Legal Commentary

Spam algorithms are so cute when they're little

By Ernie Svenson

When my kids were young I loved watching them as they learned to speak.  First they learned important noun words (e.g. mommy, daddy, doggie).  Then, they learned verbs and then adjectives and so on.  Then there were abstract concepts like time, when everything that happened in the past is, at first, called 'yesterday.'

My kids have gotten older and learned to speak properly, so there is a slight void in my life.  Fortunately, I have a blog that seems to attract a fair amount of spam comments.  I never approve the comments (rather, I flag them as spam).  But, I do enjoy reading the primitive speech.  For example, I posted something awhile back about rethinking business cards.  I mentioned that my post was prompted by a post that Andrew Flusche had on his blog.  This was two years ago.

So today I get a few little spam comment on various posts.  But the one I got for my post on business cards made me chuckle. It was so simple and so direct, and yet at the same time so incomprehensible:

Andrew Flusch you such motivates person good post

Ah, the innocence of a young spam alogorithm.  Isn't it fascinating how it learns to imitate human speech. Doesn't it sound a bit like Sarah Palin?

Full post as published by Ernie the Attorney on April 06, 2010 (boomark / email).