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Spam is internet garbage

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Omega Destroyer

Member
Joined
Sep 27, 2002
Location
Alberta
Well after reading the article on the front page, I thought I'd throw in my two cents about spam. Yes, like all of you, and EVERYONE I've ever talked to, they hate spam. They send you junk that has no relevence to your life what-so-ever, and expect you to call them.
And the way they do it is getting worse and worse. First it started with email and banners, then they started the popups, then they moved onto flash animation that you have to watch before the page loads, or popups with no close button, and now more recently sending messenger to WinXP and Win2k users through messenger. It's just so frusterating.
Really what course, or get rich quick schemes tell these people that spamming works? Don't they realize that after they do it, the whole world will hate them? They will be known as scum, the epitome of internet garbage.
So I have to ask myself does spamming really work? I mean are there people out there who are guilible enough to click on a link that promises them a bigger penis? Or click on a link for a free email address, when you obviously have one already (free or not). I guess they want to flood it with so much ads that you have to get a new one. Which seems to be what more and more people are doing. Unless you take great care to never post your address on any page, you pretty much have to get a new address everyonce in a while after the sniffers have been around.
It also bothers me that my 15 year old brother gets porn in his email, and no it's not because he subscribed, despit what the end of the letter may tell you.
Most often you never subscribed to these stupid ads. Why would you want to? And yet they insist you did.

So I guess it must be working. There must be people out there clicking on these links, and there must be enough of them that these ad companies make so much money, offering 5 cents a click.
For those of you who have popups in pages you've made. Tell me, is it worth selling your soul for 5cents a click. Fooling people into coming to your page, so you can make money off them just being there?

Well I'm sure that there is stuff that I'm forgetting to mention, and this is awfully long, and no one will read it anyway, but at least I was able to vent some frusteration. If I remember something maybe I'll edit, or not.

Anyway feel free to vent your rage. I'm going to have to give this three rage emoticons :mad: :mad: :mad:

Edit: Oh yes I forgot to mention spyware, but I try to stay clear of that cr*p. I've never installed anything like that before, but last time I went to someone's house to fix their computer, I opened up internet explorer, and it had six popups before I even typed in a url.
 
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I agree 100% with you. Same thing with spyware in stuff like Gator and Bonzi Buddy. I really despise(sp?) any person that actually clicks on these links. If I find out someone I know actually clicks on the links, I'll be sure to yell at them.

I posted something similar to this in Network Security. It sucks. We have to deal with it. At least we (people who know stuff about comps) are able to better deal with it.
 
Last thing I knew, the popups were paying better than 5 cents a click. They were automatic traffic to the site and were paying upwards of 10cents a visiter. You have to be VERY fast closing the window to prevent them from making money.

I as well hate all these new forms of advertisement with a passion. Banners on web site I have no problem with. They can be set up to give a good appearance, and fund the site without cluttering it up, if they are placed properly. Popups are VERY annoying. and those newer ones that pop under your window are even worse. the green and purple varmenets... I think it should be open season on gators and apes that try to weazle you out of your privacy! Death to the purple ape! As for spam, I though I had gotten away when I switched to my own server, but now I have started getting it again. I'm hoping I've managed to get it killed off. I was getting 10+ adds from the same company so I tried the unsubscribe link. If that sealed my fate on that account, I'll be hooking up to RBLs and other spam removal software. I have other clients on my server that are complaining about spam as well.

Let's not let the spammers win by default. Fight them with everything you have. Complain to spammers ISPs, report them to the RBLs , ask your ISP to try to filter spam, get your friends and family to join the fight. Together we can make a difference. Heck even get your government officals to try to help. (even though I don't seen this accomplishing anything, it's worth a try)
 
Bonzi Buddy and Gator are the worst. While I was going through all the crap on my buddy's machine before a reformat, I found something labled "BBSetup.exe". I opened it, hoping I'd at least be able to specify the directory I wanted it installed to. Nope. It completely installed itself and all sorts of other crap right on top of his OS.

Nothing ****es me off more than programs that think they're the top dog on my machine. The *only* piece of software that I allow to make decisions for me is 2kPro. *** damn spyware. :mad:
 
Yeah, I'd like to see spammers done away with by law, myself...but just try to get a congressman behind you without a fat campaign contribution...government by the buck, for the buck.

I'm forced to get a new e-mail address tomorrow. I've had this same one for 8 years now, and I'm very PO'd about having to change, but I got 32 e-mails today, and none of them were from anyone I know. My ISP has a supposed nospam.mail.net address, but I'm using it, and it don't work. Almost makes me think the ISP is forwarding the email to it...stupid peckerwoods.
I wish there were at least one damned legal standing that would allow me to sue these little pricks, but they're probably third party mail distributors who'd be difficult to trace anyway.
It's my damned property, I payed for it, I invented the name even, but people look at me like I've been spray-painting in the closet (thanks Surly Joe for that expression) when I say it's tresspassing.

'Sides, if we ever could fight back somehow, they'd just hide behind the first ammendment claiming that their tresspass was freedom of speech or some such crap.
Everywhere I turn to find we are all swinging in the breeze on our own.
Maybe if we signed up a few Senators to mypoints or freebie sites, they'd start to notice....maybe we should start using senator's email adresses when we don't want to use our own:D
 
Ignorance is bliss.....I ignore it, and I'm blissfully happy:)

Pop-ups. Why continue to use Microsoft Pop-Up 5.5 or 6? (oops, sorry, I meant Internet Explorer!)

Install Mozilla or Opera (they're free!) and banish pop-ups forever. (Add ZoneAlarmPro, and get double layer protection!) I haven't had a pop-up, pop-down, pop-under, or new window adverts since I stopped using IE....
 
Yeah but when you block ad pop ups, you may block other important popups in certain pages. Like sometime when you click a link, or visit a page, they have popups essential to that page, and you will block those.
I have norton firewall which does that, but I don't use the feature for that reason.
 
lol good reading, i like to spam my tech teacher with anonmous emails liek 1-2 hundered will crash his computer, great fun~!!
 
As a designer, I can tell you how many clients REQUEST pop-up advertising on their sites. They think it is the best thing since sliced bread, and the revenue potential is endless.

I gladly tell them that if they want to use that type of advertising, to ask another design firm, because I won't put my company name on that site.
 
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