BaedonWebz Newz: Spam, Spam, Spam, real comments, and Spam

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Spam, Spam, Spam, real comments, and Spam

[caption id="attachment_450" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Even this little on knows Spam SUCKS"]

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Since the last reboot of this blog, some time in March, I’ve had over 4,000 SPAM comments pass through the comment checking system. You would think that Spammers would figure out that this blog is not a good place to try to leave their wares.

The hardest part about starting out a blog is getting an audience. I know, the more successful blogs stick to one topic, but I can’t seem to do that. But the thing that really begins to annoy the average blogger is the copious amounts of Comment Spam we have to deal with. Every blogging system has some way to help fight the spammer, but nothing really works. It is just something we learn to deal with.

The only thing that I've found that works is using a CAPTCHA of some sort. But, this also derails the concept of leaving a comment. Most people don't want to be bothered with an extra step when the leave a comment. The only recourse the admins have is screening comments before they are posted. This is tedious and time-consuming (yet, something I do).

Social Media Spam

This happens the most on Twitter. You are talking with your Tweeps, when suddenly someone you never heard of sends you a message that links to some product. You didn't ask for this message, it was sent to you by an automated bot that was trolling Twitter for the specific word you used in a Tweet. There is nothing you can really do about this. You could report the account, but why should you have to do this? Just another annoyance to deal with on a daily basis.

Spam is just part of like, like radio and television commercials. We can either get totally ticked about it or we can ignore it completely. I think I'll head to the kitchen and fry up some Spam and eggs for lunch....