Fun With Junk Mail & Spam Bots

Not only is Sierra Godfrey a Brilliant Writer pal, business colleague, and fellow Person With Great Taste In Music, she's also an inspiration for time killers. In this case, this post inspired me to take those pesky spam messages -- both automated and not -- and use them as a writing prompt for a little off-the-cuff creativity. What transpired? Let's find out...

Now, let's recall that my business is technical writing and marketing copy. Sometimes, I get inquiries from peers who might have questions about overflow work or simply the business process. It's the reason why things like LinkedIn were invented.

Of course, if you're going to ask about this, you should at least show that you have a firm grasp of, you know, grammar. It's kind of important when writing business copy. Here's a tech writing "firm" straight out of India:

(All names have been removed, but grammar goofs and weird spacing issues have been kept wonderfully in tact.)

For all your technical writing needs Trust someone the world trusts - Trust XXXXXX

If you need:

· Permanent Technical Writers who can quickly join you. And are capable, experienced, and cost effective

· Temporary Technical Writers who can quickly join you when you need them, and leave when you don’t need them. And are capable, experienced, and cost effective

· To improve Technical Writing Skills of your development or technical writing team

· A world class technical writing team that can take full responsibility of doing technical writing work for you. Focus on your core skills and outsource ‘non-core’

Why XXXXXX?

· International award winning company: XXXXXX has won awards of ‘Excellence’ from Society of Technical Communicators(STC) USA, for technical documentation it created for its clients

· Experience of more than 9 years in providing technical writing services to its clients. It has a large team of technical writers

· Talented team. A large and talented team. Its core team includes includes {SNIP} All of them are with XXXXXX – full time.

· Trained organizations such as Deloitte, Accenture, TCS, Virtusa, ADP, and Synopsys in technical writing. Trained more than 1000 technical writers in various technical writing courses that it conducts.

· Did technical writing work for more than more than 100 organizations world-wide. This includes {SNIP}

· Placed experienced Technical writers to a large number of organizations on temporary or permanent basis. Has a large database of technical writers

· Implemented XXXXXX’s own Documentation Solutions to create, edit, and manage technical documentation. For example DITA XML solutions for Azingo Inc

Our Process

Stage 1

· Understand Needs: First we try to understand what exactly you need in terms of the final deliverables. This generally involves a high level understanding of the product, the target audience, the current state of product and documentation(if any).

· Establish Process: Once we know the exact requirements, we define a high level process optimized for your project. This covers main steps involved in completing the project, the quality standards.

· Estimate Effort:. Along with the process, we also calculate the effort involved. We create an effort-breakup table clearly showing effort (in hours) in each step of the process. This effort estimate table is sent to you.

Stage 2

· Once there is an agreement on the cost involved and overall process. We create a draft statement of work (SOW). This SOW contains the complete plan of the project, process involved, and delivery schedules (including intermediate deliverables for review).

· Once this SOW is finalized and signed off. We commission a documentation team for you.

· The project starts as per the plan.

We will be happy to provide you more details, delivery models, references, samples, and cost. Just let us know.

Now, when writing blog posts or other semi-off-the-cuff material, you're bound to make mistakes, since you're not shooting for the level of polish that comes with a business letter or a query letter. But if you're IN the business of writing and you're asking TO GET PAID for your writing, don't you think you'd double-check your first piece of contact?

That being said, here's what I wrote back.

I might have some leads for you. However, I have to trust the skills

of anyone I refer my clients to.

Therefore, please tell me what is grammatically wrong about about the

statements below. They're taken from XXXXXX's process flow:

-Once we know the exact requirements, we define a high level process

optimized for your project. This covers main steps involved in

completing the project, the quality standards.

-Once this SOW is finalized and signed off. We commission a

documentation team for you.

No response. Hmmm, maybe they didn't need my referrals after all. Well, if you're curious, I perused their site, and this lack of Microsoft Word Grammar Check flows on to their blogging as well. Here's a recent post on why technical writing is Da Shiznit career choice for new mothers.

Many technical writing jobs also come with work from home option or flexi hour option.The reason being technical writing job involves writing about "something" once you "konw that something" no other dependecy is necessary.Writing can be done from any place.

And now for the best part of the news-monetary benefits involved in technical writing jobs are equivalent to a software job.

Isnt this then the God send job for all mothers!

Isnt this then the best example of why technical writers doesnt get respekt!

Well, when I'm not being solicited to outsource my writing gigs to other people, I get asked to purchase outside services to help grow my business. Case in point -- here's a fellow who wanted me to sign up for his mailing list service:

My name is XXXXXX, from a Global Database Company with Multi Channel Marketing Services and we help our clients in Demand generations and Lead generations by using our B2B & B2C Email Lists, and Data & Email Appending services.

Our core services include: Email Lists, Data Appending, Email Appending, Telemarketing and Direct Mail marketing, etc

USP’s of our company: Faster Deliverability, Affordability, working based on clients budget, Global coverage, guarantees on services, unlimited usage on our lists, etc.

DATABASES

{SNIP -- BIG BORING LIST}

We have many more email lists.

Or you can also get Customized list where you just define your target audience and give us any of the following data, as per your needs:

{SNIP}

I hope you are the right person to discuss about this in your company? If not please refer me to the right person so that I can discuss more about our services.

If you are the right person I am sure you will be looking for email lists for marketing purpose, if yes let me know what kind of list you are looking for so that I’ll send you more details.

Looking forward to working with you.

Thanks and waiting for your reply.

Yes, he was indeed waiting for my reply. And I was very sincere in my gratitude for his outreach.

This is fantastic. Even though I never asked for information on your

product or advertised that I needed something like it, you took the

time out of your busy day to hunt me down and personally contact me

with this unrequested information. You didn't even ask permission

first! Now that's a pro-active approach! Sure, you could have just

sent a quick note that said, "Hey, I think my mailing list service

could help your business. I don't want to spam you, but would it be ok

if I sent you a little more info?"

No, not for Mr. Pro Active XXXXXX! Instead, you've delivered the

internet's version of an infomercial. And, just like the P90X program,

you've shown me a program...

...that I already manage for myself. And come to think of it, you did

spam me. Which is really annoying. I'm guessing you're an XXXXXX

XXXXXX affiliate -- oh, erm, Business Development Executive. I

have to believe that they frown upon spamming people, seeing that

they're in the business of OPT-IN email marketing, and I didn't opt

nor in.

I'm sure you get some measure of business by trolling ZZZZZZZ

service ads but your approach is, at worst, unethical, and at best,

annoying. I'll be reporting this to XXXXXX XXXXXXX customer

service, and I suggest you re-think your approach.

Ok, maybe I was a little harsh. But damn it, this crap annoys me, especially from the ironic stance of representing an opt-in company. Sweet Jebus.

So, I've been solicited for outsourced work and for direct vendor services...but what about chatroom sex? Look what happened on my IM today:

[14:53] (obvious spammer): hey

[14:53] (Mike's IM): my kitchen is on fire

[14:53] (Mike's IM): and the frogs are everywhere

[14:53] (obvious spammer): how's it going? havent talked to you in awhile.. lol

[14:53] (Mike's IM): i can't put their eyes back

[14:53] (Mike's IM): everything is purple

[14:54] (obvious spammer): do you remember me?.., it's Stephanie.

[14:54] (Mike's IM): after the satellite crashed into my car, i lost all of my coffee

[14:54] (obvious spammer): so what's up?...

[14:54] (Mike's IM): now the tea is leaking into my soul

[14:54] (obvious spammer): not much here just got out of the shower went to the gym today

[14:54] (Mike's IM): don't you get it? it's an emergency

[14:55] (Mike's IM): there is a fire in my kitchen!

[14:55] (obvious spammer): i gotta question do you like a girl with big tits? or do you prefer a girl with a fat ass..

[14:55] (Mike's IM): and the frogs are everywhere!

[14:55] (obvious spammer): okay! well i got alot of both wanna see? im feeling a little naughty@!

[14:55] (Mike's IM): my arm, it's on fire now

[14:55] (Mike's IM): the fingers have melted off

[14:55] (Mike's IM): call the police

[14:55] (obvious spammer): well im gonna show you if its okay

[14:55] (Mike's IM): or the government

[14:55] (obvious spammer): hahaha! call em! and tell them you are reporting a felony... YOUR HAIRSTYLE!! You might wanna get that looked at!

[14:55] (obvious spammer): k.. click [HYPERLINK] once it loads click the green "accept invite" button on the left then fill out your info.. then we can make a private 1on1 chat to play

[14:56] (Mike's IM): the frogs, they're eating the remains of my arm

[14:56] (obvious spammer): ;)

[14:56] (Mike's IM): they have acidic tongues

[14:56] (Mike's IM): it burns, it burns

[14:56] (Mike's IM): i will have to eat my hair to survive

[14:56] (obvious spammer): dont be shy its 100% free babe just gotta make sure you're over 18 before we make a private room and get naughty

[14:57] (obvious spammer): ;)

I showed this to Sierra today and I told her I thought it was a spambot. However, she wasn't sure, since the response to my "Call the police! Or the government!" message was the bizarre hairstyle comment. I still think it's a spambot that's probably designed to recognize certain words and phrases for a specific response.

Of course, I'll say this about the spambot...at least it replied, which is more than I could say about those Technical Writing professionals or Mr. Mailing List.