Student antics and spam

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September 30, 2006 · Filed Under This blog

Over the last few days I’ve been getting some funny spam and I was worried that I had been targeted by some hacker/spammer. However, it transpired that my site and some others were merely the target of a student who was participating in an SEO contest and using a system to bring certain keywords up to a higher ranking in Google. This experimenting individual seems to have realised that he/she has done something that was not appreciated and will hopefully find another way to achieve what he/she wants to do. Now that I have calmed down a bit, I don’t feel so bad towards this person, after all, we all make mistakes.

This incident also reminded me of rag mags. Anyone remember those? They were magazines produced during student rag weeks and contained a selection of naughty jokes, and at school we all circulated these publications rather surreptitiously, hoping that teachers/parents would not find this little tome with all its bad language and dirty jokes. Basically it was all a little harmless fun. Funny how certain things remind you of the past, isn’t it.

This affair also reminded me of when I got myself in a little trouble with the then Department of the Environment after I had phoned up central government and told them that an amendment to some legislation had made our jobs rather difficult. I still remember my boss calling me into his office, whilst trying to suppress a smile, and telling me that someone in the Chief Executive of the County Council I worked for at the time wanted to know just who I was. I did not feel particularly bad about what I had done and luckily my boss agreed with my point of view. I suppose, with hindsight, that I could have got myself in big trouble over the incident.

You see, we all make mistakes, the trick is to learn from them. Hopefully the inadvertent spammer will learn from his/her silly mistake and avoid doing the same in future.

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