6. Spam Bait

6.1. For Special Attention

Some people apparently don't appreciate being called "spammers".

I got the following entertaining threat from someone claiming to be associated with the following email addresses: <theboss@1stfamily.com> <arriba@1stfamily.com>

Today I discovered that you have an old email address of mine listed as a SPAMMER.

I am hereby informing you that unless my email address is not removed within one week from your receipt of this email, my attorneys will sue you for 'harrassment, slander and libel as well as unfair business practices'. A judgment of this severity could be as high as ten million dollars as I estimate my damages at the moment, and it could be higher.

Whoah, damages of as high as ten million dollars. I have visions of Doctor Evil chortling as he holds the earth to ransom, demanding " A Hundred Billion Dollars."

You know, the damages for the pain and mental anguish that such accusations cause me would have to lead me to file a countersuit for, well, hundreds of millions. And I'll need to pay someone to make me some " Freedom Toast" for breakfast in order to make me feel better. With some good Quebec maple syrup to make it taste good.

UNLESS YOU are prepared to pay tens of thousands of dollars to defend my lawsuit and then pay a judgment potentially large enough to ruin you for life, I strongly suggest you remove my email address:

'theboss@1stfamily.com' 'arriba@1stfamily.com' and any other reference to 1st Family or 1stfamily.com from your website.

My attorneys are the Number One lawfirm in the country and they have already won dozens of similar lawsuits for me already. Everyone we've challenged have either settled or gone bankrupt and then we have seized their assets.

I'll bet that the " Everyone we've challenged" part comes from there not being anyone that they have challenged.

From what I can tell, Gowling, Lafleur and Henderson, LLP seems to be the " best law firm in my country", but the sheer fact that the guy was clueless enough to assume that " the Internet" implies " the country" suggests to me that he's probably from the "Land of Clueless Litigiousness", also known as the "Untied States of America"... (A run of whois confirms that not only is he from the USA, but from the very nuttiest state of the union...)

THINK CAREFULLY on this warning, Mr. Brown. You will not get another. We run a lawful and respectable business and I have a family to support. You are endangering the health and welfare of my family, something I consider unacceptable and you better believe I will take all lawful steps to have this problem corrected every time I find them. You sir are a problem to me and I have done nothing to you. Think carefully before you make your decision. If you own bank accounts, cars, business assets, stocks, bonds, Real Property, etc. a judgment will allow me to seize THEM ALL.

Aside from the recent threatening email, the last time anything got through to me that was not blocked by someone else was back in 1997, so perhaps they don't "do spam" anymore. (It seems unlikely, but it is not unimaginable.)

Even more entertaining, the guy submitted multiple notices of this. He also wrote " You will not get another." Far be it from me to speculate on whether that contradiction results from wilful stupidity, dishonesty, or something else; I have no idea.

Perhaps they wish they weren't considered "spammers," but others still have other opinions:

• Anti-spam measures in use on our systems at University of Toronto include blocking their domain.

  Hint: University of Toronto has a lot more bank accounts, cars, business assets, as well as what are likely billions of dollars worth of Real Property, than I do. They even have their very own uniformed police force that are empowered to carry guns and arrest people and all that sort of thing. And, like me, they aren't in the United States of America.

• Overview of spam from 1stfamily.com

• SPAM - Exclusive AOL Mailing Service... 1.25 Million a Month! (fwd)

• Spam Domains

• Deadbeats' Hall of Lame, Page 10