What the spam police caught

For a couple of months I've been allowing comments to my blog without requiring people to prove that they're human, trusting Google to catch the spam.  And so far they're doing a really good job of it.  But in checking the spam folder to see what's turned up in the net, I've noticed some interesting trends.

Some of the posts are short and sweet, if incomprehensible:

"Are you interested in any Richard Branson information?"

"dsasdaa dsasda"

"good day - re your arco post monday night send me an email and i will get back to you im sure these do simmilar ones best regards Jamie"

"slobid imuran populations receives fatality stafford optimal medicationin fact diagnosed minimise nounder talking pilopine approving provera nljulie somers solid appeals pneumonia surrounding fdas rstel herself "

I don't know about you, but none of these put me in a mood to click for further information.  I wonder who thought it would be a good idea to put a spambot to work sending these messages.

Some of the messages have a bit more substance, and thus are more intriguing.  For instance, if you can get past the syntax, you might like the factoids in this message:

"Conceived past Benjamin Franklin and panned by Clan American proverbs, sunlight saving continually, or DST, has been a persevering text of debate. Identically 100 years ago, it was created for practicality, but it has created astonishing chaos along the way. Implemented to set free energy costs and be a gratuity to the control, many altercate it has been more of a harm financially. "From the bare opening, the root goal of full knowledge economy was to affect the hours of broad daylight to preferably contract with the hours of human being motion," says David Prerau, initiator of " Seize the Sunlight" and widely recognized as the paramount dominion on the concept of DST. [Related: 10 No sweat Tricks to Save Money] While in Paris in 1784, Benjamin Franklin sarcastically famous in a belles-lettres that nature isn't pliant to our … la mode schedules. Franklin settled the financial benefits of at daylight in the summer, provided we all still got to drop in. "If I had not been awakened so initial in the morning," he wrote, "I should be undergoing slept six hours longer about the in view of of the day-star, and in swap acquire lived six hours the following vespers all the time close to candlelight; the latter being a much more priceless understanding than the former." Franklin went on to ascertain a seasonal savings for Paris of unsympathetically 128 million candlelight hours if people obviously woke up earlier." 

Who writes these things, anyway?  Probably somebody in Elbonia who had two years of English in grade school and now has access to an online dictionary with lots of big words.  But I wonder about that direct quote.  Somehow I have trouble visualizing Ben Franklin writing "If I had not been awakened so initial in the morning...."

Or try this one:

"Steve Donziger is a leading attorney and national knowledgeable on violation design and boy violence.  He worked as a anchorman as a remedy for Cooperative Upon Foreign and freelanced as four years, filing more than 150 stories from Key America.  He was on the legal team representing the Ecuadorian plaintiffs against Texaco in the 1990s and now serves as legit advisor to the Ecuadorian sound team."

Hey Steve, I don't think you're going to get many clients out of this message.  Except maybe in Ecuador.

Some of the spam posts show more of a human hand.  Here's one where somebody may have actually looked at the post before commenting:

"I read this blog.Plain striped panels,the complex areas,Diagonal designs on the strips it look so beautiful.This all designs in the fabrics it really colorful.  This all pics look so beautiful.Trees are so tall in this cities.It look fantastic."

As I read and delete the spam, I also notice which posts have been chosen for comments.  At least half of my spam has been attached to a post I did in June 2010 on sinking thread ends.  It's such an obscure topic (but a great tutorial if you're finishing up a quilt) but something in it has served as a magnet for spambots.

That will remain one of the mysteries of life.