I took a slightly different route on becoming a spammer.
One day my web design teacher asked me to write a script that will send out e-mails to all the alumni in our MySQL database. I knew exacly how to do this, and with full confidence I opened up notepad and wrote up a neat little PHP script.
Eventually, after the script was done, I hit the 'send' button, and all was well. Except, it was taking a bit long. (The script resided on a rmote webhost from which the emails were sent.) So I waited, I waited. Until I received the email. (I put myself on the list just to be sure it was sent. Well, let's just say it was.) So I'm like, "well, good, it worked."
What I didn't know is it worked about 500 times too much. In a few moments, I received another copy of the email. And another. And another. And another. Within 6 hours, I received roughly 500 copies. So did everyone else on that list.(Roughly 500 alumni members.)
So, I made a small coding mistake in the loop. Ehm. 250,000 emails sent out. 5 gigabytes of traffic. Many angry calls to my school. But fortunately, I'm still the most trusted programmer in the class.:-)
So yeah. Not completely intentional, but I'm pretty sure that fits the definition of spam.
No one ever takes an article posted on April 1st with any seriousness.
One of these days, it'll be like "Saddam fights back against Bush! Thousands of Iraqi troops entering American borders." and we'll all be like "GahahaA!!"
Next thing we know, we're all wearing turbans and riding mules to work...It could happen!
My computer was giving me a lot of trouble -- specifically my RAM. I took it out and put it back in, over and over, in different combinations, while running numerous scanning programs.
One time, I didn't quite put it in all the way. Next thing I know, my computer wont boot, something smells awful, and half my motherboard is yellow-hot. Literally, a quarter of the ram stick was lighting up my entire room; it was that hot. You see, I stuck it in unevenly; half of it wasn't in at all.
So I quickly pull the plug, pull out the ram stick and juggle it for a while until it cools down. I make catch my breath and clean off the ashes. A good portion of my ram slot was completely incinerated and part of the connection strip on the ram chip was completely black. Luckily, the metallic contacts were still intact on my motherboard. I took a set of pliers and adjusted them to the proper position. I cleaned the ram. I tried sticking it in. I boot up. Tada, it works. Phew, that was a close one.
A few days later, I come home from school and turn my computer on as I always do. While it boots, I go off to wash my hands and change. I come back under two minutes later, my entire room is engulfed in smoke. I dive to turn it off. I vent off the room. I couldn't figure out what burnt. The ram stick was still fine, but I took it out just incase. I run it again, it runs okay for a couple of minutes. Suddenly, smoke again. Then I notice the wires that connect the ATX case to the motherboard are melting. Horrible smell. I unplug them immediately. Turns out that one of my wires was plugged in upside down. I think it was the PC internal speaker wire. I tore off the wire, I don't need it.
I turn on the computer, all is fine for a while. It struggles to boot and then, again, smoke! Ahh. I turn it off, I sniff around. The entire room smelled awful. I couldn't tell what burnt this time. I try to turn it on again, wont go. I unplug all non-essential hardware, wont go. I take out all the hardware, piece by piece, analyzing it, sniffing it. I get to the PSU. My god. It smelled like a skunk crawled up another skunk's urethra, set itself on fire and gave birth to another skunk.
So my PSU burned down. I get another one.
Yay, my computer works again. But wait, my hard drive is dead. The PSU must have been kind enough to overload before keeling over and dying.
I got the hard drive replaced. I stuck the burnt ram stick back into the burnt ram slot. I stuck the burnt wire back into the burnt connector. I brushed off the ashes from various parts. I even overclocked it a bit. It all works fine now.
As good as new. Just a few tints of black here and there.
first off, its 599 megs
second, they released the files well prior before the keys were released
third, as a beta tester, I must say that is was well worth the download.
and fourth, sending out CDs, that would require addresses which not all beta testers provided
and blah blah blah i gotta go:)
- Shadow
Slashdot Mirror
I took a slightly different route on becoming a spammer.
.(Roughly 500 alumni members.)
:-)
One day my web design teacher asked me to write a script that will send out e-mails to all the alumni in our MySQL database. I knew exacly how to do this, and with full confidence I opened up notepad and wrote up a neat little PHP script.
Eventually, after the script was done, I hit the 'send' button, and all was well. Except, it was taking a bit long. (The script resided on a rmote webhost from which the emails were sent.) So I waited, I waited. Until I received the email. (I put myself on the list just to be sure it was sent. Well, let's just say it was.) So I'm like, "well, good, it worked."
What I didn't know is it worked about 500 times too much. In a few moments, I received another copy of the email. And another. And another. And another. Within 6 hours, I received roughly 500 copies. So did everyone else on that list
So, I made a small coding mistake in the loop. Ehm. 250,000 emails sent out. 5 gigabytes of traffic. Many angry calls to my school. But fortunately, I'm still the most trusted programmer in the class.
So yeah. Not completely intentional, but I'm pretty sure that fits the definition of spam.
- shazow
The beginning of spam:
Moses brought down the ten commandments.
Result:
Related spam has grown exponentially into dozens of religions.
Half-Life 2: Where The Other Half Went.
- shazow
Does anyone else get the feeling that the RIAA is being run by Dr. Evil?
- shazow
No one ever takes an article posted on April 1st with any seriousness.
..It could happen!
One of these days, it'll be like "Saddam fights back against Bush! Thousands of Iraqi troops entering American borders." and we'll all be like "GahahaA!!"
Next thing we know, we're all wearing turbans and riding mules to work.
- shazow
My computer was giving me a lot of trouble -- specifically my RAM. I took it out and put it back in, over and over, in different combinations, while running numerous scanning programs.
One time, I didn't quite put it in all the way. Next thing I know, my computer wont boot, something smells awful, and half my motherboard is yellow-hot. Literally, a quarter of the ram stick was lighting up my entire room; it was that hot. You see, I stuck it in unevenly; half of it wasn't in at all.
So I quickly pull the plug, pull out the ram stick and juggle it for a while until it cools down. I make catch my breath and clean off the ashes. A good portion of my ram slot was completely incinerated and part of the connection strip on the ram chip was completely black. Luckily, the metallic contacts were still intact on my motherboard. I took a set of pliers and adjusted them to the proper position. I cleaned the ram. I tried sticking it in. I boot up. Tada, it works. Phew, that was a close one.
A few days later, I come home from school and turn my computer on as I always do. While it boots, I go off to wash my hands and change. I come back under two minutes later, my entire room is engulfed in smoke. I dive to turn it off. I vent off the room. I couldn't figure out what burnt. The ram stick was still fine, but I took it out just incase. I run it again, it runs okay for a couple of minutes. Suddenly, smoke again. Then I notice the wires that connect the ATX case to the motherboard are melting. Horrible smell. I unplug them immediately. Turns out that one of my wires was plugged in upside down. I think it was the PC internal speaker wire. I tore off the wire, I don't need it.
I turn on the computer, all is fine for a while. It struggles to boot and then, again, smoke! Ahh. I turn it off, I sniff around. The entire room smelled awful. I couldn't tell what burnt this time. I try to turn it on again, wont go. I unplug all non-essential hardware, wont go. I take out all the hardware, piece by piece, analyzing it, sniffing it. I get to the PSU. My god. It smelled like a skunk crawled up another skunk's urethra, set itself on fire and gave birth to another skunk.
So my PSU burned down. I get another one.
Yay, my computer works again. But wait, my hard drive is dead. The PSU must have been kind enough to overload before keeling over and dying.
I got the hard drive replaced. I stuck the burnt ram stick back into the burnt ram slot. I stuck the burnt wire back into the burnt connector. I brushed off the ashes from various parts. I even overclocked it a bit. It all works fine now.
As good as new. Just a few tints of black here and there.
- shazow
first off, its 599 megs second, they released the files well prior before the keys were released third, as a beta tester, I must say that is was well worth the download. and fourth, sending out CDs, that would require addresses which not all beta testers provided and blah blah blah i gotta go :)
- Shadow