# Another 'What's the point of all this spam?' thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 16, 2007, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664 "2007-11-16T10:01:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/1 "2007-11-16T10:01:04Z")
Drowning under a deluge of spam on one or two email addresses at the company (I guess that’s what you get for having an email address like sales@… or enquiries@…), I’ve installed a spam filter on the server meaning it’s now my job to babysit it for a while and train the filter. **So amongst today’s crop of spam, I have the usual stuff:** _MoneybackPolicyPharmPharmSpecialPrices_ (containing just a link I’m not going to click on) _Your cock will get a bigger size and you’ll love it Make order and get 4 Viagra pills for FREE! Appreciate better prices and higher quality of medications received from Canada. Cheap and excellent software - too good to be true? Read information below! Have you seen this Britney photo? Kindle a passion in her heart with your magic stick Beat her womb with your new big rod, so that she knew who wears the pants! Most intimate problems can be solved with WonderCum. Style up your life with classy replica watches!_ (And so on…) **Plus a number that deliberately mislead with their titles, for example:** _Does the Bible forbid Interracial Marriages?_ (actually a link to buy viagra online) **A number that have garbled, terse or vague subject lines such as:** _I haven’t seen you for weeks. For Sales attention RE: orcistic dreezitk RE:14_ **And a few that are clearly designed to try to bypass the filter with an assortment of random words:** _Monster Army Telescope Wheelchair Bowl Bathtub Sex Leg Bathtub Bible Worm Square Signature Adult Pocket Dress Fungus Bible Bee Tunnel Meteor Sandwich Pocket Gemstone Teeth microclimate two in Vancouver Carrying live_ I know this has been discussed to death - they wouldn’t create these messages unless there was money in it, and nobody would pay the money unless it was effective, but I still don’t get it. Are there really that many people out there in the market for penile enlargement? Are there really people who would take pills they bought from a seedy, shady website? Are there really people who want to know if the Bible does forbid interracial marriages, but on opening the email, decide they’ll buy viagra instead? Who is it that makes this profitable? ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/2 "2007-11-16T10:20:54Z")
even a single sale is profit - these days there are a number of ways to get free email accounts, including: set up a domain name - send a bunch of email - cancel the domain name; not to mention all the foreign yahoo domains I’ve been seeing in my spam. ---
**Author:** ![Surok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@Surok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surok)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 10:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/3 "2007-11-16T10:50:21Z")
I heard one of the authors of [this book](http://www.amazon.com/Inside-Spam-Cartel-Trade-Secrets/dp/1932266860/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1195210053&sr=1-1) speak at a conference. IIRC, he had some interesting numbers on click-through rates and purchases. You might find a 20 minute flip through interesting. ---
**Author:** ![chappachula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d2c977/32.png) [@chappachula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chappachula)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/4 "2007-11-16T13:14:40Z")
I only wish to point out an interesting item: This is a thread about spam–and the Google ad right now says “Cure Erectile Dysfunction Naturally & Always Be Ready To Go. Order Now!” Is that a coincidence? Or does Google’s artificial intelligence program understand the logical connection of the words “spam” and “erectile dsyfunction”? ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/5 "2007-11-16T13:18:34Z")
I expect it’s picking up on the word ‘Viagra’. The ads are context-sensitive, or at least I think they try to be (I haven’t seen them for a long time). ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/6 "2007-11-16T13:28:19Z")
The ones that I’ve seen a lot of lately that puzzle me: **_Sold Out_ Rolex replicas** So, they _don’t_ have the product they’re selling??? For this to work requires two groups of idiots. The first group that thinks that adding “Sold Out” to an ad increases sales. The second group that thinks that “Sold Out” products are a good thing to buy. P.T. Barnum wishes he was born 150 years later. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/7 "2007-11-16T13:43:32Z")
[QUOTE=ftg] The ones that I’ve seen a lot of lately that puzzle me: **_Sold Out_ Rolex replicas** So, they _don’t_ have the product they’re selling??? [/QUOTE] No, they’re selling replicas of Rolexes that have been “sold out” and unavailable. One of the pitfalls of headline writers is that they sometimes can be read two ways. ---
**Author:** ![jali](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecae2f/32.png) [@jali](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jali)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/8 "2007-11-16T14:43:32Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] No, they’re selling replicas of Rolexes that have been “sold out” and unavailable. One of the pitfalls of headline writers is that they sometimes can be read two ways. [/QUOTE] Hey… How do you know? Hmmm… Are you the master spammer? ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/9 "2007-11-16T16:24:23Z")
There is obviously _some_ profit to be made. I think the problem is that they don’t _need_ a high click-through rate to be profitable because the financial outlay for a spam campaign is negligible and is probably paid for with just one or two sales. So, as long as they can find just a relative handful of suckers to click on this crap, they’re making money, and this kind if low investment/high return scheme is attractive to shady sorts. (Well, jeez, that very concept is attractive to _any_ business model, but spam campaigns have incredibly low overhead so they are as near to an an ideal version of that model as you can practically get.) The form these bits of spam take, however, is still a mystery to me. I am at a complete and utter loss to explain the sort of person who would follow a link contained in an E-Mail whose subject line exclaimed, “Stochastic Rubber Banana Meat Plug!” Because even the densest among us has to know that they will be sorely disappointed when the included link unsurprisingly turns up absolutely no stochastic rubber banana meat plugs. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/10 "2007-11-16T16:31:39Z")
Perhaps someone can enlighten me. My assumption about contemporary spam is that some of it is intended to sell, but some is intended to provoke the recipient into responding or clicking a link with a title such as “unsubscribe.” This would 1) inadvertently confirm receipt and thus allow targeting of a viable address; or 2) sucker the recipient who’s trying to “unsubscribe” into providing information or downloading something that allows access to the computer or provides more personal data. In other words, I’m assuming that spam has a built-in and deliberate annoyance factor that leads to the real intent of the spam. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/11 "2007-11-16T18:46:31Z")
[QUOTE=Mindfield] There is obviously _some_ profit to be made. I think the problem is that they don’t _need_ a high click-through rate to be profitable because the financial outlay for a spam campaign is negligible and is probably paid for with just one or two sales. [/QUOTE] Like **Mangetout** , I still find myself wondering. I mean, it must cost _something_ to buy a list of email addresses. It must cost _something_ to cook up some fake Viagra tablets. And there’s obviously a certain amount of bother involved. Even if you send out a million spams and get 15 takers, is it really worth it? Seems more likely, as **Shoshana** points out, that the point of spam is not to sell something, but to do something nefarious to your computer. ---
**Author:** ![Mindfield](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mindfield/32/19759_2.png) [@Mindfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mindfield)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/12 "2007-11-16T19:29:19Z")
Oh, there are plenty of phishing spams, too – the ones that try and get you to click on something to infect your computer with malware of one flavour or another. Others might just be complete frauds trying to get you to divulge your credit card information. I’d even wager than the majority of spam takes this form – though I have absolutely no cite. It just makes more sense; scams are easier to pull than running some sort of quasi-legitimate business. Still, for this latter, type, expenses are likely still at a minimum. They can buy the fake/knockoff products fairly cheap in bulk and mark them up to whatever the hell they want as long as they’re still far cheaper than the branded stuff, thus making them attractive. Lists of names are also typically pretty cheap. I seem to recall some study several years back that, when it comes to the more conventional spam (that is, junk mail in your real mail box), the average name list costs about $0.02 per name. I’d wager it’s a lot cheaper for spammers. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/13 "2007-11-16T19:51:12Z")
[QUOTE=jali] Hey… How do you know? Hmmm… Are you the master spammer? [/QUOTE] I bought one. A pretty good watch, but you have to go to Hong Kong to replace the battery. ---
**Author:** ![Pithy\_Moniker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8dc957/32.png) [@Pithy\_Moniker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pithy_Moniker)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/14 "2007-11-16T20:20:02Z")
[QUOTE=Mangetout] _Monster Army Telescope Wheelchair Bowl Bathtub Sex Leg Bathtub Bible Worm Square Signature Adult Pocket Dress Fungus Bible Bee Tunnel Meteor Sandwich Pocket Gemstone Teeth microclimate two in Vancouver Carrying live_ [/QUOTE] So many band names. So little time. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2007, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-whats-the-point-of-all-this-spam-thread/426664/15 "2007-11-16T20:46:50Z")
I’ve probably deleted a fair number of legitimate e-mails because I didn’t recognize the sender (it is unlikely I would want to read mail from Importunio Kovalevsky or Malassezia Furfur) or because someone uses the same subject line as spammers (my sister, for instance, is prone to sending e-mails with the subject being “Hi”). There are enough stoopit or hopelessly naive people out there to keep spammers in business just on the sales angle. And undoubtedly scads of first-time computer users are daily clicking on phony bank links and sending all of their vital personal data to Boris and his crew in Estonia (“Wow, I never even knew I _had_ a People’s Bank account! Better be safe than sorry, though”).