# Have you purchased anything from spam? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 14, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147 "2010-12-14T19:07:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Nars\_Glinley](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nars_glinley/32/8177_2.png) [@Nars\_Glinley](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nars_Glinley)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/1 "2010-12-14T19:07:17Z")
Poll question in title. Have you ever opened an unsolicited email and thought, “What a great deal! I think I’ll respond and buy one.” I know that I haven’t but yet I continue to get deluged with spam. How effective can it be? I know that the production costs are low but they can’t be non-existent. ---
**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:** [December 14, 2010, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/2 "2010-12-14T19:32:10Z")
No. On principle, I will not buy anything from spam, including phone spam and door to door marketing - even if it looks a really good deal (I’m actually a lot less principled than this on most things, but this one is absolute) ---
**Author:** ![RandMcnally](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b782af/32.png) [@RandMcnally](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RandMcnally)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/3 "2010-12-14T19:47:05Z")
I have not. There might be a really good deal on something I want but I’d never know, it gets deleted the moment I notice it. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/4 "2010-12-14T20:08:35Z")
No. I don’t want to encourage people to do marketing this way. So I don’t purchase anything that has been marketed by email spam, telemarketing, or door-to-door solicitation. Also, I don’t buy stuff from people who approach me in a public place. I was wandering happily around a fabric store this morning, when a woman approached me and tried to sell me several scarves that she had in a shopping bag. This woman wasn’t a store employee, just some random stranger who wanted to sell stuff. People who do this sort of marketing cannot be trusted to deliver the goods, or to deliver the goods that they are representing. Well, I’m pretty sure that if I ordered from the folks who claim to be offering Rolex replicas that I would, indeed, get something that resembled a Rolex. ---
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/5 "2010-12-14T21:59:42Z")
Who the blazes voted “yes” on the poll? Mind telling us what you bought? ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/6 "2010-12-14T22:02:07Z")
The actual % of actualized revenue from spam is very very very small, but it still generates more revenues than the cost, which for the amount of people it reaches, is inconsequential. ---
**Author:** ![Al\_Bundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e79b87/32.png) [@Al\_Bundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al_Bundy)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2010, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/7 "2010-12-14T23:42:42Z")
I just would not reward a spammer by making a purchase. Also, I would distrust the site as far as using credit or providing any financial information. A spammer loses any chance of a sale with me. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2010, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/8 "2010-12-15T04:06:03Z")
I’ve been this way with advertising in general for a while. If I saw something advertised in an annoying way, and I really wanted it, I’d get it from the advertiser’s competitor. I also just today refused a subscription to a pop culture website that actually reported topics I was interested in. I don’t want to encourage automatically putting people on a mailing list because they leave a comment. As far as I’m concerned, what they sent me was spam. In fact, while I normally won’t do it with newsletters, I actually marked this as spam in Gmail. If enough people mark it as such, their newsletters won’t be getting through, and they’ll have to change things. And if it was just a mistake, no harm done. ---
**Author:** ![BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed)\ **Post date:** [December 15, 2010, 10:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-purchased-anything-from-spam/564147/9 "2010-12-15T10:17:50Z")
Not from a spam email, but from a banner ad. Saw a laser mouse (back when they were sort of new) offered for a slightly cheaper price than I’d seen in stores. Clicked the ad and bought it.