Spammer Sighting

September 7, 2006 1:51 PM

Spammer Sighting
posted by briank to Etiquette/Policy at 1:51 PM (60 comments total)

*sharpens pitchfork*
posted by Zozo at 1:53 PM on September 7, 2006

I was just popping over this way to say something like this. "london escorts" purports to be a way for a mess of escorts in London to use MetaFilter but self-links to their webpage as a sig line? Um, yeah.
posted by cgc373 at 1:53 PM on September 7, 2006

SHOULD BE IN PROJECTS
posted by sonofsamiam at 1:55 PM on September 7, 2006

Is this London Escorts as in Ford Escorts that are available in the Greater London area?
posted by ob at 2:00 PM on September 7, 2006

We need a flagging system about stuff like this.
posted by justgary at 2:01 PM on September 7, 2006

Oh no it's escorts as in the porny kind. My mistake...
posted by ob at 2:02 PM on September 7, 2006

Weird. He spammed the site about a month ago. I assumed he was banned.
posted by blag at 2:02 PM on September 7, 2006

I thought you just flag it "breaks guidlines".

Sorry, but I commented in thread before thinking about it.
posted by BrotherCaine at 2:03 PM on September 7, 2006

Just for the record: what's the guidelines on running your entire business from your mefi user page? I'm thinking I could list a bunch of products with preview pics, do payments through kagi or something, turn that pagerank into page-BANK, namsayn?
posted by sonofsamiam at 2:04 PM on September 7, 2006

yeah i remember this guy getting discussed a while back when he posted someone's project.
posted by delmoi at 2:07 PM on September 7, 2006

This is why sig lines should be stopped.


~birdherder
London Escorts
posted by birdherder at 2:08 PM on September 7, 2006

I removed the spammy link/comment. I don't remember what happened to this guy last time but maybe it's time for another chitchat. Mathowie puts nofollow tags in the profile page so people having links to whatever in there doesn't matter too much.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:13 PM on September 7, 2006

Thanks birdherder!
posted by ob at 2:18 PM on September 7, 2006

He spammed the site about a month ago.

No he didn't, he merely posted a project to the front page. And there is zero pagerank on userpages.

If this guy posts a sig line again, he'll be banned. This is his first infraction.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 2:20 PM on September 7, 2006

Shucks, I thought I was gonna see blood.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 2:24 PM on September 7, 2006

I'm just looking forward to his first infarction.
posted by cortex at 2:34 PM on September 7, 2006

Isn't an account named "london escorts" and the accompanying profile self-evidently an attempt to use MeFi primarily for commercial purposes? Every single post or comment with that user attribution becomes a commercial self-link. Which is the intention, obviously. I don't understand why you didn't immediately ban this account, Matt.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 2:38 PM on September 7, 2006

It's kinda dodgy, I'll give you that, but it's not breaking any rules or guidelines, it's just kinda crass to call yourself by your business name.

But you're extending the term "self-link" to the point where it becomes meaningless.

There's no pagerank on user pages, they are invisible to search engines, so there is no benefit there. I think members here are smart enough to not click on every link put in front of them, or if they do, realize they clicked it themselves and can avoid it next time.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 2:41 PM on September 7, 2006

The contents of the profile don't matter a whit, if the user behaves and doesn't unduly direct attention to their profile. And if they don't behave, fuck 'em.

Your profile could have links to a dozen commercial sites and an essay on why you like to fuck corpses, and it's all good if you're a good citizen, as it should be—bad behavior is bad behavior and that's that.
posted by cortex at 2:44 PM on September 7, 2006 [2 favorites]

in other words, being gauche is not a bannable offense, of itself, but only a self-inflicted punishment
posted by cortex at 2:45 PM on September 7, 2006

so this insomniac chooses to watch competitive eating to pass the night, rather than socialising with the working girls?

obviously just a harmless idiot.
posted by UbuRoivas at 2:47 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

purports to be a way for a mess of escorts in London to use MetaFilter

Any chance of them showing up at the next London meetup?
posted by George_Spiggott at 2:53 PM on September 7, 2006

Great, since matt hasn't banned the guy, I won't feel guilty about banging one of these hot escorts. Too bad I don't live in London or have any money.
posted by delmoi at 3:16 PM on September 7, 2006

Any chance of them showing up at the next London meetup?

remember that these girls charge by the minute.

i suggest you take up a collection - you'd have to expect to be set back at least two or three quid at a meetup of intarwebs ppls.
posted by UbuRoivas at 3:21 PM on September 7, 2006

a mess of escorts

The Freudian collective noun?
posted by TheDonF at 3:29 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

I agree with those above who've said that we need to stop these pre-emptive spammer/self linker MeTa threads.

Every time there's one, I pull out my flaming torch and make around 20 calls on my mobile to summon a righteous mob of justice and between the price of petrol and mobile phone calls, all these threads are costing me real money!
posted by Effigy2000 at 3:43 PM on September 7, 2006

May I take this opportunity to say that I'm disappointed that we haven't heard a peep out of NextStepBabyMonitors.
posted by tellurian at 6:00 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

"But you're extending the term 'self-link' to the point where it becomes meaningless."

and

"The contents of the profile don't matter a whit, if the user behaves and doesn't unduly direct attention to their profile."

But something like "london escorts" is a self-link and does unduly direct attention to a profile (which is a commercial advertisement). Maybe I'm sort of an old lech, but I know exactly what "somecity escorts" is intended to connote. The account could as well be "best XXX porn on the net!" with a commercial profile. It's inherently a self-link in the most important sense that self-links are banned from MeFi: they're a self-serving, non-community beneficial means of self-promotion (a rule that considers commercial self-promotion worse than mere personal blog self-promotion!).

The reason that commercial profiles are acceptable is exactly as cortext says: they're an incidental advertisement. A users posts and comments themselves aren't advertisements. But for the same reason that if a post or comment calls attention to a commercial service out-of-context it's unacceptable and exploitative of MeFi, just so is a username that is designed to call attention to a commercial service and does so out-of-context in every instance excepting when the thread happens to be about escort services available in London.

People Google for "London escorts" looking for London callgirls. What a good deal this user has in having every post and comment be a possible Google hit for their services.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 6:05 PM on September 7, 2006

Ethereal Bligh writes "Isn't an account named 'london escorts' and the accompanying profile self-evidently an attempt to use MeFi primarily for commercial purposes? Every single post or comment with that user attribution becomes a commercial self-link."

Lots of precidence for usernames being marketing vectors. Guys like 327.ca even have a domain as their userID.
posted by Mitheral at 6:08 PM on September 7, 2006

I'm working on my IPO. I'll keep you guys posted.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 6:09 PM on September 7, 2006

ethirial blighe is a luser
posted by best XXX porn on the net! at 6:49 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

so is a username that is designed to call attention to a commercial service and does so out-of-context in every instance excepting when the thread happens to be about escort services available in London.

The issue is primarily, to my mind, one of enforceability. Yeah it's lame to have an account named after your business, a little. On the other hand if you're a good community member your name does not matter. If you're a lame community member you're associating that lameness with your business. Once we start saying which sorts of usernames are and are not okay, everyone fights in MetaTalk all the time about everyone's username.

This person barely uses the account, it's closely watched, it's not harmful. Lots of people on MeFi have sites in their profile that are at least slightly business-based - how can we say that london escorts isn't okay and others aren't? Then we get into the business of having to draw arbitrary distinctions which are hard to enforce and tend not to sit well with the community anyhow.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 6:50 PM on September 7, 2006

If you're a lame community member you're associating that lameness with your business.

Eh, that's a total non-factor. The point is to build your pagerank. People googling for london escorts aren't going to clicking through your posting history, they're going to read your profile description and click on your homepage link. It seems like an effective hack to me.
posted by gsteff at 7:19 PM on September 7, 2006

People Google for "London escorts" looking for London callgirls. What a good deal this user has in having every post and comment be a possible Google hit for their services.

Ethereal Bligh, if people google for london escorts and they get a few random mefi threads, then Google is fucking broken.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:39 PM on September 7, 2006 [2 favorites]

how can we say that london escorts isn't okay and others aren't?

You're getting freebies, aren't you?
posted by kosem at 7:53 PM on September 7, 2006

I had the impression from the user page that it was a catch-all account for a bunch of people, which I thought was against TEH RULES, such as they are.

I know sometimes people log in and allow family members or friends or whoever to use their account, but usually there's a notice of some kind, and it's a one-time or sometime kind of activity. If somebody pays five bucks for their office to use a MeFi account as a big groupthink wankfest way to waste time at work, a) their HR department sucks, and b) they're not paying for individual user accounts, which I thought was required.

But maybe I'm misreading that user page altogether or misunderstanding the site rules or something.
posted by cgc373 at 8:11 PM on September 7, 2006

I had the impression from the user page that it was a catch-all account for a bunch of people

how is it a catch-all account if the person has 1 comment so far?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:21 PM on September 7, 2006

Gender: Around 30 female on our gallery, the hotline receiptionist is male

What's the deal with your nickname?

This nick name London Escorts is a collective for all of us, it just seemed to be the right way to go at the time.....

The first time we started using the internet? - 2003

I read "around 30 of us," "all of us" and "we" to indicate a collective, a bunch of people using the same account. I guess you're reading it differently, and it's ultimately a wait-and-see thing. So, I'll call it "flagged" and I'll move on, as per TEH RULES.
posted by cgc373 at 8:41 PM on September 7, 2006

I thought someone was just trying to help Pretty Generic out.
posted by drezdn at 8:44 PM on September 7, 2006

Was Zarisa from the same company?
posted by horsewithnoname at 9:49 PM on September 7, 2006

ATTACK OF THE BRITISH PIMPS
posted by bob sarabia at 10:19 PM on September 7, 2006 [1 favorite]

posted by Eideteker at 11:17 PM on September 7, 2006

If you're a lame community member you're associating that lameness with your business

Yeah, I was recently searching for a whore in London and turned down London Escorts because of their poor Metafilter history.

$5 wasted lusers.
posted by Joeforking at 1:20 AM on September 8, 2006

"Yeah it's lame to have an account named after your business, a little."

To me, the distinction between what should be acceptable and what shouldn't be is somewhere in the difference between having a username that's a business name because it's just your identity and having a username that's a business name so you can use metafilter to promote your business. And your point is that it's hard to tell, so it's hard to enforce. My point is that when that business name is followed up with a user profile that's an advertisement for the business, then it's not hard to tell in the least.

Similarly, I agree that advertisements in profiles should be acceptable because especially with no-follow there's hardly any way that they're exploiting mefi. They just sit there, not effective as ads at all, really, and most mefites don't know the ads are there, either. But a username that's an advertisement completes the circuit and makes that profile do what it couldn't do ordinarily. I'd bet some bucks that "xxx porn on the net!", if he/she kept posting, would get far more visits to his/her profile page than the average user gets (proportionally).
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 2:55 AM on September 8, 2006

But a username that's an advertisement completes the circuit

Only if they post, actually. So far this user has posted one comment and one spammy comment that was removed. It's not a great batting average, but if the account continues to just be a spambot, it will be banned for that reason alone. If it turns out that it's a group account that lots of people use, it will be banned for that reason alone. Right now it's just a suspicious-looking account that has done almost nothing.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:32 AM on September 8, 2006

Oh, sure, now you're up late, jessamyn. But asleep when jamjammo was crashing and burning :-)
posted by Dunwitty at 3:48 AM on September 8, 2006

It's late for you perhaps, early for me.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:03 AM on September 8, 2006

Eidetaker, is than an anus?
posted by rxrfrx at 4:04 AM on September 8, 2006

You're getting freebies, aren't you?

I was recently searching for a whore in London and turned down London Escorts because of their poor Metafilter history.

Just wanted to highlight these great lines. MeFi snark at its finest!
posted by languagehat at 5:28 AM on September 8, 2006

No, it was meant to be a quick mockup of an aerial blast map like you might see here. My model was monochromatically red, though.

You should have seen the first model; it was more of a light pink, with hot pink outlines. Now that looked like an anus.
posted by Eideteker at 5:33 AM on September 8, 2006

posted by mr_crash_davis at 7:27 AM on September 8, 2006

Joeforking writes "Yeah, I was recently searching for a whore in London and turned down London Escorts because of their poor Metafilter history."

If you were actually looking for a public escort and not a private entertainer, how articulate the person was on metafilter would actually be a good metric.
posted by Mitheral at 11:27 AM on September 8, 2006

This craptoad spend a massive amount of effort spamming all over my blog's comments, and resulted in me first disabling comments and then stopping writing the blog altogether.

I'd dearly love to hit him in the face with a pointy stick.
posted by Kickstart70 at 3:24 PM on September 8, 2006

Just out of curiosity, once you'd disabled comments, what could he do that would make you stop writing the blog altogether?
posted by languagehat at 5:18 PM on September 8, 2006

It was the culmination of the whole thing. After weeks of (apparently automatic) spamming my (Greymatter-driven) blog (at geekly.com) and all my efforts to kill the spam, once I had finally given up on having comments I took a look at the blog and realized without comments it wasn't what I wanted to do.

Admittedly there was a certain level of dissatisfaction with what I was writing as well, but this pushed it over the edge.
posted by Kickstart70 at 7:28 PM on September 8, 2006

quietly taking off my pants...
posted by allkindsoftime at 11:31 AM on September 9, 2006

This isn't like kicking up a fuss over a film to get people to pay attention to it, is it?
posted by tomble at 7:40 PM on September 10, 2006

But something like "london escorts" is a self-link and does unduly direct attention to a profile (which is a commercial advertisement).
By your thinking then, crunchland should be banned?
posted by dg at 8:18 PM on September 10, 2006

Umm, not suggesting that I think that - quite the opposite, in fact. Just, you know, trying to make a point.

Shutting up now.
posted by dg at 8:19 PM on September 10, 2006

dg, did you read the comment from which you quote me? It deals with your point.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 2:57 AM on September 11, 2006