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The Economics Of Spamming
Shardleton writes "What kind of an idiot would buy penis-enlargement pills? Even more idiotic, who would buy them from a spammer? Apparently LOTS of people, according to this article at Wired. The operators of a spamvertised order site left their customer logs exposed. There were 6,000 orders for the pills since July 4. Sayeth Wired: "Do the math and you begin to understand why spammers are willing to put up with the wrath of spam recipients, Internet service providers and federal regulators.""
Ok, reading the article and following a couple links - here's the penis pill spammer!
Braden Bournival
561 Montgomery. St, Manchester, NH 03102
Tel. #: (603) 669-7422
Email: frappe_boy@yahoo.com
Do whatever you want with this info but don't blame ME!!!
My Stack Overflow user
Tim Campbell
1235 George Ave.
Windsor, Ontario
Canada
N8Y 2X6
TEL#:(519) 948-9208
I sued a porn spammer and going after more spammer.
Fight Spammers!
-T
It's not free speech if you have no way to avoid it.
1. Don't use the Internet.
2. Use the Internet, but don't receive e-mail.
3. Receive e-mail, but only from certain addresses (i.e. whitelisting).
4. Receive e-mail, but only from servers that aren't listed in SPEWS or whatever (blacklisting).
5. Receive e-mail from anyone, but make them click a link or something to verify that they're real human beings and not spammers (self-whitelisting).
6. Receive all e-mail, but programmatically filter out spam (using e.g. Bayesian
statistical analysis).
7. Just delete spam when you receive it. I use this strategy on my account at home, and now that I'm over the initial outrage, it costs me less than a minute a day. Plus I got these great penis enlargement pills. They really work.
8. If you're a programmer, write an e-mail system that spammers can't abuse. People might like something like that. I bet they'd use it.
You have a very wide range of options. The fact that spammers are subhuman lowlifes doesn't absolve you of the responsibility to think before you say X form of communication "isn't speech".
Actually, they're called a honeytokens. Good point.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
I read an article once (in Salon or Wired, I forget) about how some spammers simply feed on each other and rely on the fact that the message is sent, but not necessarily read or even (stupidly, as in this case) used to buy something. Some spams contain links to crap that doesn't even exist, and I don't mean the opt-out or anything - the website or telephone number or address are bogus, so even if you wanted to you can't actually buy anything from them.
Weird.
Telemarking created a lot of jobs...jobs which the federal do-not-call lists are jeopardizing. Not sure how I feel about it because the phone never stops ringing at my parents house because of them. Salon.com ran an article about it but the link is broken (provided here in case it gets fixed). Here's the Google cache of it.
On a side note, I use Mail.app in OS X and the Junk filter is pretty damn good. I get 20+ spams a day and it only lets 3 or so in. Sometimes legit mail got lost and I'd have to dig it out of my Junk folder, but not anymore (because it "learns" over time). The updated Mail.app in 10.3 (Panther) is supposed to be even better, too.
Those are probably bogus emails to harvest valid emails to sell. Usually they put a 1x1px image in the mail so they know who read it and who did not, then they sell those addresses as "1million valid addresses, only $99.99!!!"
Bayesian filters [python.net] work
Ok, first of all, I do agree... they work pretty well given the content.
But, here's my problem. It involves my parents. Their email address gets lots of spam. They are on a dialup connection. The problem is, if I set them up with some kind of bayesian filtering (or even other spam filtering) they still must download all the spam in order for it to be filtered. Most people don't run their own mail servers and can't install a server-side filtering program. Mail hosts and ISPs don't want to filter email (in most cases) because of the fear of losing somebody's important email and being sued. It just seems like something else needs to be done, like options to filter mail more stringently (i.e. Bayesian filtering).
There are only 10 kinds of people in this world... those who understand binary and those who don't
As a GNC member & frequent customer, I can attest to the fact that many of the products work on placebo effect, if at all they do.
The side-effects are severe, sometimes fatal.
The advertizing is quite deceptive, bordering on scam.
Here are some examples -
1. GNC MRPs & Protein powders : Body can utilize only so much protein. If you buy a powder with 100 grams protein per serving, you'll simply tax your kidneys and piss it off - no anabolic ( muscle-building ) effect. Anything above 30-40 grams is overkill.
2. Aspartame in MRPs : Almost ALL meal replacement powders sold in GNC have aspartame. Check aspartamekills.com for known risks. Lately, a few ( eg. MET-RX ) have switched to suclarose and prominently advertize "No aspartame", but doesn't that make then liable since they have sold aspartame-laced powders for so many years before making the switch.
3. Protein cannot be effectively utilized without carbs, however, the protein powders sold in GNC contain 2-4% carbs, quite inadequate.
4. GNC also sells soy-protein. On the protein utilization scale, soy has the lowest value. ie. just 30-40% of soy can be utilized by body, the rest is excreted. Besides, soy protein intake leads to man-boobs.
5. GNC sells ephedra in various brands ( stacker, xenadrine, metabolift etc ). Ephedra is banned in over 20 states in US and has caused over 100 deaths ( check New England Journal of Medicine transcripts ) & thousands of cardiac impairments.
6. GNC sells glutamine. Now, the body can only utilize glutamine manufactured by its BCAA. It cannot use glutamine consumed orally, so it is pointless to even take glutamine in this form. If you really want glutamine, take BCAA capsules. Of course, GNC won't tell you that.
7. WTF is NO2 ? Huge ads in GNC for NO2, totally unproven product.
8. All these calcium supplements - coral calcium, oral calcium whatnots - quite ineffective. Calcium does not bind to the bones when taken in this fashion. Milk builds bones, because the calcium in milk is bound to the carbs and digested as such, and gets to the bones. You can't just pop a pill of calcium & hope it'll get to your bones - it'll simple be excreted.
9. Male sexual aids in GNC - yohimbe & other herbs, are quite unproven in their efficacy. Check any sex-med mag.
10. GNC is in the health business, just as tobacco companies are in the nicotine-delivery business. The set aim of GNC franchisee is to sell healthfoods so they make money. Just walk into a GNC and act dumb, and ask them what you should buy to get fit fast. You'd be amazed - they'll give you tons of useless junk that simply don't work & if it does, contributes marginally to making you fit. You have to workout intensely, and they won't tell you that.
Know your facts before you step into a GNC. At least talk to a nutritionist. There is some really good stuff in GNC, but the vast majority is just sham products with fantastic marketing.
If you want to use it to host a website you won't have any problems, just don't expect any other networks to accept email from you.
Spam was only part of the problem, their customers have also been hijacking open proxies and CogentCo will do nothing about it. You can read the long history of their customers' abuses and their inaction at news.admin.net-abuse.email
Whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the rigour of penal law is obliged to give way...
Sure they sell flintstones chewables, and that makes the entire aisle they devote to the caffeine+aspirin "fat loss" pills legitimate.
I guarantee at the 30 bucks a bottle they sell that crap at, it drives their bottom line.
After all, vitamins you can get from any reputable pharmacy.
Beefcake 2000 is their bread and butter.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
"What's wrong with waiting 30 seconds or a minute to download a bunch spam, as long as you don't have to see it ?"
The same thing that is wrong with waiting 3 seconds, 3 hours, or 3 days. It is my time, it is my money paying for the bandwidth. They are forcing me to pay to receive things I don't want. And with your 30sec-1min estimate you're also falling for the fallacy of assuming your spam volume is everyones. If I were on a slow dialup, spam would make it unusable.
Imagine the highway you drove to work on became a toll road. At the toll booth, you have to pay a quarter. This money is used to pay not for the road, but for a whole ton of leaflets advertising things you don't want, which are available at the toll booth. Would you be satisfied if the toll booth operator explained "Well it's only a quarter, and you don't have to take any leaflets, what's the problem"
It was tried. It failed. Spam-supporting ISPs would swap the spammers to another IP block, and swap a legit client in and ask for it to be unblocked. This game of whack-a-mole went on for years. SPEWS does start blocking a single IP or small range. Only when the ISP doesn't do anything about it do they expand it.
SPEWS is certainly not a perfect solution, but it seem to be one of the only ones that will eventually make an ISP sit up and take notice. Ask them why it took so long.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Freedom of speech is not absolute, and the "yelling 'fire' in a crowded theater" example is only one of the most simplistic restrictions.
Let's take a quick look at prohibitions of Freedom of Speech that have been upheld by the courts.
Noise Ordinances: Yes, the Nazis must be allowed to march through Skokie, but not down a residential street at 2 a.m. on a school night. Courts have consistently upheld that protected speech can be limited to specific places at specific times so as not to constitute an undue burden of noise or disruption on the public.
Property Rights: Your right to be heard does not include a right to come on my property, against my wishes, to speak to me. A good example is when ACT UP! invaded a church during services and started shouting "you're killing us" as part of a protest against the Catholic Church's policies. Had they kept it on the sidewalk in front of the church, it would have remained a legal, protected protest. When they entered the church, they became criminals and were arrested for trespass.
Unsolicited Advertising: Opt-out is very supported by the courts. After one telephone call or junk postal mail, if I provide you with proper notification, you may not make another unsolicited call or send me another unsolicited advertisement by post. If you do, I may sue you. The law gets even more restrictive regarding unsolicited advertising by fax, requiring opt-in.
Violence: Incitement to riot is not protected. Advocating the violent overthrow of the government is not protected. Using speech intended to goad someone into a physical altercation is not protected. To take the shouting "fire" in a movie theater example a step further... shouting "what are ya, some kinda faggot" in a crowded redneck bar is not protected speech.
Fraud: Speech intended to defraud me out of services, property, or money is not protected.
Slander & Libel: Slanderous or libelous speech is not protected.
Protection of Children: It is illegal to sell pornography to children. Though it is protected speech, its distribution can be restricted to a certain age group.
Commercial Speech: You can be forced to warn people your product is dangerous, tell people how much fat or sodium it contains, etc. Commercial speech is MUCH more restricted and burdened with rules and regulations than political, religious, or artistic speech.
Broadcast Censorship: Ever seen hardcore porn during prime time on the networks? Of course not. The Supreme Court ruled that since radio/television waves enter your home unbidden, they can be regulated much more restrictively than print media.
CONCLUSION
This isn't a comprehensive list of the legal restrictions on free speech. It's just some of the major ones. There are little ones (remember that DeCSS was found not to be protected speech), and even coersions (*legally* withholding funds or licenses from groups that exercise their first amendment rights in a manner the government does not like).
So don't argue that spam is an exercise of free speech. Spam is commercial, it violates the property rights of its recipients, and is subject at bare minimum to the same restrictions set on phone and postal solicitations.
Of course my favorite quote on free speech is from Hubert Humphrey: "The right to be heard does not include the right to be taken seriously." - Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television
Urban Detail
The point is this: by not getting a rejection notice ("No such user" type message) they confirm its an actual address. On big servers like Hotmail, dictionary type spam works.
....c om ....
Example: The spammer sends an email to
a@hotmail.com
b@hotmail.com
c@hotmail.com
aa@hotmail.com
ab@hotmail.com
ac@hotmail.
and so on.
Now, send a billion emails to all combinations of addresses, and the ones that don't get rejections are real addresses.
I had once stumbled upon an interview with the guy in charge of Demetrius Software, a russian spamming company. He genuinely believed he was doing the right thing, and, indeed, helping his clients achieve their business goals.
He illustrated the effectiveness of spamming thusly. My services cost $500 (can't remember the actual figure, but it was something to that effect), he said, for sending messages out to a list of 4 million addresses. However, I had more than once been approached by people starting small businesses and not having even $100 in their budget for advertising, asking to, like, send their spam to 400,000 people for $70. I never refused, he said, and guess what - all of them were repeat customers coming back in a short while and ordering full-scale mailings for the full price.
This would only mean, he reasoned, that spamming boosted their business well enough.
Cites on studies that support this 30-40 gram limit? Or how about any studies showing problems with healthy kidneys processing large protein intakes? There is no set limit on how much protein the body can process per serving. It depends on a multitude of factors -- how quickly the protein digests, the overall energy balance of the person, whether the person is exercising or sitting their ass.
Again, any studies to back this up? You're good at making claims, where is your data? A hint: quotes from bullshit websites do not count. Something published in a real journal does.
You really are a fucking idiot, aren't you?
It'll be far too tedious to go item by item and point out how wrong you are since pretty much every point you make is either flatly wrong or mostly wrong. You spout a combination of myths and pseudo-science that has no factual backing. None. Zero. You must be a personal trainer at a Bally's or some other chrome and tone gym. Or perhaps you've taken your own advice and spoken with a nutritionist. Most of them are quoting 20 year old texts that have been invalidated through new studies and understanding of nutrition and physiology.