Spam and Eggs

Originally, I was thinking of summing up my recent trip to Chicago for the Sage Summit (referenced in my last post). I'm not going to do that, except to say that Sage, like the Yankees, is in for a "rebuilding year," and they're being very open about the need to fix what's not working and to continue to have real conversations with partners and customers. Kudos for that—I'm a sucker for honesty. Also, there weren't a whole lot of announcements, so I have no material.

One other thing: Chris Gardner (the guy who wrote The Pursuit of Happyness, and was Sunday's guest address) is a highly engaging speaker, seems like a great guy with lots of wry humor, and had it even harder than it looked in the Will Smith movie. For starters, his son wasn't Jaden Smith's age at the time, but a toddler. Holy shit. There's more, but you should read the book instead of my blog. Wait. You should read the book after you read my blog.

What caught me as the kernel for today's topic was an email from Jason Brown, a business development executive from a company called Optinlists. I'll quote:

Hi Marshall !

I understand that you are the person responsible for prospecting initiatives and lead generation’s program? Optinlists provides online marketing solutions, which can aid you and your customers in their marketing initiatives. To discuss Mailing List Subscription service for the year 2007 -which can get you targeted mailing lists every quarter or every month.

I had a chance to look your website and I thought there might be a need for us to have a quick chat regarding your marketing initiatives and lead generation processes.

...

Please test our email append service by sending 100 sample records with contact name, company name, mailing address and telephone number. We will append missing email and or any other missing data at no cost. Test results will be sent within 48 hours with a match rate analysis report.

OK, it's clear that Jason (if there is such a person) has no idea who I am, is lying about having ever seen my Web site—actually, my employer's site, as this was sent to my destinationCRM address—and is tempting me with a baldfaced request to give him more poorly-qualified leads so he can do this to 100 more people. And these jokers want to have a chat with *me* about *my* lead generation and marketing?

Spam exists. Spam will always exist. But I'm feeling peevish. One of my new missions in life is to serve as an agent of corporate Darwinism. By sending crap like this to a business and social media journo, Jason and his company have demonstrated their unfitness to survive in business. So I will collect and publicize any such things that come my way in the hopes that I can hasten the corporate deaths of the senders.

Also, Time Warner Cable's RoadRunner service sucks. Its unreliability has made it nearly impossible to work from home, and I'm paying a lot of money for an Internet connection that doesn't work. I'll be looking to resolve this dispute, but I've got to say it really grinds my gears how Verizon and TWC slam each other in their ad campaigns when neither of them can get the job done. I'm tempted to go with dialup at this point.

Comments

[Mae]

Hi,

Jason Brown does exist and is a vital entity of Optinlists. We as a company are into providing internet marketing solutions to various companies across the globe. But from your statements I can understand that you have very limited knowledge about spam and issues relating to the same. Individuals like you invent phony stories like the one you have posted on your blog.

Have a visit to our website and read the testimonials posted by our clients. You ought to feel peevish Mr. Whoever you are when you will be receiving a legal notice from our team for spreading misinformation about a legitimate firm.

And yes this team of jokers rightly termed want to chat with a bunch of dunces like you who have learned to browse and marvel the net a few years back.

So why dont you goahead and publish the reply i have sent on all the other sites you are familiar with, so that people reading this can have a rib-tickling session during the weekend with a mug of beer.

Social misfits like you would score 10 points less than a jelly fish for an IQ test. I always wanted disprove Darwin to show him that there are many specimens still evolving to become homosapies. Cleansing the world from weeds like you would win me the nobel peace prize. My mom is proud of my social activities.

[Jason]

Hi Marshall,

This is Jason replying to that interesting piece of information you have written about me. You must be a guy with 207 bones, the additional one being the funny bone. You have a weird sick sense of humor that makes people tripping on coke to get back to their senses in a jiffy. You should create a separate blog for your sick jokes :)

And you call me a spammer, what are you? Spam will exist with spammers like you who have the audacity to create blogs and fill it with junk. I really pity your employer who has hired work shirkers like you who are jobless and spend their valuable working hours in posting nonsensical messages like these on their blogs.

By not been able to differentiate between crap and a valid marketing message plagues like you are unfit to survive in our society.

So guys who have read my reply including you Marshall would have had a hearty laugh. You can now get back to reading Chris Gardner's book.

Cheers,
Jason