A Moment of Silence for Dance Tights Bob, the Spam Guy
This blog gets a lot of spam, but it has a wickedly good spam filter so all I have to do is clean it out now and then, checking to make sure it hasn’t caught a friendly keyboard in there. And today I counted to see what kind of spam I was getting.
First, lots and lots of sexual dysfunction spam. Viagra was the clear winner with 74, Cialis (28) and Levitra (11) trailing (I was going to say “coming close behind” but they aren’t close and really, it seemed too low to stoop). And that’s not counting the 22 that were offering me many drugs, the Big Three along with phentermine and tramadol which I did not even know existed. (I’m pretty much a Bayer girl, myself.) Surprisingly there were only two porn e-mails—“hose mature pantie” and “tripod.com”—so evidently Viagra is taking the place of video. Maybe if you have the pill, you don’t need the porn? One spelled it “pron.” I wondered if that was an attempt to avoid the filter or if, since it was on the “hose mature pantie” spam, it was just more evidence that whoever had sent that one had a less than firm grip on the language. Or was typing with one hand. I was also surprised at how many of the pills were advertised as “soft tab.” I guess spammers are not much into irony.
After that, it got miscellaneous fast: airline tickets, Enterprise car rentals, two car insurance offers, one quickie loan, Nick who wanted to sell me ink jet paper, and Bob who in a single e-mail offered to sell me hotel reservations, airline tickets, sunglasses, wedding cake toppers, and (my fave) dance tights.
I’m not kidding, look:
Bob | Ann@gmail.com | guida-apertura-conto-corrente.pointyou.info
hotel repubblica ceca
account loan payday savings
video pompino gratis
philippine airline ticket
offerta hotel
dolce and gabanna sun glasses
piscina costruzione
wedding cake toppers
filtro aria
dance tights
I don’t know what video pompino is (gratis is free, right? Yeah, sure) or piscina costruczione, but they both sound like fish to me. Which would work with the air filter, filtro aria? No? And then dance tights in English. You have no idea how much I wanted to click on that e-mail. But I knew that way lay madness.
It was worth wading through all 128 because trapped amongst all the soft tabs was poor little Jill, who just wanted to point out that Bob (not the dance tight Bob, my writing partner Bob, although come to think of it, have you ever seen them together?) has a book coming out. I released that one and deleted the rest, but it made me think.
Who buys this stuff? Somebody must click on those links or they wouldn’t keep sending them. Non-dance-tights Bob says it’s like a pick-up line, it only has to work once for them to keep on trying it, but I’m thinking it must work more often than that. So I looked into it and then got lost in spam-lore.
Turns out this blog is not getting spammed, it’s getting blammed, or blog spammed. And evidently there is something worse than Viagra spam: evangelists have been known to spam with preaching e-mails. (They’re going to hell.) Using somebody else’s e-mail address to spam is known as sporgery. The classic term does not stand for “shit posing as e-mail” or “stupid pointless annoying messages,” but—according to the Wikipeida—was inspired by the Monty Python Spam Sketch in which a bunch of Vikings sing “Spam, spam, spam” so loudly they drive out the other conversation. The Wikipedia goes on to say “In the 1980s the term was adopted to describe certain abusive users who frequented BBSs and MUDs, who would repeat “SPAM” a huge number of times to scroll other users’ text off the screen. In early Chat rooms services like PeopleLink and the early days of AOL, they actually flooded the screen with quotes from the Monty Python Spam sketch.” If only today’s spammers had Monty Python’s charm, or at least the wit to see that “soft Cialis” is not a selling subject line.
I waded through several published studies on the efficiency of spam, all of which concluded that spam was bad. I also found out that the word spam was not applied to e-mail until 1994, when lawyers Lawrence Cantera and Martha Siegel spammed Usenet with ads for green card help. Cantera was disbarred. I’m hoping Martha had something equally devastating happen to her, like carpal tunnel that spread to her frontal lobe. Most spammers argue they have a right to spam as part of free speech, but I’m not seeing a lot of speech going on in the blog spam, just a lot of penis anxiety, although I might protect Dance Tights Bob since he seems to be innovative and open-minded; there just aren’t enough people selling fish on the internet. And the blog never gets the fast-breaking stock opportunities and the pleas from foreign widows (who are willing to offer half of their deceased husbands’ multi-million dollar bank accounts now frozen in the US for a very reasonable up front fee to cover costs) that my e-mail account used to get, so I’m gathering that blammers have a different philosophy from spammers. There’s just something so pathetic about spamming blogs. It’s like flashing a bus.
But I digress. I found out that only a fraction of a fraction of one per cent of spam e-mails ever get a bite, but the sheer volume of them means that they do work and we’re stuck with them until we start catching the bastards and executing them. Until then, I have, as I said, deleted all the spam that the filter caught, yes, even Dance Tights Bob. When it comes to protecting this blog, Akismet and I are implacable.
Sorry about that, Jill.
Whyfore are there no comments? Are they too now considered spam? Or is this a…
… Virgin Blog!
(gasp)
Honey, I wrote it. There’s nothing virgin about it.
That no sense of irony thing? (see: soft cialis) I wholly agree. Of course the thing that annoys me most about annoying people is that they have no sense of humor about anything, especially themselves.
“piscina costruzione” is swimming pool construction.
I guess you could keep your fish in there.
After construction was complete.
I keep getting emails that tell me I have won a lottery (that I never entered) in some country I have never heard of, and all I need to do is send them my bank information to have the money deposited in my account. Yeah, right. I once tried to email the idiot back who sent me the email but for some mysterious reason it was boucned back to me….. Hmmmm.
And have you ever actually READ any of those male enhancement spams? OMG! Talk about erotica! My husband made me open one once, just to see what it said, and I am telling you it made ME blush! I started reading it out loud and he fled the room!! LOL! My email system bounces those things back to the sender so that helps cut down on the emails.
My favorite spam/stupid email shows up at work- The country of origin differs, but the latest was Korea- and they want 20 shirts or something like that and will we accept credit cards for internet orders- a few folks I know have fallen prey to this- they take the credit card number, send out the merchandise, and then are left in a pickle when the credit card is stolen or fake and the product is gone
Have you ever read Danny Wallace’s book Yes Man? He takes a vow to say ‘Yes’ to everyone who asks him to do something.
I enjoyed it when the telemarketer called to ask him to get double-glazed windows. He answered [somewhat paraphrased] “Yes! I will get double-glazed windows! And I’ll tell you why! Because I’ve decided to say ‘Yes!’ every time someone asks me to do something and even though I don’t actually own a home, I’m sure my landlord won’t mind if you… hello? Are you still there?”
Sadly, this technique didn’t work with the son of the Sultan of Oman, who urgently required his bank account numbers to be sent to an email address in Nigeria. As I recall, Wallace kept saying ‘Yes!’ but then would, instead of giving the numbers, ask the Sultan’s son for more information. The replies become increasingly strident, until one of his friends stepped in and sent a nasty email to the spammer.
Spam is my gauge to measure how well my email is working. When even the spam doesn’t get through, I know I’ve got a problem LOL!
My dad once got a piece of junk mail, and the signature looked something like “Fish.” And he said that this was a well-known signal that something was a rip-off, if it included “fish” somewhere in it. This was like 30 years ago. And of course, today, “phishing” means trying to scam someone out of their personal information on the internet. My big question is, if you are going to run a scam, why advertise it by including fishy terms? Is it so you don’t con the really mean con artists, who are all in on the Fish Conspiracy? But in this day and age, almost everyone knows about it . . . so what’s with all the swimming pools and everything? Is this a good argument for making sure children get a Latin education?
My SPAM record was only last week when overnight I received 1012 emails - thats one every few seconds - with mail delivery system fault and returned mail type stuff in the subject line.
Boy, was I pissed off that morning!
I get lots of viagra and cialis too and do you want to cum like a porn star etc etc.
Me thinks not….
Yeah, I hear you about the dubious free speech nature of spam. I’m also puzzled about not getting advertising for other non-sexual dysfunction products. When I think of mindless mass advertising, I think of late night infomercials. Salad shooters. 50 knives for the price of one. Extraterrestrial adhesives.
I read that Danny Wallace book too. Really funny, and cool.
Spam on my e-mail always seems to be about shares in America that I have to buy now. I am in a lot of debt as am a student, it really isn’t intelligent thinking on their part I’ve always thought.
There’s just something so pathetic about spamming blogs. It’s like flashing a bus.
LOL …. Thanks SO much! Today is the last day of finals and I needed a laugh!
But what about real Spam? Back in my pre-vegetarian days, I LOVED Spam. Especially fried up in a pan with a little brown sugar.
It’s not quite the same with tofu.
I love the funky spelling they use to get around spam blockers. I once received a porn spam asking if I wanted someone to suck my coock. Since I’m a girl who knows her way around the kitchen I had no need of that particular service - no matter how you spelled the C word. I love the spam for penis enlargement. Where *exactly* are you going to put a 15″ penis?
I don’t know if these qualify as spam, but I hate the ads/services/Your computer may be at risk messages you get when surfing legitimate sites. For example, yesterday I was looking up jams and jellies on allrecipes.com, and when I clicked on a recipe, I got one of those your computer may be at risk messages that look official but really aren’t. By the time I got done clicking out of that, my allrecipes site was closed, too. Poor jams…we hardly knew ye.
Pron, also spelled pr0n, is a l33t-speak term for porn - a way to get around all kinds of filters, not just for spamming, but work filters, online in-game filters, etc. It’s more of a self-aware ironic joke than anything else at this point. Except to the script kiddies.
I don’t nearly as much porn (or pron) spam as I used to, but I get a LOT of Viagra/Cialis offers. I get a lot of the ‘you’ve won the British Lottery’ messages, but not so much the Nigerian business scams these days.
I’ve started actually looking at the sender names, and some of them are fairly amusing. They’re faked to get around the filters, but come on! Does anyone believe that Precious K. Obvious or Extraordinary M. Register is a real person????????????
I think I got blammed again. My last post disappeared.
Did you know that if you Yahoo search piscina construzione you get links in Portugese (or whatever) but you can click on ‘translate this ‘ and get this:
http://66.218.71.231/language/translation/translatedPage.php?tt=url&text=http%3a//www.puntopiscina.com/&lp=it_en&.intl=us&fr=yfp-t-501
No Dance Tights Bob, his Lost Girls ,and I got blammed together with viagra, cialis, video pompino gratis, and swimming pool construction ? That’s –interesting.
Guess I should pimp the Lost Girls somewhere else.
What’s the link for the pool construction ?
I think that “filtro aria” is the filter you need for the swimming pool construction.
Seems that spam is an international curse. I could probably buy the Taj Mahal with all the loans that were accepted, plus win a fortune at online casinos, plus earn extra money by posting my naked pictures on the net (nah, that wouldn’t make big bucks, rather stick with the loan.) And then I could invest it all in the Popnet stock which is sure to go off like a rocket in the next few days.
from Office Wench Cherry on May 10th,
Where *exactly* are you going to put a 15″ penis?
My question is “Will the guy still be conscious after he tries to use it?” It takes a lot hydraulic pressure to “lift” something that big, and the blood has got to come from somewhere.
OMG! Victoria! I damn near peed my pants when I read your comment on the 15″ penis and hydraulic pressure to lift…. OMG!
I hate spam. Had to change my e-mail address a while back because of spam.
You may have heard on NPR about another fun connection between Monty Python and spammers/scammers.
“Scambaiters” are people who answer those Nigerian prince e-mails and try to turn the tables, thereby wasting the scammers’ time. One scambaiter, over the course of six months, convinced the would-be scammers that he had money to give to struggling actors. They could qualify for that money by auditioning.
The result is one of YouTube’s most popular clips: Two Nigerians performing the Monty Python “Dead Parrot” skit. Here’s the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvyrzQldOKE
LMAO
well, spam has done wonders for me. apparently, i just need to get a lawyer and i can get millions- millions- from an African bank. but they need the lawyer to stop the government from taking it, and then it’s all mine. i’m going to be rolling in it, just rolling in it.
don’t worry, i’ll share. some of you have pool supplies to buy.
LOL! Oh, Victoria, I love your twisted, twisted mind!
I think The Guy With the 15 Inch Penis would make a great romantic hero — he gets the extension as a foolish young man, but everytime he tries to use it, he passes out — in fact, everytime he gets aroused, the room spins. Because of the pain of the original surgery, he won’t put things back to rights, so he’s trained himself to ignore all passion.
And then he meets his True Love. Maybe he blames it on narcolepsy. But sooner or later, he realizes, she’s going to want to sleep with him, and he’s afraid and shy. Talk about conflict! Man vs. his earlier actions! Man vs. his primitive self! Man vs. his traitorous blood!
(-: OK, maybe this is why I am not a romance writer. These hero conflicts are pretty 80s.
OMG! Micki - too funny. I think I need to remind myself to use the little girls room before reading this blog. Sheesh.
Gee, no one else seems to get my #1 spam message. My husband and I moved over two years ago, and we’re still getting constant messages for mortgages and various real estate deals for the old address. We get more of those than the Cialis and Viagra offers, even though we haven’t owned that house in more than two years.
I have no idea what the spam I get at my day job is all about. Most of it comes in with subject lines that are apparently created by a random word generator–”Whaling headphone flower,” or “the in for special.” I presume this is to get around the spam filters. Unfortunately, at my day job, they’ve turned off the spam filter since an important client email got filtered. I’m out of the office all next week, and I shudder to think what I’ll see when I get back!
I recently received blam on a post I wrote last summer. Even the free online language translator couldn’t completely translate the Spanish. It could have said pool construction or penis construction. Might have mixed both and been construction for a 15″ pool that only a water rat could love. Whatever the case, it kicked off a plot idea that I what-iffed on my blog. Too bad I don’t write romantic suspense. Maybe I should try. *vbg*
One questions, Jenny — what were you supposed to be doing instead of your in depth SPAM research? *g*
Spammers and blammers should be executed utilizing the products they’re trying to sell. Let’s see how soft that Cialis is in excessive amounts.
Mary Stella, I’m surprised your employer turned it off completely. Most HR departments these days are worried about employee harassment complaints - “My employer isn’t doing anything to stop all this pornographic spam! So now I’m too traumatized to look at my e-mail, and since I missed that important client request, they fired me. Now I want a million dollars for lost wages, emotional trauma, and punitive damages.”
Of course, our spam-filtering service is terrible, but it does trap everything to a Suspect folder where I can wade through 20 erectile disfunction e-mails, 30 help-you-lose-weight-fast ads, 10 Nigerian lottery announcements, and 2 demands for me to update my banking information with Bank4 Idiots.
It was actually me, not Mary Stella, whose employer turned off the spam filter. And yeah, I’m kind of surprised they did it too. I think I’m more likely to delete a client email that got lost among the clutter than for that spam filter to filter a client email. But hey, I’m just a worker bee, so I’ll let other people worry about it.
I managed to miss Spam: The Documentary AGAIN, but your post reminds me that I should try to find it one of these days.
Spam filters are getting to be so annoying though. I recently wrote a friend with an e-mail titled “Mandolin Rain” (because it was raining, and I’d just heard the 80s song on the radio), and when she wrote back, it looked like she had to fish it out of her garbage.
gmail seems to do the job for me. but my school address getsa lot of “you want to make $3000 a week by filling out surveys? we have the job for you. just pay $59.99 for the program and you will be making money hand over fist”
yeah, let me just send off that extra 60 bucks i have lying around.
This is not spam….
HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!
Okay, this has to be the weirdest spam I’ve ever gotten:
“new testament theology…
shit-happens 3004169 Of new testament theology and more…”
Shit happens, read the New Testament? WTF?