12 February 2006: This Classic Spam has been retired to the attic. Very few spammers anymore attempt to lecture you about spam, they just leave their droppings and move on. You'll find more-up-to-date Classic Spams here.

Not content with merely trying to swindle me, this near-illiterate di*khead also wanted to lecture me about what spam is, and also added a bit of religious proselytizing for good measure. I've snipped out the header and the usual work-at-home crap to focus on the extra added annoyances: By the way, here's a free tip for network marketers: If you find yourself constantly in the position of having to explain to your readers why they should not be annoyed by your ads, you really ought to think very hard about what you're doing.

This message is coming to you as a result Ê of an Opt-in Relationship our Clients have had with you.
Ê If you simply wish to be Removed from all future Messages, then CLICK HERE
if not, Thank you and we will keep your email in our database.

ONLY SCAMS ARE SPAMS........Ê ('cuse the wee bit of poetry, but it be Sooth, :-) UCE vs "Spam" Info:Ê Basically uce is the correct legal form, as opposed to "blatant" spam, because it has contact means and mailer DOES actual removes, AND "ADV" for "advertisement" is in the subject-line.Ê People have a tendency to do the A=A=A association by ACCIDENT of "all emails from unknowns is spam", but this is, as I say, a reactive association and incorrect.Ê If you don't believe it, become a member of latimes.com, then enter "spam 9/28/02" in Search engine there and read the WHOLE article, and you'll see how the courts see it.Ê World needs to grow-up and see uce is nothing more legal and issue-wise thanÊ "junk mail" in your home Mail-Box!Ê :-)Ê It's ONLY because of reactive response and Internet being in early Wild-West days that wild conclusions had been incorrectly arrived at! Thank you VERY much!Ê God-Bless America!Ê Now let's go after REAL targets, like terrorists!

Public Service announcement:Ê Those wanting a better world with Christian values and recognize it starts between the ears of the heads of the world, listen in to this advisory Sunday morning show "The Jesus Christ Show" on www.kfi640.com, 6am to 8am Pacific Time-USA via the web, it's unlike any advice show you've ever heard!Ê Thank you, over 'n out! :-0

OK, first of all this person does not undersand how to create a web page that will be readable on any computer system, since the message is full of invalid characters that do not render properly on all (if any) computers. Plus, his text-table layout (which I've spared you) is atrocious, as is his choice of background color. Some folks should just not be allowed anywhere near Microsoft FrontPage.

Second of all, even if his bit of "sooth" (he means "truth") near the top of the message is actually sooth, it still applies to his message since he's trying to run one of the oldest scams in the book down my throat.

He attempts to make a distinction between "honest" UCE and "blatant spam" (whatever that means). If he were actually selling some sort of plausible good or service, I might be inclined to agree that his message was less pernicious than most. However, there's no way that the usual "work-at-home" scheme could be interpreted as "honest" spam. In any case, in my book, this message was bulk-delivered and was not solicited by me, so rule #2 says it's spam.

Spam e-mail is emphatically NOT the same as unwanted commercial postal mail, for reasons I discuss elsewhere. Postal adverts are paid for by the advertisers, whereas the vast majority of the costs for spam are borne by the recipients and not by the sender.

He uses the hoary old S.1618 figleaf to claim that his mail isn't spam, but he has not provided the full contact info that would have been required by S.1618 had it actually become law (no phone numbers, no postal or street addresses). And, how do I know he's going to remove me from his list, particularly given the lack of other contact info I could use to follow up on a removal request? He alludes to a "relationship with one of our clients," but does not identify which client and what sort of relationship has entitled him to try to defraud me

As for how the courts view spam, Mr. Amateur Lawyer might like to review recent case law on spam; he'll particuarly want to check with Todd Pelow of the erstwhile Monsterhut operation (who failed to convince the NY Supreme Court that his ISP was wrong to terminate his contract for spamming) or notorious spammer Alan Ralsky (who settled out of court with Verizon over spam complaints, and is no longer allowed to send mail to Verizon customers). He'll also want to review the spam laws of U.S. states such as Washington and Virginia (not to mention the recent CAN-SPAM law, which admittedly was not in effect when this message was sent).

Wrapping himself in the flag, he gives out with a pathetically empty "God Bless America!" (cynical, that, coming as it does from an offshore relay) and urges us to go after the "real terrorists," as if we cannot deal with spammers at the same time that we deal with Al-Quaeda et. al. Perhaps, by his logic, we should dispense with the enforcement of traffic laws to free up resources for the FBI and the DoD.

The "Wild-West Internet" cliché is an old one, but I'm not sure how the metaphor applies here.I doubt that Mr. Internet Historian means it to apply to his own hip-shooting activities.

Finally, his trying to cloak his message in Christian piety is disgusting in the extreme. I've never heard "The Jesus Christ Show" (wasn't that a bit on South Park?) so I wonder just whose version of "Christian Values" are being touted (Torquemada's? Cromwell's? Falwell's?). And just which particular Christian Value holds that lying and spamming and attempting to swindle millions of strangers are What Jesus Would Do?

(c) 2003-2006, Richard C. Conner ( ) 00809 hits since March 28 2009

Updated: Sat, 06 May 2006