respect the intent of these laws. Unfortunately, though, they are being made by lawmakers with little knowledge of the technology or how it works. We're making 21st century laws with 20th century lawmakers. If ever there was a basis for a plea to change the "old guard", this would be it.