No I think your message illustrates things pretty well. I guess the fundimental differenc here is not only does it cost usually very little to receive these messages it costs even less infact dramatically to send spam. It seems there is no real reason for the spammer to be concerned with whether the mail is properly targeted or not so a full on flood is possible and the leads generated by this flood percentage wise have to be many factors less than the percentage of success in snailmail. On 3 May 2002, Paul Vixie wrote:
... I'm not sure entirely what the big deal with spam is. Honestly sure I get it like everyone else, in some of my accounts more than others ... I have a delete key ...
in the time between when you sent the above, and when i read it, the following messages were added to my mailbox:
1+ 05/03 stay5hard@hotmail The Harder you are The More She Will Come .. Vi 2 05/03 stayhdard@hotmail An Investment that will Rise with out a Doubt.. 3 05/03 sta4yhard@hotmail The Harder you are The More She Will Come.. Via 4 05/03 stayharud@hotmail The Harder you are The More She Will Come.. Via 5 05/03 "henning@mercadob Nasty Japanese Whores! 14918<<Have you ever won 6 05/03 Cindy_W0887w08@ho fw.....$25 Investment - Massive Return<<======= 7 05/03 Cindy_W5276c01@ms fw......$25 Investment - Massive Return<<====== 8 05/03 "Joke-of-the-Day! Patients taking Tri-Phetamine for 30 days, lost 9 05/03 istayhard@hotmail The best Hard-on you have ever had<<VIAGRA (and 10 05/03 sjtayhard@hotmail Be Hard as a Rock.. Make her come and come../<< 11 05/03 "AEMI" ADV: A low cost professional 800 number is fina 12 05/03 "AEMI" ADV: A low cost professional 800 number is fina 13 05/03 stayhayrd@hotmail Be Hard as a Rock.. Make her come and come .. V 14 05/03 sxtayhard@hotmail Vaniqa .. Order today You Unwanted Hair Will be 15 05/03 zstayhard@hotmail The Harder you are The More She Will Come.. Via 16 05/03 stayrhard@hotmail Take the Blue Pill.. and show her how far the R 17 05/03 sthayhard@hotmail Better for Him Better for Her.. . Order Viagra 18 05/03 fobare@imcnet.net Quality Affordable Hunts!<<<html> <head> <title 19 05/03 mailing@revistatr Especial 100 edi es<<A TRIP deste m s j est na 20 05/03 "AEMI" ADV: A low cost professional 800 number is fina 21 05/03 stadyhard@hotmail Take the Blue Pill.. and show her how far the R 22 05/03 "Kitty Dials" Record Low MORTGAGE rates! *Act Fast* 11551<<<h 23 05/03 "AEMI" ADV: A low cost professional 800 number is fina 24 05/03 "AEMI" ADV: A low cost professional 800 number is fina 25 05/03 stayhnard@hotmail Online Pharmacy..Any Medication you Need Lowest 26 05/03 "Val" (&~) You only THINK you're a U.S. citizen! %8t<
it comes in 24 hours a day, 365.24 days per year, at about that rate. and that's after subscribing to several source-address-based rejection filters, and rejecting some additional sources. (otherwise it would be 4X worse, at least according to my syslog.) here's a short term histogram:
lartomatic=# SELECT DATE(entered),COUNT(*) FROM spam WHERE DATE(entered) >= '2002-04-01'::DATE GROUP BY DATE(entered) ORDER BY DATE(entered) DESC; date | count ------------+------- 2002-05-03 | 78 -- (partial) 2002-05-02 | 111 2002-05-01 | 176 2002-04-30 | 122 2002-04-29 | 99 2002-04-28 | 65 2002-04-27 | 128 2002-04-26 | 143 2002-04-25 | 107 2002-04-24 | 107 2002-04-23 | 73 2002-04-22 | 121 2002-04-21 | 72 2002-04-20 | 101 2002-04-19 | 104 2002-04-18 | 89 2002-04-17 | 100 2002-04-16 | 78 2002-04-15 | 119 2002-04-14 | 113 2002-04-13 | 116 2002-04-12 | 167 2002-04-11 | 167 2002-04-10 | 100 2002-04-09 | 166 2002-04-08 | 81 2002-04-07 | 105 2002-04-06 | 115 2002-04-05 | 116 2002-04-04 | 125 2002-04-03 | 91 2002-04-02 | 88 2002-04-01 | 97 (33 rows)
go ahead and "Just Hit Delete" if you want.