Spammers Suck

The spammers launched a massive attack on my Movable Type (MT) files in the past few days. Why? The spammer bots wanted to post hundreds and thousands of comments and trackbacks on all the sites supported by my MT system. The funny thing is that the spammers did not successfully post any comments onto my public pages due to my anti-spam tactics. However, their inability to spam did not stop them from trying and trying and trying. Needless to say, the attack or should I say thousands of attempts stressed the server of my web host. My web host informed me that they had to disable the search and comment functions of my blogs due to the attack. As soon as I heard of this news, I knew that I will be wasting a ton of time trying to counter the spammers to restore or replace the lost features.

I spent the last few days upgrading my MT, testing the new version, adding and setting up anti-spam tactics, and conduct research about the problem I am experiencing. I implemented tricks such as renaming common system files and removing comment posting for older entries. With all said and done, I was only able to restore my commenting system. I am still trying to figure out a way to restore my search function.

What a waste of my time! Sure, I understand spammers' motivation, money. And if there weren't companies paying the spammers, there won't be any spammers. If there are no idiots clicking on the links of spams, there won't be any spammers. Unfortunately, we live in the real world where spammers continue to make money from companies who make money off customers buying from spams. The cycle never ends. We all hate spammers. We all wonder how someone can be foolish enough to actually buy any products from spams. Sadly, there is a small percentage of people who do clicked on the spams to make purchases, enough for spammers to justify their pathetic existence.

The Internet could be so much more productive and efficient if there weren't spammers. Sure, web developers will always find a way to counter the spammers by winning a battle here and there, but we are losing the war. The only way to eliminate spammers is stopping people from buying products via spams. Unfortunately, the only solution is one that is beyond the control of web developers.

People. Please stop buying from spams!