How does spam work??

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Does spam really work?? I mean the whole purpose of spam is to sell your product or service right? Has anyone ever bought a product or service that was brought to their attention by spam?? Every one swears that they hate spam being sent to their computers and now cell phones, but common sense tells me that if no one bought their product they wouldn't last very long. Can anyone explain how they stay in business...I guess someone must buy their junk.
 
I agree. I wonder this about a lot of things, like telemarketers that continue to call us even though we've asked them not to. Uh, if we have asked you not to then we're not interested. Or porn sites that put false META tags on them to catch people who are looking for other things. Uh, if I'm looking for other things I'm not interested in porn, and if I'm interested in porn I will search for it. I really don't understand it either.

John
 
Originally Posted By: John_K
Uh, if I'm looking for other things I'm not interested in porn, and if I'm interested in porn I will search for it.
Strangely enough, I know exactly what you mean.
 
Didn't think I'd make it did you? What was going to happen to me? (Not really talking to you
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) Is that what's being taught?
 
Now that's confidence! "Spam will find a way", as someone once said... (I think that's how it goes) What's the lesson there?
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They continue because it costs the sender so little, even a negligible response rate is profitable.

Email takes very little computer time to send, and quite a bit to receive. A typical ratio is that it takes a million times more compute cycles to run a spam filter and display the message than it took the originating machine to send the email.

And modern spammers almost never send from their own machines. They use "botnets" of virus-cracked MS-Windows machines to do the dirty work. So the owner of the computer that sent the mail probably didn't know their machine was being used.

The problem is only going to get worse, until the law changes to make it possible to prosecute those that sell the products, based on the whole pattern of activity. The fly-by-night front company that cashes the checks or runs the credit card claims not to have anything to do with the company that ships the sugar pills, and 'no one knows anything' about the email.

Just last week there was another legal set-back. Parts of CAN-SPAM act (which seems to mean "is allowed to spam", since it's incredibly weak while preempting state and local laws) were ruled unenforceable for free speech reasons. I'm 100% for most free speech issues, but the first amendment shouldn't cover using criminal methods to push unwanted commercial speech.
 
Spam is to create a baseline demand load on the internet infrastructure. It's kinda like a breeder reactor for hardware and infrastructure growth. Sorta like texting. It serves no purpose for the most part, but keeps costs high.

How did that sound?? I made it up
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But lets say I'm selling xyz Super 3/8" Ratchets. Wouldn't a few ad's in a lower end (cheaper ad's) car mag, or men's mag, earn a bettter return on my advertising budget??
I thought I learned in my business 101 that you had to spend money to make money.
 
Most of the spams I've seen are for black market viagra. They spell it \/iagra etc. Presumably it's so embarrassing for some people to order the anonymity of a spammer is welcome.

I bet even mentioning inexpensive viagra triggers some filter on this BBS software.
 
Email is so cheap to send that just one or two hits per million spams is enough to stay in business.

Besides, spammers target stupid people. Surely there are enough of those to go around.
 
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