I like Spam (of the email variety)

Okay, not exactly, but since getting a blackberry phone, it's a different experience. My computer systems tend to do a good enough job screening out all of the offers for software, pharmaceuticals, Nigerian ___(fill in the blank) schemes, and various body-part enlargements. Not so with the blackberry--most all of these get through the defenses or lack thereof.

With it's small screen, I've accidentally opened a couple of these spam emails to discover little haiku-like compositions that completely baffle me. For instance, this email offering cheap Rolex watches contained the following hidden non-sequitur:

driving at? when placed at six When it was

Don't go that way no doubt

Other favorites include...

in the general language use category:

Should you want not to acquire this opening offer any further say no more.

in the general general category:

we need to get Free Games I'm afraid Final Fantasy I'm afraid

in 1940 to our topic Food So-so in 2006

you are stupid What would you like? Go I'm trying Photos

Okay...well, you do that, why don't you.

mark, Dec 16 2005 11:52AM

i read an article in the ny times a while ago about how spammers are having to use creative spelling and language to get past the new class of filters. they were predicting a day when spam messages would have to become unintelligible in order to actually get delivered.

one of the better ideas i've heard for thwarting spam is to charge a miniscule amount of money (ten-thousandth of a cent) to deliver each message. for the average user that would not translate into any amount. but for a spammer who is sending 500,000,000 messages there would be a financial penalty.

do whatever it takes is what i say. 75% of the email i receive is spam.

rusty, Dec 16 2005 12:02PM

On the Macintosh, there is an excellent third-party application called SpamSieve. With a small amount of basic training, it is by far the best spam solution I have ever used. It almost totally eliminates ever seeing spam. It does cost a few dollars. $30 or so.

Heather, Dec 16 2005 7:26PM

Gmail is also incredibly good about keeping you from getting spam. I don't know how they do it, but since I've had my account... I don't get spam in my inbox.

mark, Dec 19 2005 4:08PM

i should add that very few spam messages land in my inbox because of the excellent filtering by mozilla's thunderbird. it is only through webmail that i notice the shear volume of garbage that my account receives.

thanks for the tips, though.

bob, Dec 20 2005 11:17AM

What are you people talking about? This stuff is great! ;)

chris, Dec 21 2005 9:47PM

I can't wait for the next email to see how this one ends! Needless to say, I placed my order right away...

My uncle was very discreet, but he did allow that he watched the honored judge go to the Inter-Island counter and purchase a ticket. He further permitted himself to say that he knew he had been right. The judge and the French war hero are related and wish to meet confidentially on matters of great import. If that was the case, why didnt the honored judge have a reservation?