I usually don’t complain about it. I have good systems in place to deal with it. But the other day I tweeted about being tired of it.
Spam!
It’s costly, annoying, time-consuming, and frustrating. It can shut down a website or email server. And it doesn’t appear it’s going to go away any time soon.
In our brief Twitter conversation about it, one of my friends suggested that we should all report spammers.
Shelly and I often agree on things, but in this case, I have to disagree. Reporting spammers is just not worth my time and energy. In most cases, I don’t believe that reporting it will result in any real action against the spammer, so I don’t bother.
I came across a blog post today that clarified some things about the spam comments I’m getting (they aren’t spambots; real people come by and post them), explains some of the reasons why they’ll continue, and confirms some of my reasons for not taking time to report it. Take a couple minutes to read it and you’ll see why I feel that way: Why blog and comment spam isn’t going away.
Steve’s research uncovered something I’ve always suspected. It can be very lucrative for the people who actually place the spam comments or circulate the email. And many of those people are outside the jurisdiction of any “officials” who would be in the position to do anything about it. Again, that’s one of the main reasons I don’t report.
So what do I do about spam? I use tools to combat it and I try not to use up much time and energy on the spam that gets through. Delete works much faster than trying to track down the source to report it.
For comment spam I use the standard WordPress plugins, Akismet and Bad Behavior, and they do a very good job of blocking and moderating spam comments. If you need more help, you might want to try the plugins mentioned in, How to Stop Blog Comment Spam
These articles contain my recommendations for tools to help combat email spam:
- Stop Wasting Time on Spam
- Will Bontrager on Email, Spam, and Mailing Lists
- Stop Wasting Your Time
- SpamStopping.com
There are some instances where I would take the time to report. One is if the spam is originating from one of my sites because it’s been hacked. And the other is if I’m bombarded with spam coming from one source. In both cases swift action is necessary to save my business.
Of course for some people, reporting spam is in itself gratifying. If it eases your frustration and gives you a sense that you’re doing something about it, then by all means, report away. Please just be careful to report spam and not inadvertently report legitimate email and comments. Being falsely accused can be quite damaging too.
How about you? Please leave your comments on this post. Report or not? If you report, have you seen any results from reporting? How do you combat blog comment spam?
