NYT reports that California has banned spam:

Gov. Gray Davis of California signed a bill today that outlaws sending most commercial e-mail to or from the state that the recipient did not explicitly request. That is a far more wide-reaching law than any of the 35 other state laws meant to regulate spam or any of the proposed bills in Congress.

“We are saying that unsolicited e-mail cannot be sent and there are no loopholes,’” said Kevin Murray, the Democratic state senator from Los Angeles who sponsored the bill.

The law would fine spammers $1,000 for each unsolicited message sent up to $1 million for each campaign.

As the nation’s most populous state and the home to many large Internet companies, the California bill could well have a significant effect on spam. The bill puts the burden on the sender to determine if the recipient resides in California.

Very bold. I can’t see how this could possibly work from a technical standpoint, however.