It’s odd we’re – speaking generally here – so willing to abide spam. Not the canned meat, which has some value if you’re hungry (and desperate) and besides, no one is forced to pay for that kind of spam.
I mean the other kind of spam. The kind that “bots” post in the comments section of web sites such as this one.
There is something interesting to me – as the owner/editor and publisher of a web site – as regards this spam. When I worked for what is called “hard copy” newspapers and magazines, if someone had infiltrated the presses and filled the pages with ads they had not paid for that had not been approved for publication by the owners of the publication or their duly deputed factotums, it would have been treated as a criminal act. As it ought to be, for no one has the right to hijack someone else’s publication and use it to promote something they’re selling. If someone were to paint over a billboard ad someone else paid to use to advertise their product or service with the “spammer” product or service, the person who did the painting-over would likely get a visit from the cops.
Again, rightly so.
But – somehow – it is treated as a nuisance we (publishers and also you, the reader) just have to accept and put up with. I am expected to spend my time deleting spam posts. I must pay a computer guy to erect various firewalls to try to keep the spammers from polluting my site that I pay to publish from using my site to get “eyes” on their products/services at my expense.
They are, in other words, thieves – and also something worse, for their spam is also obnoxious, which annoys and turns off readers – which isn’t good for my business. They are, in other words, costing me money as well as insulting me (and you) along the way.
I think it should be a crime to spam a web site. Just as it is criminal to hijack a printing press owned by someone else and print dreck on someone else’s publication. This would be entirely in keeping with what libertarians argue laws ought to exist for. That being a mechanism to hold accountable those who cause harm to others, especially deliberately. That latter part is indeed the element that defines a crime, properly speaking. Inadvertence that leads to harm caused does require the harms caused be remedied, as by making whole the person harmed. But inadvertence is not criminal because it wasn’t intentional.
It is intentionality – the deliberate harming of others – that constitutes the defining essence of criminality. And spam is 100 percent intentional. The sender/originator/propagator of the spam knows exactly what he is doing. Knows, more finely, that his spam is unwelcome and yet continues to use every stratagem conceivable to flood other people’s property – their web sites – with this spam, knowing it can be done with impunity.
How is that copyright infringements online are pursued with extreme vigor but spammers are effectively told they can pollute the Internet at will? All it would take to change this would be to arrest and financially ruin the major peddlers of spam to end spam. Or at the very least, reduce it to an occasional annoyance.
Will it ever happen? Probably not.
Still, it’s a nice think to think about. Even more so, talking a baseball bat to the heads of these spammers.
. . .
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Eric,
I really strongly suggest watching the keynote speech of Jack Mallers discussing proof of work on his video “there is no second best.” In it he gives the background story of the inventor of proof of work and how it prevented certain types of spammers from succeeding. Of course, he’s also a rock solid bitcoin apologist. But please watch and learn.
Hi JSR,
I’ll check it out – thanks! And: It’s good to know I’m not the only weirdo up at this hour!
25,000 words to read from entries and comments are plenty.
In other news, global warming is winning! Instead of minus 32 degrees for an overnight low, it is only going to be minus 27 degrees by Saturday night next week. Monday’s forecast is for -32 F for the overnight low.
Winter is to blame, nothing else.
The dirigible Al Gore-zilla has it all under control.
Similarly, we are supposed to have some type of anti-virus software on our personal computer, in order to protect our data from being hacked.
John McAvee invented his software to do just that, but afterwards (after being sold) recommended uninstalling same…calling it bloatware.
Towards the end of his life, he was constantly on the run.His crime: REFUSING to give another dime to the tax federales.
John supposedly hung himself…prior to being arrested…or was it really a murder?
I didn’t follow the story that closely.
So are you equating it to Trespassing or Littering or Loitering?
I could go for that, but the problem is it obliterates anonymity. We don’t live in a perfect world, and I won’t send a copy of my ID or type in my social security number to use the internet.
Practically speaking there’s not much that can be done other than a firewall, and I get your outrage, but it’s hard to make a case for that stuff without begging for a security state and uber-orwellian practices.
I think on social media, I think the first amendment should apply short of petty libel. I would be upset if big tech had legal recourse to sue individuals.
Touchy area. I wouldn’t give the NSA any more rope at all.
Give it 10 years, and see if you can set up firewall rules via an AI prompt and expect it to intuitively execute without being totally leftist bias.
Anti-spam measures exist, sure. I was thinking along the lines of tools that can be adapted to any website with ease. I wonder what AI will bring to the table for basically no cost in the future.
Back to the Alex Jones show. “Muhammad married his 9 year old! …”
Another great post, Eric.
I remember the first spam message I received sometime in the early 90s, and how violated I felt. I even (stupidly) replied to it, telling the sender what I really thought of him. Then, finally, my brain kicked in.
The internet was born under the assumption of trust, that any machine (and any persons with access to that machine) were completely trusted. Internet Protocol (IP) messaging was designed with that underlying assumption.
Whoops.
Dang.
Zero-cost, anonymity, assumed-trust — along with man’s propensity to sin — guaranteed this digital hell-hole we suffer under today.
Thanks, Bill!
As a publisher, spam is a particular annoyance (as well as an additional expense) for me. The person who came up with Spam deserves eternal Herpes in Hell.
I have to thank you, Eric, for putting up with such annoyances (and the expenses of running this site). I love this oasis you’ve created in this corner of cyberspace. Great articles, and great commenters, too.
Thanks, Mr. Bill!
I see you’re another one of us weirdos up at this hour!
Anybody see on video the Obsequious Orange Slave help Bibi sit down in a chair?
wassupwiddat?
Bibi doesn’t need to spam websites, just has to have Congress and the White House Idiot hand over another 50 billion.
Add in 4700 1000 pound bombs, Bibi gets what he wants, all handed to him on a pillow.
You know who is in charge, it’s not Donald Trump.
“We’re from the government and we’re here to help,” said the Orange Idiot
“You have no choice,” replied Bibi.
Quite true, drump…not MAGA…actually MIGA.
Quite a TANGERINE TROJAN HORSE.
One of the reasons they spam is for SEO. They put links to their stupid products in a million comments section, they believe it will help their ranking when another idiot somewhere else searches for antibiotics or other pills online. Not even sure that works anymore – but they still seem to think it does. So they spam the hell out of forums and boards and websites worldwide. What a pain in the ass.
Another kind of spam is when what appear to be independent news publishers are receiving undisclosed government subsidies, making them de facto propaganda organs.
One reason USAID got taken down: ninety percent of media outlets in Ukraine were on its payroll. When the subsidies stopped, the Ukie media began pleading to its readers for donations. Did those readers realize they were consuming US agitprop all along, which was dangerous to their health and welfare?
Earlier this week, it was disclosed that leftist media outlet Politico received $8 million in fedgov payments last year. Occasionally I visit Politico. They never disclosed being on the government’s payroll. Now they claim that Politico and Politico Pro are two different things. Really? How would we know? Tell us, please, about the impregnable Chinese wall separating these two.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/06/politico-note-to-readers-00202917
Let’s keep it simple: Death to the Lügenpresse.
Department of Government Efficiency
@DOGE
Treasury leadership verified that their NYT contracts were cancelled today.
Elon Musk
@elonmusk
Feb 5
NYT is government-funded media.
https://x.com/DOGE/status/1887354310830272644
Cancel the New York Slimes.
WikiLeaks
@wikileaks
USAID was funding over 6,200 journalists across 707 media outlets and 279 “media” NGOs, including nine out of ten media outlets in Ukraine.
https://x.com/wikileaks/status/1887501752213409919
Corrupt much? This is only the tip of the iceberg. Wait till they audit the Federal Reserve. :-0
[…] Guest Post by Eric Peters […]
Cracking down on spammers is hard work.
“Law enforcement” doesn’t like hard work.
Copyright infringement often has a large, monied interest behind the complaint.
Websites owners that violate copyright are easily identifiable.
And the lack of enforcement will be defended by
1) no law is being violated
2) no harm is occurring
There is no grift money to be had, hence not their problem
And that damn pesky first amendment.
The problem is, in what JURISDICTION? most of this shit originates from such fine, upstanding places like Nigeria or ISRAEL. If OM really wants to do something USEFUL with our Military, he’ll have a Navy Seal Team sent to fetch a boiler room full of these cretins, kill them, and put their rotting corpses in cages overlooking, say, the Golden Gate, with a placard saying, “Spammers! Ye Be Warned!”
I’ve been stung by spammers spamming, has to be. Ready and willing to take advantage of your naive ignorance, you are a mark and then a sucker. A message on your phone makes you panic, have to do something.
You fall for it, sounds real, you act to protect yourself, lo and behold, you have a charge on the debit card for 350 dollars, a trip to the bank, no fraud report to the cellphone. Everything turns out to be wrong and fubar.
Every kind of tactic is used, like a sail boat, you zig and zag.
Another sucker is out there, no problem.
Hi Drump,
I despise peddlers- but above all, the kind that accost you with their wares. The ones that come uninvited onto your land or call you up – wasting your time and violating your space. They should all be fire-hosed down the sewer.
Hi drumphish:
I used to call my card provider who inevitably told me it was a scam. The worst thing they said you could do was entering your PIN/ account numbers and what have you into the scam site because they would then be able to drain your account.
In other words if your phone suddenly asks for your PIN or Account number ignore it if you were not enacting a purchase, restart your phone and clear your browser cache. For that reason you should never store passwords on your phone.
The problem with spam is that at some level it gets customers. If people just ignored the spammers; it would go away as it would be a money loser for the spammers.
“Spam” could be thought of as “trespassing” or “vandalism” as applied to websites and their administration.
I do hate receiving repeated calls from “Spam Likely”, though that could be thought of something different, as it could be argued Mr. Likely has some right to try and call you as long as it doesn’t become harassment.
But it would be satisfying to pop Mr. Likely in the mandible.
I rely on apps to stop spam texts and on filters for spam email. It’s crazy how many of these get suppressed in an average day. How many hundreds of thousands of missives go out to hook one fish?
And, in case you’re not familiar with the history of ‘spam’, it comes from an old Monty Python bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE
Spam is quite popular in Hawaii.
I’ve often thought that a sort of online bounty hunter, subscription based, to go after spammers and scammers would be eagerly consumed. Especially if it included (ahem) “factionalized” accounts of Justice being done to these cretins with various household objects like baseball bats and bent steak knives.
I haven’t been able to figure out how to bring it off though as you would need big surveillance capabilities to get it started.