Slashdot's Disagree Mail

Ernest Hemingway's micro-story, "For sale: baby shoes, never worn," is one of my favorite examples of how less is sometimes more. Sometimes a few sentences say it all; you don't always need a hundred pages to convey an idea. Most of the mail I get is brief and to the point. Others are just brief. To be honest, I appreciate the short, crazy email more than the long rants, and they can be just as funny. Read below for this week's mail snippets.

The less we talk about this first guy, the better. Let's just hope that he found love and a treadmill someplace.

On Mon Aug 25, 2003 ******** wrote:
"Hello, I am a 'generously proportioned' male (375 pounds) with a less than generous penile length (4 inches erect). I seek a vendor of quality inflatable sheep who can give away free samples as I am unemployed. Best regards."

I'm not really sure what this message means. I didn't get the cryptic first mail that he talks about, but it sounds important.

On Sat, 20 Aug 2005 ******* wrote:
"Be well advised that my last email contains information about the persons that this script was, in fact, not written for. this section contains authorizations as to ensure that authorizations would work. Also be advised that the infromation therein is no longer valid."

The last two are both from people who obviously used the wrong address. I can assure you that I never accused the second guy of any sexual impropriety.

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 ******** wrote:
"hi, i look for south america road atlas. can be each country or two \ three countries combination gather in one. can you addvice or help me? thanks ahead."

On Sat, Aug 23, 2008 ******** wrote:
"Seeing as you accused me of having child pornography AND I DIDN'T and you accused my of ATTEMPTING TO RAPE YOU and I didn't I thought it best that I didn't have any contact with you. You are a disturbed person. Do not contact me. Thank you."

My Theory

[scorp1us]

What spammers did was to use a slashdot email address as a destination. The idea is that a random, unsolicited yet strange email would solicit a reply, at which point you now have a validated email address to sell. Each message played to a particular emotion in hope to get a reply.

Each tactic:
Humility
Severity
Compassion
Offensive

While someone might not reply to offensive emails, that psyce might reply to calls for compassion. Or vice-versa.

This is becoming pointless

[rickb928]

These look more like misaddressed emails. Not so entertaining. And not very unique. Maybe it's time to go biweekly with disagree mail???