Spammers Say the Darndest Things 115
The Narrative Fallacy writes "Bill Sweetman has a tongue-in-cheek post about how a few years ago he started collecting some of the more outlandish and amusing email subject lines from the many thousands of spam emails he received promoting various 'solutions' related to his private parts. Sweetman, a Canadian internet marketeer now working for Tucows gets a guilty pleasure from the copywriting 'skills' of the spammers. 'Sometimes the writing is clever. Sometimes it is accidentally funny. And sometimes it's just plain bizarre.' Sweetman writes that it takes a certain twisted creative genius to make your spam message stand out from the rest. and gives us ten of his favorite spam subject lines as well as his would-be replies to the messages. Favorites spam subject lines include 'Small friend is for hiding, big friend is for showing off' and Sweetman's reply: 'Even if the product they are pitching works as promised, I still don't think I would be walking around the neighborhood showing off the results.'"
"Men will see your power in every public shower." (Score:1, Funny)
They offered to enlarge my breasts... (Score:3, Funny)
[and my wife is already properly-shaped]
Sp4m poetry (Score:4, Funny)
It's better to be hung than to work with your tongue.
Women don't like it tender they need a major member.
The dimensions of your tool will grow to a duel.
Re:Sp4m poetry (Score:5, Funny)
The dimensions of your tool will grow to a duel.
What, you fight people with it? Or ceremonial battles turn you on?
Re:"Men will see your power in every public shower (Score:2, Funny)
Thats to funny...
... as you are to people with low SAT Verbal scores?
Re:"Men will see your power in every public shower (Score:3, Informative)
In case you don't want to go bother and look, the others are pretty funny:
1. "Small friend is for hiding, big friend is for showing off."
Even if the product they are pitching works as promised, I still don't think I would be walking around the neighbourhood showing off the results.
2. "The hard friend in your pants will look up into the sky."
Thanks, but I would prefer it if my friends stayed out of my pants.
3. "Men will see your power in every public shower."
If they did, wouldn't I be arrested?
4. "Who doesn'
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I know what he means (Score:5, Interesting)
I use Gmail, so the spam I get is nicely packed into the spam folder.
I don't just clear it though. An amusing minute can be had reading the subject lines they come up with before hitting the delete button.
Re: (Score:2)
I wish I had funny spam. My spam nearly all comes in this variety:
"ç¼éOEç¼èé'ç"Yæé£åsï¼OEå±åZå好æ©Yæoefï¼ç æ é è è ås å ç® å æ èz èã"
Not even funny ... just boring ... like spam ... (Score:1, Insightful)
Must be a slow news day ... oh, right, it's Sunday.
Re: (Score:1)
The rapture will come on a Sunday.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
The rapture will come on a Sunday.
Psst ... hate to be the one to tell you, but it already happened. You got left behind.
Me, I didn't want to go in the first place, so no downside for me ...
Re: (Score:2)
No downside?! What do you call all these damn locusts with scorpions' tails, then?
Re: (Score:2)
No downside?! What do you call all these damn locusts with scorpions' tails, then?
A really bad case of the crabs?
Re: (Score:1)
But where are all the zombies?
Re: (Score:2)
Well, that's certainly taking the short-term view.
Re: (Score:2)
Me, I didn't want to go in the first place, so no downside for me
Well, that's certainly taking the short-term view.
Actually, it's taking the long-term view. I have zero interest in spending eternity with a bunch of jesus freaks (or any other religion, for that matter - but since they're the ones who believe in the foolishness of "the rapture" ... :-).
After all, if they're there, it sure ain't heaven.
Re: (Score:2)
Me, I didn't want to go in the first place, so no downside for me
Well, that's certainly taking the short-term view.
I think it is amusing you chose to use 'short-term view' to describe the act 'going to heaven'
Is there something about that slashdotters fate that we don't?
Sounds to me like the definition of long-term thoughts on that subject!
A recent one I got (Score:1)
This iss your penis: 8--o
This iss your penis on drugs: 8=====O
This one was fairly original as well:
Poke her from her vagina to her throat with your new enormous dick from Penis Enlarge Patch.
The Angry Inch?! (Score:3, Funny)
This iss your penis: 8--o
This iss your penis on drugs: 8=====O
The second one's still well under an inch on my monitor. That's nothing to shout about :-O
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
The second one's still well under an inch on my monitor. That's nothing to shout about :-O
Want to impress your girl? Big monitors on sale here!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Do they distribute diffs or do they use some kind of binary patcher? One the one hand I'd like to review their changes, on the other hand I don't want to have to recompile my penis. This is quite the conundrum.
Re: (Score:2)
This iss your penis: 8--o
This iss your penis on drugs: 8=====O
If you're going to compare it to the ISS it should have some solar panels sticking out the sides.
BTW:
the copywriting 'skills'
"Copywriting" is not a valid compound word. This usage requires a hyphen. (It's in TFA as well.)
Obligatory webcomic link (Score:5, Funny)
Not really a webcomic, not really updated any longer, and I'm unsure if it's completely safe for work.
Re: (Score:2)
Similar concept different medium:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c03b5A_gfIU [youtube.com]
Not dead at all (was: Re:Obligatory webcomic link) (Score:1)
It was funnier when (Score:2, Redundant)
My collection (Score:5, Funny)
Like the author of the article, I too have been collecting the most poetic entries:
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
"If the glove don't fit, you must acquit!"
I wonder if Johnnie Cochran got that line out of his spam folder
Re: (Score:1)
If it rhymes it must be true.
Therefore that very statement isn't so certain. Maybe it's true but no rhyme so you're hurtin'.
Re:My collection (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My collection (Score:5, Funny)
I got some spam the other day that said this:
This iis your penis: 8--o
This iis your penis on drugs: 8=====O
I showed it to a workmate. He said "I didn't know they were personalizing spam these days"
Bastard.
Re: (Score:2)
You could make a haiku from it!!
So what rhymes with penis?
Re: (Score:2)
So that another man with envy green is,
because his wife with his neighbour often seen is,
his little friend ugly and mean is,
and probably not very clean is.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
I couldn't agree more.
"Hey baby. Great set of hooters [nationalgeographic.com] you got there. Wanna touch my tuber [dahlias.net]?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"How to attract men with large breasts"
(spamvertising breast augmentation pills)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"How to attract men with large breasts"
I dunno... be female and hang out in Games Workshop? :P
Re: (Score:2)
Why the hell would I want the pope walking in and blessing me every time I have sex? I mean, "extremely blessed" sounds like something only the pope can do.
Python (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
If it's a reference to 1984 it should be wearing a boot.
Re: (Score:1)
You can hope in one hand... (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope the days of the spammer are numbered. Until then, at least we have can enjoy a good laugh at their expense.
But yet almost nothing is being done to actually stop people from sending spam. You can filter and whitelist/blacklist all you want, but that won't stop spammers from spamming. At no point does a spammer likely ever consider whether or not their spam will reach your box; it is a trivial cost for them.
Spammers will continue spamming as long as they can make money doing it. And a spammer poetry contest is equally as useless for impeding that as filters.
Re: (Score:1)
ever thought to realize that most spam is sent by virus botnets, and not a spam network, per-se?
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Completely and utterly false myth. Spammers don't make money from sending email, they get money from people reading it and then buying the trash they're peddling. If filtering works, upstream or at the local mailbox, then the recipients won't see the mail, won't buy the products, and won't give the spammers money. Problem solved.
Fi
Re: (Score:2)
Completely and utterly false myth. Spammers don't make money from sending email, they get money from people reading it and then buying the trash they're peddling
That is splitting hairs. Obviously the act of sending out spam isn't the profitable part, few people are dumb enough to pay for having email sent out, especially at spam volumes.
If filtering works, upstream or at the local mailbox, then the recipients won't see the mail, won't buy the products, and won't give the spammers money. Problem solved.
I'm afraid that part is a myth. Some spam will get through, somewhere. Furthermore the spammers will find ways around the filters and get more spam through. The spammers won't just give up because of the filters, they'll find a way to continue reaching their audience.
Filtering works
Only if you ignore the cost of the spam that you had to fil
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I hope the days of the spammer are numbered. Until then, at least we have can enjoy a good laugh at their expense.
But yet almost nothing is being done to actually stop people from sending spam.
You should really get started on that, you have a lot of work ahead of you.
You say 'nothing is being done' as if you expect others to do it for you. Some people are, and cheers to them. Are you?
If so, then my apologies, and a cheers to you too. Otherwise you don't have much room to complain.
You can pitch in and help too, anything from technical expertise (coding new better filters) to legal expertise (better laws to deal with the problem, realistic things to enforce) to financial ($$ donated to those who
Re: (Score:2)
a lot of work ahead
That part I agree with.
coding new better filters
As I have stated before, filters will never solve the spamming problem, because they do nothing to remove the economic incentive that drives the spammers to send spam.
You can pitch in and help too
The best thing I have found that I can do is to report spamming domains to their registrars to get their records canceled, which invalidates the links in the spamvertising emails. Hence when someone receives an offer for discount v!@gra or other such nonsense, they click on the link and never reach the spamvertised s
LOLspam (Score:5, Funny)
is what we've been calling it for some months now, here's a couple of recent favourites:
Reconstruct your male friend and you will love the changes.
You won't find even the traces of your small miserable and retarded friend in pants.
More strength, length, and pleasure with less efforts...
He temperate? of But. And fix be identical.
Which in 'we'll glints God. At injury TWISTED, pausing.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"Brand new Hard Horse Blowjob"
don't mean to make him sad, but.... (Score:2)
...his answers aren't funny :(
My favorite from a few years back (Score:5, Funny)
Throw it to her from the other room.
Re: (Score:2)
And from the Spam folder of my gmail account - "You can wear tight tops and mini skirts again." Thanks, but I don't think anyone's EVER wanted to see me in a miniskirt.
Re: (Score:1)
Don't be so sure.
Funniest spam I ever saw (Score:3, Funny)
The funniest spam message I ever saw had the subject header "Pound her 'til she finishes". I thought that was so funny I went and bought some Viagra from them.
Some more data for your entertainment (Score:3, Interesting)
I generally do not get a lot of spam, but one episode recently made me collect some samples [bsdly.net] and blog about them (/.ed as Giving Your Greytrapping a Helping Hand [slashdot.org]).
That page also contains references such as the complete listing of subject lines [home.nuug.no] from spammers caught in our blacklists over a few years' time.
Enjoy!
Re:Some more data for your entertainment (Score:4, Funny)
That page also contains references such as the complete listing of subject lines from spammers caught in our blacklists over a few years' time.
Seeing all those subject lines on the same page, I'm reminded of what an AOL logon experience is like.
Discriminative spam (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Her $HAIRY_ANIMAL needs more times a night
Reminds me of all the spam I get where someone screwed up the template. "Re: [SUBJECT]" or "Dear $TARGETNAME" etc.
I voted for Obama (Score:1, Funny)
Thats the best he's got? (Score:2)
His spam filters must work better than mine, these are pretty lame and common.
Inundate Your Neighbors! (Score:1, Funny)
That one showed up in my in box once, advertising something that was claimed to increase the volume of one's ejaculation. The mental imagery is unmatched by any other spam I've received before or since.
Goddammit (Score:1)
please... (Score:1)
The most ingenious idea (Score:3, Interesting)
The best idea I ever saw for spam subject lines was simply using random news headlines. Knowing full well it was spam and that the message body had nothing to do with the headline, I still had to fight the urge to open the message to read what it said. The headline caught my attention (I think a lot of them were political FUD attacks during the election) and I wanted to click on it to see more.
Flute... (Score:5, Funny)
Increase your ejaculation 500%! (Score:1)
We spent the rest of the day at work debating whether this was quantity or range.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure why anyone would want to increase the actual volume or force, as long as they've got a relatively healthy, normal system. So I'm guessing it must be a frequency thing. Makes me think of the movie Roxanne, where the young stud says to the heartbroken Steve Martin/Cyrano character, "I couldn't get it up... the fourth time."
the best I've ever gotten (Score:1)
"Transform from a grass snake to a python." (Score:1)
Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)
Girl giving head crash (Score:3, Funny)
There was a stretch where I was getting some spams whose subject lines were obviously being constructed: each consisted of a short phrase followed by a single unrelated (and clearly randomly selecte) word. One of them came out "Girl giving head crash". Ever since, I've had an image of a comely female sucking on a disc drive :-)
unwrap me, let me be your XXXmas present (Score:2)
Turn your Cessna into a Boeing. (Score:2)
n/t
Sometimes regular people can be too clever... (Score:5, Interesting)
Needless to say, I remember being annoyed that my spam filter hadn't caught it, and manually deleting it without even checking to see who it was from.
A few weeks later, we were both at a dinner, and he was talking about his efforts, and I asked him to include me in his correspondence so I could help out, and he said he had, that I just hadn't ever responded. After a little back and forth, we figured out where the miscommunication was.
Extreme Cat Rape? (Score:2, Funny)
Just got one today titled "Extreme Cat Rape".
I guess that's where you go when normal cat rape just doesn't do it for you anymore.
We will always have Paris (Score:2)
There was an especially good run about 6 months ago. I wonder who came up with these! I take my hat off. Here are some of the better titles I harvested:
Paris Hilton 'bent over backwards' for me - says Stephen Hawking
Paris Hilton full of Seamen
London sleazebags swarm to club's Paris Hilton night
Paris Hilton Returned By Aliens
Britney Spears and Paris Hilton to Visit Burma
Paris Hilton's Vagina Bites Penguin
Paris Hilton caught sucking a Fisherman's Friend
Paris Hilton screwed by Boy Scouts
Paris Hilton denies scr
Here's another one (Score:1)
My all-time fave porn spam email subject line (Score:2)
I got this one years ago and it burned itself into my brain, it was so bizarre...
"Sweet young p***y, stuffed with pony"
STUFFED? With PONY? I mean, that implies a third-party being involved, to do the aforementioned stuffing. I mean, no one really self-stuffs, right?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
OMGPONIES!!
What about the From: line? (Score:1)
I don't have any especially memorable spam subject lines to report, but I've seen some amusing From: names.
For a while, I was receiving spam from people who apparently assembled their From: names randomly based on the pattern "Adjective X. Noun", where the X could be any letter. The first of those I noticed was "Statesmanlike M. Quadruped", which has remained good for a laugh ever since.
The Big Book of Spam (Score:1)
Here's my contribution (Score:1)
"PLEASE READ" - Not terribly funny, but it does grab ones' attention.
"I am confounded what these people do with ladies!" - I am confounded that you sent me the link to the site too..
"If you want to be a real man - be him!" - OK I will! Thankyou for the sound advice!
and finally..
"Your Accounnt Was Banned" - Well how about that? Which account you say?
Re: (Score:1)
"Fly over the rainbow with pink Viagra!"
Re: (Score:2)
I'd totally forgotten that nonsense. For those who don't remember, MyMiniCity appeared a couple of years back and was superficially a Flash-based simplistic Sim City clone where your aim was to get your city to the top of the rankings.
However, IIRC the size or "success" of your city was derived solely from the number of unique visitors to its page. In other words, it was a clever