Ever answer a piece of spam? /mini rant

[hyphenate]

Once in awhile I get a piece of email spam that just rubs me the wrong way, and I answer it. One of the most recent spam influxes has been for loans/cash giveaways/grants/etc. Then today I got one from the "Christian Financial Fund." I answered it. And not nicely, I might add. As a rabid hater of the radical religious right, I launched a tirade that would have St. Peter himself blushing if he read it. (I'm not religious anymore, except as an atheist/agnostic) I don't know if I would say it was deeply satisfying, but at least I released some stress as a result. :)

[realisticphish]

1. congrats!

you just signed yourself up for 500 other lists! :)

[RebelOne]

2. Here's what I reply with when I receive a Nigerian scam letter.

Dear Sir,

Thank you very much for writing to me. I am Conchita and I am so poor that I have no last name, as my father could not afford one for me. We live on a small island in the South Pacific and are the only family that has lived here for the past one hundred years.

Unfortunately, we have eaten almost everything on the island except for the dirt and two skinny dogs that are too old to scratch fleas. Fortunately, we ate all the fleas so there are none left for the dogs to worry about.

I am so pleased that you have offered to send us all that money. We have not seen money for the last three generations as we have no place to spend it and no means of getting to a place where we could spend it if we wanted to. I can assure you that we will take excellent care of your funds and invest them wisely. Our plan for the money is as follows:

1. We want to build a deep-water port in Williwilli, our little lagoon here on the island.

2. We then want to bring in a barge with an electrical generator so that we can have electricity on the island once again. We haven't had electricity in over two hundred years because the last generator broke down and we have no parts to repair it.

3. We want to build a school here so the children can learn to read and write. It is really hard to create email messages with no electricity and no knowledge of reading or writing skills.

4. We then want to install a phone company so we can communicate with the outside world and meet more wonderful people like you and your blessed family.

5. We then want to build a satellite cable system so we can watch television and see all the latest fights in the world. We don't have those here and miss them very much. We think that we could probably hook up a computer to the cable or telephone lines so we could send email messages to our newfound friends when we get them.

6. We want to build a grocery store so we have a place to buy things like bubble gum and candy, something we have never had here.

7. We will then need to build a road from our cave to the grocery store so we can get there. Of course, we will need a car to drive on the road or there will be no point in having a road, will there?

8. If we get a car we will need gas and oil but maybe we could just take some from the electrical generator and save that money for a beauty salon, something we really need here. Have you seen the women around here? They are just awful looking.

9. Of course, we will have to build a church so we have a place to go and be thankful for the gifts you have offered us.

Once all these things have been completed, if there is any money left we would like to use it to build a house to live in. The hole we use for an outhouse is rapidly filling up since we began receiving your letters of appeal and we will need to move soon as the cave will be unbearable to live in during hot weather. Air conditioning in our new house would be nice too.

It is too bad that I am only eight years old. If I were older I could come and visit you if you sent me an airplane ticket and an airplane with pontoons on it so it could land in the lagoon. One of my grandchildren would like to come and visit you also, if you don't mind.

I shall patiently await the arrival of the next bottle with your message telling us when the money will be here. Thank you again, for your kind generosity; it is sincerely appreciated.


Conchita

[meegbear]

3. Yes I do ...

I have an email account for a side job that I created on Comcast. This woman sent an email asking if this was so-and-so. I told her no (the name and the email address isn't even close). I guess she ignored it, because she put me on her mailing list.

About twice a week I get a "Fwd:Fwd:Fwd:Fwd:Andy Rooney Said What?" email, the ones debunked on snopes.com and breakthechain.org.

I berate her for them, but I keep getting them. Just put her email address in my spam filter.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

4. I have eaten many Spam sandwiches

and not one of them has asked a question. At least not a question that I recognize.

Then again, my IQ is several points above that of a Spam sandwich (IMHO), so I may be feeling too smug and superior to pay attention to its questions.

Spam emails are just sent by machines, and I doubt if any answers are read, just noted as a confirmation of a good email address to increase the value of the mailing lists the spammer is selling.