I’d like to think that now - most people have 2 e-mail accounts. One for Spam and the other for genuine e-mails. This means that spam gets even less attention (because now we can assume that everything in a certian mailbox is spam and ignore the whole lot in one. instead of having to ignore e-mails one at a time)
And, Sky (UK digital satelite TV service with too f*&^%g many adverts) is slowly realizing that people don’t take any notice of adverts (people actually learn which channels are not likely to have adverts so that they can switch to them when adverts start. thus getting around SKY’s shitty tactic of trying to syncronize adverts). Partly through a filmed survey they did where people actually went out of the room if they couldn’t find a channel without adverts at that moment.
So… How small does the percentage of people that do pay attention have to get before the rest of us are relieved of the evil that is spam and adverts. It must be something like 5% now, yet they still bother.
I belong to several mailing lists. Whenever I post to them, my address shows up on the list. Spammers get it from there. I haven’t figured out how to prevent my address from showing up in the mailing list. Therefore, your “2 addresses” idea doesn’t work for me. And similarly, there are an awful lot of other web-challenged people who also don’t bother with the two separate accounts.
When we send a catalog to our customer, our call volume increases by about 1 or 2% - so I doubt that 5% is reasonable for spam.
Let’s say it is only .5%. However, .5% of 1 million emails is still 5,000 responses. And to harvest 1 million addresses is nothing hard to do. So, it is still worth it, unfortunately.
There is also a “second order” effect at play here. Some of the spammer companies do nothing but sell lists of addresses to other companies, or offer sevices to other companies to “get your ad in front of 2 million people.” The spam company knows full well that only a miniscule fraction of those victims will do anything other than hit ‘delete’, but the company that hired the spam company remains blissfully ignorant of that fact. Therefore the spam company makes money anyway by charging the naive company for the “service”.
I’ve long felt that the only way to really combat spam is to educate people to NEVER, EVER buy anything from unsolicited email, under any circumstances. Until that message becomes widespread, it will be worth it for spammers.
I think Keeve hit the nail on the head. People like my parents are very web-challenged. They know how to check e-mail…period. Search engines? Well, that’s rocket science to them. So if a spam message comes to them for a product they remotely want, they click on it because they wouldn’t know how else to seek it out.
They also fall for every “Check this out” and “why haven’t you responded to me e-mail?” subject line/ click-thru link deceptive e-mail which I’m sure the spammers count as a ‘hit’ in their mind.
I think you’re assuming a lot here. Most people I know have one email account, think nothing of signing up to whatever free services they think they can get, forward hoax virus warnings / free Gap voucher emails etc. They’re not stupid, but they’re not cynical, long-standing web users. Unsolicited commercial email obviously does benefit some people; however many refusals and filters come into play, the cheapness of sending it means even a few reponses are generating a profit.
I’d just like to make something clear to those that think I am assuming. It was not an assumption, it was a wish. I was hoping rather than assuming most people have 2 accounts.
Blalron’s Highly Illegal Solution to Ending Spam: Start a cult or criminal organization with a couple hundred followers. Get them to check their emails for spam. Sometimes the spam has a PO Box to mail orders to. Get your followers to camp outside near the PO Box or sleazy motel and wait for the spammers to appear. Physically assault them. Word will soon get out to the other spammers that spam doesn’t pay.
I have several accounts that forward to one account. This way I can check my mail with only one login and if an account gets on the spam lists, I just kill it and start a new one.
Slight hijack:
I don’t mind the e-mails, because I also have multiple accounts. The thing that really gets my gripe is the ICQ messages. Everytime I get one I flood back to them “spam sucks” until it doesn’t send anymore. Usually it works for 5 seconds or so. Does anyone know if this is actually reaching the sender? I mean, even if it was a bot, it would be appearing on some computer, right? Even if it doesn’t, it makes me feel better to do it. I encourage everyone else to try it.
