Annoying and funny is still annoying -- but still fun to mock

[jducoeur]

On the downside, I'm a bit cranky that somebody has clearly come up with a new spam service this week: the amount getting into my Gmail Spam box (as opposed to being deleted outright) has abruptly risen tenfold.

On the upside, some of these new script kiddies are so incompetent that it's almost a little endearing. Like the several copies of spam I just got whose subject line is literally "You Have Been Selected For [PRODUCT] Samples." And yes, the content of the email (in enormous, boldfaced colored letters) is, "Hey Jducoeur, [PRODUCT] Sampler is Waiting". Somebody apparently doesn't understand that there aren't actually hordes of Americans who are anxiously awaiting [PRODUCT].

Sometimes I can almost see (if I squint a lot) how some particularly naive people might be fooled into clicking on some of these spams. But seriously, folks, you have to at least try...

Comments

[laurion]

And if you haven't yet, it is time to read Charles Stross's Rule 34...

[jducoeur]

How to phrase this without spoilers?

Yes, but these emails don't leave me terribly worried about the end of that book coming to pass any time soon...

[serakit.livejournal.com]

...trust me, people really are that naive. Though with most of the people I'm thinking of, it's not so much "naive" as computers just being *that* foreign such that "don't click strange links" actually hasn't penetrated.

[hudebnik.livejournal.com]

Wait... this doesn't make sense. I don't understand, what is [PRODUCT]? Oh, here's a hot-link; maybe if I click on this it'll make more sense.

[ilaine-dcmrn.livejournal.com]

there was this theory kicking around that the spammers are deliberately filtering out the smarter marks in order to not waste their own time on people who won't be profitable to them