Several days ago I commented on the spam lawsuits, and noted that the real problem was one of supply and demand, that as long as users responded to spam the deluge would never let up.
There is a story on the front page of today’s Wall Street Journal that backs me up. As per the article, Mr. Orlando Soto of New York considers browsing through spam to be a “treasure hunt”. He likes to get 150 spam messages a day, and lamented the day on which he only received 17 messages. He reads them, picks the ones he is interested in, and … and here is the worst part … he buys stuff from spammers. He has bought a bingo machines, all sorts of vitamins, ribbons, cigarettes, a metal detector, and more. And he is actually thankful for spam.
Thanks to the likes of Mr. Soto, we are doomed.
We're Doomed to an Eternity of Spam
3 responses to “We're Doomed to an Eternity of Spam”
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I just sent him an offer for a brain liposuction device. Let’s see if he picks up on it…. 😉
(For lots of spam there’s not a direct financial return to the originator… they get paid for hits, rather than results. This could decline with time if the foolish did not participate, but there’s not necessarily a direct relationship between spam and sales anymore.) -
I was reflecting on your post the other day– I think an interesting argument could be brought-up that the rate of mental problems is probably actually higher than the purchase rate of spam. Given even that single statistic, it would be virtually impossible to eliminate spam from a social perspective rather than a technology solution.
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A very sad, unbelievable yet believable world we live in. Anyway re: Spam. I run a small hosting company and decided filter how many spam emails my mail server receives. Last month I received 16244 spam emails. For more details go here http://spamlog.portal80.net/spamlog.cfm I have spam filters, content filters you name it, I give up. Spam will never go away unless we do not let it happen in the first place. I am thinking of building a new email protocol or can someone please build a mail service that enables the recipient to get mail ONLY from the people he/she wants mail from. Yes I know that the rest of the world will have to use this email service but at least it is a start and I am sure would spread rapidly and whomever develops this service will be richer than Bill himself, but don’t tell anyone my idea (he hah). I am sure you can build this in no time Ben, just give me 1 Mill when you have made 10 and I will be happy.
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