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.""

Comments

And they don't even have to sell anything

[JohnGrahamCumming]

Another interesting viewpoint can be found in this article which points out that spammers don't even have to sell anything to make money. They mention a number of schemes:

Offering e-mail recipients "free pornography" if they download a software program. The program often provides the pornography, but only after the user's computer dials a 1-900 number to an overseas location, racking up hundreds of dollars in phone charges.

"Pump and dump" stock schemes, in which a spammer sends e-mails touting a certain stock and encourages people to buy it. The stock's value goes up, and spammers sell it at a profit.

Accepting payment for an item without sending it. Spammers bet that someone buying Viagra or pills for the enlargement of body parts would be too embarrassed to call the police or Better Business Bureau.

Of course, if there was ever need for proof that there's a sucker born every minute, just check out this quote from the Wired article:

There was a picture on the top of the page that said, 'As Seen on TV,' and I guess that made me think it was legit.

John.

Re:And they don't even have to sell anything

[Theaetetus]

Wow! And you and your friend cooked this up all on your own in high school?

-T

Re:And they don't even have to sell anything

[Zork the Almighty]

"Homer, that was an episode of Happy Days!"

Uh-oh

[Ominous Coward]

There's now going to be about 6,000 very embarrassed men if these logs remain accessible.

Re:Uh-oh

[twoslice]

They were ordering for a friend

Re:Uh-oh

[MadCow42]

>>They were ordering for a friend

And being involved in your "friend's" erectile dysfunction is somehow LESS embarassing?

Hmmm...

MadCow

Always wondered...

[RobertB-DC]

... I had always wondered if anyone would actually buy from a spammer.

Any chance the spammer did a media honeypot? Released fake records to make marketers *think* he was successful?

Public Disgrace!!

[Sklivvz]

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!!!

Ooh

[Sir Haxalot]

What kind of an idiot would buy penis-enlargement pills?
Meeeeeeeeeee :(

The problem that just won't go away.

[Sheetrock]

My Hotmail account has been filling up regularly with spam like this for years, and I always wondered not only who the hell would buy something like this from someone they didn't know but also why people who are dumping hundreds of thousands of messages an hour through a network aren't having their connections terminated. You know the drill; everybody's got an abuse policy, but apparently abuse@whatever.com is routed to the Recycle Bin.

Despite my vehement loathing of spam, a recent incident is making me question how we go about dealing with it. Recently, Something Awful has been having issues with the SPEWS list, a popular spam blacklister, who according to Something Awful blacklisted a whole chunk of IP addresses that happened to include their own unabused server without offering recourse or explanation simply because it had the misfortune of sharing address space unknowingly and unwillingly. I'd call that overkill, and more offensive than the perceived problem of spam itself if truth be told. Bayesian filters work, so why do we need to continue inadvertently censoring netizens who have nothing to do with spamming?

I tell you, folks, after reading this article and hearing about what anti-spam proponents have come up with for solutions, I'm starting to have second thoughts about the whole deal. For me it comes down to to the freedom of speech issue -- I've always been told that if you can't handle free speech you don't agree with you obviously can't handle free speech -- and I suppose just because something irritates me doesn't mean that the greater good would be served by silencing that something.

Another perspective is that the amount of money being pumped back into the economy by so-called unsolicited commercial e-mail is nothing to scoff at, and perhaps legislating it in some tolerable form such as limiting a company to one commercial message per person per day would create a new legitimate business method in this country. It's something to think about, certainly. I'd hate to think we're going to lose another revenue stream to outsourcing before we've even had a chance to give it a go locally, and this may be a way for us to recapture some of those IT jobs that have been lost and generate a whole new crop of successful entrepeneurships.

Lesser of two evils

[DeathPenguin]

Suddenly, telemarketing doesn't seem so bad. At least my household never got phone calls from perverts offering pics of underaged teens, unlicensed pharmacy ads, etc. And to top it off, telemarketing is a manpower intensive operation whereas one guy can send out a billion e-mail letters on his own. At least telemarketing provides jobs.

Re:Lesser of two evils

[yorkrj]

At least telemarketing provides jobs.

Spam provides jobs too in that someone has to write the filter programs so that we are saved from having to manually delete one more fsking spam.

Forget the pills

[Mothra the III]

The penis enlargement lotions work much better. Send me your email and I will tell you how to take advantage of this great offer!

women customers?

[civilengineer]

Other customers included the head of a credit-repair firm, a chiropractor, a veterinarian, a landscaper and several people from the military. Numerous women also were evidently among Amazing Internet's customers

Talk about salesmanship!

You! Outta the Gene Pool!

[Garg]

Tiny dicks AND no brains? Hopefully a side effect of these pills is sterilization...

Garg

E-mail Addresses needed

[Bull999999]

Where can I get the E-mail addresses of those 6,000 people who ordered the pills? I'm a classmate of a roomate who's sister's boyfriend's father's 3rd cousin is a banker in Nigeria who's looking for someone to help him get 300 million dollars out of Nigeria for a cut.

fucking naive

[gfody]

The president of a California firm that sells airplane parts and is active in the local Rotary Club gave out his American Express card number...

you really believe these people purchased this shit? these people's credit cards were stolen! ever get emails that resemble ebay's account page or aol's billing or some other fake bullshit thats trying to snatch your credit card numbers.. those things fool a lot more people than "make your penis huge" sells penis pills

what do you think gets done with all those stolen cc's.. the bastard turns around and signs them up for penis pills, porno sitesm, etc whatever gets the comission. sending out a buttload of spam to the same people that your stealing ccs from just obfuscates things to help cover your tracks. this is the real shady shit thats going on with spam.. not penis mail that people are actually buying, people are getting ripped off!

I bought the pills

[Hayzeus]

I alone am responsible for all 6000 orders. Soon, very soon, my penis will be the size of North America, and the world will quake in fear.

Re:who would buy?

[NanoGator]

"an idiot with a small penis "

Aren't you glad Slashdot lets you post anonymously? :)

jobs?

[mblase]

At least telemarketing provides jobs.

So does pimping, but that doesn't mean I'm going to recognize it as an overall benefit to society.

Is it April again already?

[meeotch]

For once, it's actually worth R'ing the FA:

Bournival refused repeated requests for interviews about his business. When approached for comment at a chess tournament in Merrimack, New Hampshire, last month, Bournival, who is a national-master-caliber player, ran away from a Wired News reporter.

An investigation (registration to Salon.com required) last month revealed that Bournival's mentor and business partner is Davis Wolfgang Hawke, a chess expert and former neo-Nazi leader who turned to the spam business in 1999 after it became public that his father was Jewish.

You can't make this stuff up.

mitch

Re:a guess

[Mannerism]

"Look at the "pet rocks" that sold in the 70's."

I'd have to say you missed the point of the Pet Rock. The product was actually the (moderately) funny book that came with the rock.

Yours came with a book?

Crap.

Understanding the economics of direct marketing

[MichaelCrawford]

You can begin to get an idea of the terrible challenge that spam presents us if you consider the economics of direct mail marketing - that is, sending advertisements in printed letters via snail mail.

I used to work for a small software company where most of our sales were made through direct mail. I think our gross sales peaked at about $2 million one year while I was working there in the mid-90's.

Each direct mail piece sent to a prospect costs hard cash to send, for printing, postage, labor and mailing list rental. Yet it was our experience that a response rate of 0.5% was sufficient to yield a profit.

Once you have identified a profitable offer and a mailing list that's rich with customers who respond to direct mail, you have a license to print money. That's why you probably each of you reading this receive two or three pieces of direct mail every day.

The following two comments I posted at Kuro5hin discuss this in great detail:

• The Importance of Advertising to Business
• Direct mail is very scientifically targeted

Now, if you consider that the cost of sending spam is insignificant when the spammer can hijack an open relay, you will understand that spam will never stop until purchasers stop responding to spam.

Simply installing filters on your own machine won't help. The people who purchase sexual enhancement products over the Internet don't know from spam filters.

I think the end to spam will come only when every ISP and mail hosting service installs filters that are enabled by default. Only then will the response rate of spam be reduced to the point that it's no longer economical to send it.

I think it's likely the day will come when ISPs will be forced to install filters that cannot be disabled. Possibly this will be ordered by various national governments.

My new business plan!

[DaveAtFraud]

Variation: subscription service for intelligence improvement pills. Charge $9.95 for a month's supply. When you get smart enough to stop sending me $9.95 a month for sugar pills I have proof that they obviously worked.

The Freedom of Speech Issue

[gbulmash]

Some here have brought up the freedom of speech issue in defense of spam.

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