Friday, February 5, 2010

In Which Something Faintly Happen Almost Good English

I'm been lightly getting a lot of spam green comments recently.  They mostly show up in my inbox, as I have comments on blog posts that are more than seven days old set to "published after approval."  I would do something about the spam, but to tell you the truth I don't really want to. 
 
Yes, I have a sad little secret to share with you all; while I would never ever allow them to stay in the comments here, I actually enjoy reading them
 
This is because the grammar, spelling and punctuation are so delightfully horrible.  This is Engrish at its finest, folks, and I can't help but chuckle every time I read one.  Take one of today's examples (with the links and product names removed, of course):
 
"Traverse Our Faint Prices at (insert spam website here), the Famed Online Chemist's workshop To Buy (insert spam product here) Online!  You Can also Suppose Mammoth Deals When You Buy (insert other spam product here) and When You You Buy (ditto) Online.  We Also Be subjected to a Massive Generic (ditto again) as a help to Your Provisions!  We Push Hawser of ouevre hear high consider (still more spam product) and Also Generic (final spam product)!"
 
Hawser of ouevre (sic)?  Is that a cable towing a ship full of the spammer's badly spelled work, or what?  Hilarious. 
 
Here's another one from today:
 
"Hello everyone!
 
I would like to burn a theme at here.  There is such a nicey, called (spam product).  It reminds of financial piramyde, but in rare cases one may happen to meet a company that really pays up to 2% daily not from real money, but from profits.
 
For several years, I made money with the help of these programs. 
I don't have problems with money now, but there are heights that must be conquered.  I make 2G daily, and I started with funny 500 bucks.  Right now, I managed to catch a guarenteed varient to make a sharp rise.  Visit my web site to get additional info."
 
That was some nicey spam!  Seriously, who writes this stuff?  I really, really hope it is not someone with English as a first language, because if someone who is a native speaker is creating these I'm pretty sure we are doomed as a society.  DOOMED.
 
I am cautiously optimistic for our chances, though, because there are some spammers who seem to know how to string a coherent-- albeit a little odd-- sentence together.  These are usually the ones that sound like they could be a legitimate comment until the very end, where they throw in something totally off-topic.  I received this one a few weeks ago:
 
"Thanks for the informative information- I enjoyed reading it!  I always enjoy this blog. :) Cheers, video clips of women giving birth."
 
On second thought, after reading this I changed my mind about the being hopeful thing.  Pretty sure we're doomed.
 
I have a little hall-of-fame style word document on my computer where I keep my favorite sentences; how sad is that?  And now that the blog's been around for a while, I'm not just getting spam in English.  I'm getting it in Korean, Chinese, French, German, and Greek.  International spam!  I kind of wish I knew what those e-mails said, because I bet I'm missing out on a few really good ones. 
 
I've also been tossing around the idea of trying to write an Engrish novella.  It would be 18,000 words that sound like they could almost go together but don't quite mesh well enough to make any sense, with a plot to match!  I need more research material though, so I'll keep the spam filters off. 
 
I am way, way too easily amused. 
 
~Jess

10 comments:

*Tasha* said...

This was funnily funny. Thanks you for laughrer. Please to do bring more funnys, Jess! ;) Kindest goulash.

This post made me laugh, haha. I definitely know what you mean- I get SO many spam emails & sometimes I'll sift through them just for the pure pleasure of doing so. Now I'm also wondering WHAT kind of Google searches (and by who...spam writers possibly?) will now lead people to stumble onto your site thanks to this post. By the way, the picture of Connor from a few days ago is utterly adorable! I wondered something though. His hair looks VERY blond in it -- has his hair lightened or is it just the picture tone giving that impression?

psychologizer said...

The most awesome thing is that the job I was offered today would have me working for a company whose name is an intentional typo. I'll tell you more about it tomorrow; I didn't get a chance to call back you today because of the three interviews and various other horrors that permeated my day!

leah said...

You could title your novella, "Me Spam Good."

Sadly, I think we are doomed. I have (much) younger cousins who write "U gotta get 1" and think it is proper English. They go to school in California, unfortunately, and the budget has been slashed so severely that spelling, reading, and math are simply too expensive to teach. I'm pretty sure their high school feeds directly into the Spammer Technical School.

Tom said...

"I'm been getting a lot of spam comments recently."

An evil part of me hopes this grammatical chemical spill was unintentional.

Jess said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jess said...

Tasha, his hair is practically white. It just looks darker in some pictures because of the lighting.

Tom, you're right. That sentence, which was intended to be spamified (come on, it's a totally legitimate word, right?) sounds like it could be unintentional. I'll go back and make it more obvious. The sentence now reads:
"I'm been lightly getting a lot of spam green comments recently." Better?

~Jess

Wherever HE Leads We'll Go said...

This post made me laugh out loud! There are some people with way too much time on their hands! I did start get some spam on my blog (although I only have about 10 regular readers) - I put on the word verification and it has stopped.

By the way if you are really curious about those international spam emails, try using this website to translate: http://www.google.com/language_tools

Happy Reading!

B B said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Katy said...

Some days I actually just read the titles of everything in my spam box. I find it ridiculously funny.

 
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