Nationwide Domain Name/Yard Sign Conspiracy 324
robertjmoore writes "Everywhere I go lately, I see these lawn signs that say "Single?" and then give a URL with my town's name in it. Being a huge business intelligence geek with too much time on my hands, I decided to track down who was behind them and wound up uncovering ten thousand domain names, a massively coordinated and well-funded guerilla marketing machine, and the $45 Million revenue business hiding behind it all. Hot off the presses, these are my findings."
signs (Score:2, Informative)
Those are all over SE PA. West Chester in particular.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Ditto for the suburbs of DC. It's like road spam.
Re:signs (Score:5, Funny)
We should start a counter-campaign:
Married?
LincolnSwingers.com
Re:signs (Score:5, Funny)
Naw, because some asshat lawyer will steal the idea:
"Married ?
LincolnDivorce.com"
And then we'll have to kill them.
Together (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
But why not do subdomains, it has to be insanely cheaper?
Almost every demographic I've listened to the radio in has *helpwanted.com. I doubt that people would mess up *.helpwanted.com, plus it'd be MUCH cheaper.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
It seems to be that cost of printing planting these signs are much higher then the cost of a domain name, so it's no big deal to them.
Re:Together (Score:5, Interesting)
The price of Coroplast has tripled over the last 24 months. I buy 4'x8' sheets of it for making cages for small animals. My price went from around $6 to over $25!
Recycling election signs works nicely though...
Re:Together (Score:5, Interesting)
We have a small animal rescue (wildlife and guinea pig) and "Cubes & Coroplast" [guineapigcages.com](p) is about the best thing you can use for Guinea Pigs.
Most store bought cages are criminally undersized for active, grazing, social creatures.
Re:Together (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Together (Score:5, Interesting)
not in oversaturated markets. When these started springing up around DC with different neighborhood/town names in the same style I leaped to the conclusion the article draws. It is good to see it confirmed though. Additionally, since the geographical granularity is so hilariously fine, it seemed less than likely that non-transplant locals were behind it. (Of course it could have been non-transplant franchisees getting buffaloed by their franchise distributor.)
Franchise distributors have a strong proclivity to assume your market is like the market where they come from and bully you into making decisions that are more valid for that market than yours. E.g. I knew a Blimpie franchise owner who was bullied by the franchiser into following a NY-NJ business model for a fast food restaurant: find an office building and rely on the building to supply the majority of your customers. The problems with this in the DC area are several, but here are two of the biggest:
-most DC buildings are smaller than NY buildings (esp in DC itself due to the convention of not building higher than the Washington monument.)
-due to lower population density and poorer public transit, parking is usually needed in DC whereas NY restaurants can ignore this, relying on foot traffic.
These and others contributed to the failure of the franchise.
As an aside, knowledge of how to sleuth out domain registration and correlation is somewhat de rigeur for most of us in the Slashdot audience, and as such should reduce the newsworthiness of the story.
Re:Together (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Together (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Together (Score:5, Informative)
Women were charged significantly less- my wife bought in blocks of 6 instead of 36, and I was her 12th introduction.
The cost included at that time "therapy sessions" which allowed you to discover and refine what you wanted in a mate. Given the gals I was introduced to- I was either confused or they weren't using that part correctly.
Re:Together (Score:5, Funny)
This is exactly why I signed up for the service posing as a woman. Cheaper.
Unfortunately there's no checkbox for the ladies to check "Seeking Man Posing as a woman to get a better deal", so I had to resort to posing as a Lesbian.
Wonder why I am still single.
Re:Together (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, in the end, I believe it was worth it. My little 5 year old is pretty happy to be alive too. Of course, had I known then what I know now about these dating sites, I would have argued with them and purchased a smaller block.
Guess the bonus for a female using the site, is that your going ot find a guy who has $3600 of disposable income. So, he should be able to blow some cash on you. lol.
That's assuming that the competition since then (it's been 10 years for me) hasn't drastically lowered the price.
Re:Together (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Together (Score:5, Funny)
$3600 is only 18 good nights out at the bar, so its relatively cheap in comparison.
There is something wrong with either where or how much you are drinking.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
However, I'm not sure they still operate the same way- this was ~11 years ago. And they closed their office in Oregon soon afterward.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I guess they went bankrupt because you scored on the first try.
These places make money by keeping you coming back... "hitting it off" is bad for business.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
In talking to a few colleagues about this fascinating business, I learned that most private equity shops shy away from dating sites for a number of reasons:
However, just because something isn't a great investment prospect doesn't mean it's a bad business. Many, many people have become obscenely wealthy in this industry (both online and offline). The technology required to connect two people is trivial, meaning your only real expense is the cost of customer acquisition. If you are part of the natural oligopoly, your product quality will be high and people will seek you out. This cycle lowers your costs and sends your margins skyrocketing.
Furthermore, the online dating industry has made a lot of secondary players wealthy thanks to affiliate marketing. At times, online dating sites have paid as much as $100 per head for new paying customers, and routinely pay out at least a few dollars for new "free trial" users or other prospects. This means anyone with the power to herd single internet users can potentially tap into a strong monetization engine.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How Much Did You Pay? (Score:4, Funny)
$3600. About $3100 of that was wasted, as I purchased a block of 36 introductions and only used 5.
Yes, most things you spend on toward a wedding are a ripoff, anyway. I bought two dozen oysters for our wedding night and at least three of them didn't work.
Re:How Much Did You Pay? (Score:4, Interesting)
That was 8 years ago.
So the only thing I got out of it was a very satisfying marriage and a little boy with CP who is happy all the time (in fact, that was his first word- happy- amazing that his mother and I, both of whom are very pessimistic people, have a child who is so happy).
peh. (Score:5, Funny)
did you get a date?
why yes, I am new round here.. how did you know?
Conspiracy? (Score:4, Insightful)
Do the yard signs read your thoughts and beam them to a satellite? Are they emitting high levels of gamma radiation? Are the dating sites linked to Al Qaeda?
Don't tell me... (Score:3, Funny)
Even singles sites are lonely enough to pay for some action... I thought I was the only one willing to pay out $100 for head...
but do they work ? (Score:2, Interesting)
Has anyone seriously got a date from one of these sites ? It seems Mr. Moore overlooked a vey obvious question in his research.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:but do they work ? (Score:5, Informative)
Of course, I haven't had contact since they closed their Oregon office a year after I got married....
Re:but do they work ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:but do they work ? (Score:4, Funny)
I think she's worth the full $3600, plus the wasted dates with the 4 other women I met.
I'll give you $4000 for her.
Re:but do they work ? (Score:5, Informative)
If you're looking, I'm a big fan of plentyoffish.com. I'm a bit biased since I met my current girlfriend there. It's 100% free. Minimal (very very minimal) ads and ... I like it is all.
Re:but do they work ? (Score:5, Funny)
plentyoffish.com
That sounds like the perfect site for me...people tell me I'm plenty offish all the time!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I put on my robe and wizard hat
Re: (Score:2)
But I am convinced that between 60-75% of the "matches" you get are filler accounts. So in the time I was a member, I probably rejected/got rejected by 300 or so matches.. and spoke with 1 of them.
Those sites do work, I know some people who met through one and are happily ma
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
well, if that's the attitude you take regarding your clientèle then maybe people should be warned about your business.
generally, every business will have a few dissatisfied customers since it's hard to make everyone happy. but if there are dozens of customer complaints regarding the same company, then that's a pretty good indicator that they're either unscrupulous or just incompetent. so it doesn't have to be by a "disgruntled employee" for a complaint to have any merit.
besides, another poster who met
Guerrilla Marketing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Guerrilla Marketing (Score:4, Informative)
Guerrilla Marketing indeed. The article itself is a slashvert for the author's company. Nice.
Re:Guerrilla Marketing (Score:5, Insightful)
Guy observes something odd related to his field of work.
Guy notices more oddities, all related.
Guy gets an itch to figure out what is going on, and scratches the itch.
Guy keeps on scratching until he's completely satisfied.
Seriously, what nerd hasn't done the same thing in their particular field of interest? Whether it's the grepping to find instances of an odd item in your logs, or statistical analysis to compare voting records by state to federal balance of payment figures, or figuring out how to make the pelvic actuators on your girl robot work properly, one thing all nerds have in common is sleuthing.
Nerdhood, to me, is defined by inquisitiveness and a strong dedication to finding answers and increasing our knowledge. So yes, it's news for nerds, since we can all relate to the author's search for truth.
Re: (Score:2)
Since when is this type of behavior for us restricted to our fields of interest?
To me, we're monkeys to the monkey power. Curious as all hell and our biggest weakness is a problem to solve.
To make matters worse, we subconsciously define almost everything interesting as a problem. And once we've done that...well, you might as well go make tea, cause we're not letting go until we've solved it.
Re:Guerrilla Marketing (Score:5, Funny)
...or figuring out how to make the pelvic actuators on your girl robot work properly...
Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Whether it's the grepping to find instances of an odd item in your logs
Guilty!
or statistical analysis to compare voting records by state to federal balance of payment figures
Guilty!
or figuring out how to make the pelvic actuators on your girl robot work properly
*GASP* Who told you?
*SLAMS DOOR*
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, it was a great read. I see the signs periodically in Minnesota, I used to live in Eagan and the first time I saw the signs they were misspelled as Eagen or Egan but a few weeks later they were fixed.
Luckily (???) I'm already married so I don't have to worry about this stuff anymore.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's news for nerds because they're gobbling up space on nameservers. It does affect you.
BTW, these signs are all over NE Ohio as well. I concluded it was some local get-rich-quick schmuck with a magic marker. Seriously interesting to find out that's not the case.
Re:Guerrilla Marketing (Score:5, Insightful)
This is extremely fascinating. I'm not quite sure how it becomes news for nerds. But fascinating none the less.
Maybe you're being sarcastic, but i really don't see why this is interesting, really. Upon reading the article, it seems to me the guy has the reasoning powers of a shrew - it was obvious to me after seeing just two identical signs with different addresses that this company must be doing this all over the place. The author makes it sound like it's some crazy complex conspiracy and blah blah blah. Hey, guess what!? BayAreaHelpWanted.com is also part of a similar situation! There is also SacramentoHelpWanted.com and a bunch others. Gasp! Someone is using location specific domain names as a way of appearing more local!
Next he'll find out that the Shane Co. is not a local mom and pop diamond company, but a huge nationwide chain, with ads targeting specific areas (our ads only mention the 3 local stores, for example, and Tom Shane always makes himself sound so down to earth that he couldn't possibly be the head of a huge chain).
Really, i'm surprised that anyone is surprised by how this works.
-Taylor
Re:Guerrilla Marketing (Score:4, Funny)
why didnt he just fill out the form and see where he would be redirected to or wait for someone to contact him?
Because he's already on 3 other dating sites, and his wife is starting to get suspicious.
missed the point (Score:5, Funny)
I think you missed the point. You were suppose to go to the URL to get a date NOT research the registration.
Re:missed the point (Score:5, Funny)
This gives me an idea for a new set of yard signs: "Single? Bored? www.slashdot.org"
Re:missed the point (Score:4, Funny)
These signs were a great way to break up with my girlfriend*. A few dozen Single? signs in her front yard gave her a pretty strong hint.
*Girlfriend may or may not actually exist (this is /.)
Re:missed the point (Score:4, Interesting)
Well done (Score:2)
I was going to bitch about the submitter advertising his company in the summary but after reading the article, I say that he has earned it. I didn't much care about this company but the whole detective process was quite fascinating.
Cheers
Re:Well done (Score:5, Interesting)
Agreed.
What I'd like to see next is this guy taking out the "Crazy Fox" scam. Late-night TV commercials with the same video, namely a poorly-rendered CGI fox, talking about what an awesome home-based-business... yadda yadda yadda. The commercials are identical, except for a random number prefixed or suffixed to the domain name containing the string "crazyfox".
It's obviously a pyramid scheme of some sort, but the mechanism of spamvertizing it is ultimately the same as that employed by the "randomaffiliatename"{singles|dating}.com scam. The only difference is that it uses TV commercials (which are probably the "thing" being "sold" by the people at the top of the pyramid) instead of lawn signs.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm more concerned about the "send us your old and worn out gold jewelry ads".
I miss the DeVry metallic zombie ads. I particularly liked it when ads inserted by the local cable company replaced them, but at the end of the block, you saw just a flash of the zombie at the end. AAH!
Re:Well done (Score:5, Informative)
I'm more concerned about the "send us your old and worn out gold jewelry ads".
Rob Cockerham recently tested out their scam by sending them a bunch of junk spray-painted gold [cockeyed.com]. They sent him back a check! It was only $1 or so, I guess it's a consolation prize they send to anyone who bothers to mail in an envelope.
Someone else tried it with actual gold [cockeyed.com] and found that the prices they're willing to quote you (at least initially) are way below the true value, but if you complain about their offer, they'll make a reasonable one.
Fines? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now that we know who is behind putting up all these signs, apparently without permission, won't there be some huge fines coming up?
Re: (Score:2)
It is probably just a low level annoyance for each property owner (what, they get a sign like this a couple of times a year each), and without knowing who to complain about it would be difficult to ever
Re:Fines? (Score:5, Interesting)
In my city, a little old lady was arrested walking down main street placing more of these signs by none other than the chief of police. The signs stopped appearing for awhile, but apparently they got someone to replace her.
It's disappointing to see. . . (Score:4, Funny)
the low percentage of signs advertising for asians.
Mmmm, asian women. You can eat a lot because you never fill up!
Re: (Score:2)
Re:It's disappointing to see. . . (Score:4, Funny)
Ha ha. I used to live in Macon. I worked at a B.Dalton--Bookseller store out at the Macon Mall. The cops busted us and stole 500 copies of the "Joy of Sex" because it was 'pornographic.' Naturally, every cop in Macon wound up with a copy. There was even a trial. It wound up in a 'hung' jury. Oh, man, minimum wage was fun.
My garbage can is full of these signs (Score:5, Interesting)
It's an interesting story... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
People don't keep their memberships for very long. Because of that, the difference between your recruiting cost and your subscription price has to be wider than other membership sites.
Better?
Re: (Score:2)
High churn rates mean new customers have low, volatile expected lifetime values.
People don't stay on dating sites for long
This has a negative impact on the equity value of each customer, making it difficult to justify the valuation multiples seen by membership-driven websites in other verticals.
So you don't make that much money per customer
Re:It's an interesting story... (Score:4, Funny)
So you don't make that much money per customer
Dude, did you SEE how much they were charging?!?
Re:It's an interesting story... (Score:5, Funny)
So they work on the Scientology model?
Re:It's an interesting story... (Score:4, Insightful)
If you can understand what these terms are, I can communicate with you professionally, and maybe you could use my services.
If you don't understand these terms, I hope you enjoy this story.
If you don't understand these terms, or only somewhat understand them, but feel like you want to use these terms to impress your bosses, you need my help. Contact me and we'll work something out.
The "from the..." Department (Score:4, Insightful)
I know I'm slightly off-topic here, but I really have to wonder about timothy's choice of department for this article. It is:
from the tragically-yes-I'm-single dept.
Now, I am not trashing people who are in relationships or who are married or anything else. Please do not take my response that way. But my question is - why is it so "tragic" these days if someone is single? It seems as if everybody spends much of their waking time thinking about whether or not they have a date Friday night and the never do something with their lives. I personally have a number of a friends (girls tend to be the worst offenders) that gain their self-esteem from whether or not they are in a relationship. That seems horrible to me (and a really crummy way to live).
I don't know...mini-rant I suppose. I guess I just don't see what the big deal is about being single. Yeah, it *can* be lonely at times. But even people in relationships can be lonely. (On the flip side, I do know singles who can be alone, but their not lonely.) Being single offers so many advantages - your time is yours, your money is yours, you aren't tied down, and single people (especially ones who are content with that) tend to adventure a lot more.
Why being single = a bad thing, I don't think I'll totally understand.
Any response back from anybody here on Slashdot?
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:The "from the..." Department (Score:4, Interesting)
As far as the money/time/etc is concerned, agreed, it is yours and it is great not having to worry about anyone bouncing a check, spending more than you had planned or a whole host of other things.
The flip side, as you allude to, is that there are those times you want to spend it with someone, whether a football game, a movie or a simply walk in the woods. Then there's the whole human touch thing for those of us who are of the affectionate type. It's especially difficult when you work with a few cuties and your mind has lascivious thoughts of them throughout the day. Not good for work performance.
Then again, dating is like combat [earthlink.net] so it's not necessarily an easy thing to do.
But then, what do I know? I have an entire region of women who want nothing to do with me unless they want a problem solved.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This line caught my attention in your essay,
No longer is dating an activity to be pursued because one wants to find their 'one and only' but rather, dating is an investment in time.
Like any statement that involves the phrase "these days", "nowadays", and "in this day and age" it is actually the opposite of what is stated. Dating today is probably more about finding the "one and only" than ever before.
Case and point, after my grandfather died and we were sorting out his belongings I had the opportunity to look through some of his old books. I came across a book he had during his college days, the 1950's, that was about college study prac
Re:The "from the..." Department (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that, quite frankly, one of the most painful issues with being single for geeks is when we have friends who constantly enjoy the pleasures of physical relationships. I, for one, have a friend who is constantly "pulling women from the bar" because "variety is the spice of life". Sure, he's always complaining to me that he will never find a good girl... But at least he's getting to have some fun in the sack.
For us pragmatic geeks who think about consequences, consider other peoples feelings, and simultaneously have the same mammalian urges as our more risky, wreckless friends, it's clear how one can feel that being lonely is tragic. ... comming from a 24 year old virgin who has more experience writing in assembly than hacking into panties.
Re: (Score:2)
Because you won't pass on your genes?
Re: (Score:2)
Unless he's 40, there's still plenty of time for that.
Seriously, I dated two girls in high school,and then didn't date anyone until 27, when I met the love of my life. Now I'm really happy. The not-dating wasn't really on purpose, but it sure saved a lot of hassle and broken hearted-ness; and it meant that I had a solid 10 years to be really free to do my own thing. It probably also saved me from a highly sub-optimal decision: I'm not really that picky, and if I'd b
Re: (Score:2)
Because evolution has hard wired us to want to procreate and pass on our genes? And for the vast majority of our existence on this planet, that has required a relationship? At least for the past couple hundred million of years.
Re:The "from the..." Department (Score:5, Insightful)
I believe the "moral" imperative to "be fruitful and multiply" comes from a desire of certain subgroups (mostly religious and ethnic in nature) to grow themselves. People born in to your church/ethnic group are pretty likely to stay loyal to it.
From this simple goal come many other "moral" values: anti-abortion, anti-birth control, anti-homosexuality, anti-promiscuity, anti-interracial marriage, and anti-singlehood.
However, the world in which these values formed is very different from the world we know today. A few centuries ago, with high infant and childhood mortality, a much higher birthrate was necessary to produce enough adults of childbearing age (the extra hands on the farm helped too).
Today, childhood mortality is incredibly low meaning most children make it to child-bearing age. The threat of overpopulation, rather than extinction, is now looming. Additionally, birth control dramatically alters the consequences of sex.
Our moral values are only slowly catching up, hence the intense clashes over abortion and homosexuality.
In short, being single is "bad" because we still have yet to shed some antiquated moral beliefs that aren't nearly as applicable in the modern world as they once were.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
In reality, you can find fulfillment any way you like, but typically people prefer to couple up.
But every so often I need to switch hands and then it just feels weird.
Thank You. (Score:3, Interesting)
This is genuinely relevant to my interests, and made my day better.
BTW, those signs are illegal (Score:5, Interesting)
If you hate them as much as I do, visit this site [causs.org] for tips and contact your local code enforcement office.
Legally, they are no different from litter. If you don't have a permit to leave something in a public place, it's nothing but trash. That said, the neanderthal assholes who post them might not be aware of that* and almost certainly won't be happy if they catch you taking them down, legally right or not, so be careful when picking up trash.
* and I'm sure the assholes who SELL the signs never mention it, either.
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks, I can't stand these damn signs either. I thought it was just a problem around where I live. They appear to be planted around intersections and exit ramps by someone leaning out of their car in the middle of the night. Since they are close to the curb I've had the urge to drive over them. As if the trash that blows off of lazy people's trucks wasn't bad enough.
Re: (Score:2)
That said, the neanderthal assholes who post them might not be aware of that* and almost certainly won't be happy if they catch you taking them down, legally right or not, so be careful when picking up trash
I don't know that they would be mad. The guys who are hired to plant the signs won't have any interest as to whether they work or not. Their boss tells them "Put all these signs up and I'll give you $20." If you followed them closely, picking up the signs right after, some of them might realize that whoever is paying them minimum wage might drive by later to make sure they weren't just being tossed in the trash, and they won't get hired again. But the point of the signs is that they are cheap and dispen
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I really thought I was the only one that got angry enough to actually yank the signs out of the ground. Thank you so much for that link! It's good to know I am not alone in my neurosis.
I usually just pull them up and leave them on the ground because I don't want to get my car trunk dirty.
I know what I will be catching up on tonight. Now if only we could destroy all the billboards too...
Makes a change to political signs I suppose (Score:2)
I had actually seen a few of these in my local area, thanks for clearing up who they belong to anyway.
The McCain-Palin signs are mostly gone, the Obama signs are mostly gone as well as of today. All of a sudden I'm seeing Fair Tax signs pop up.
The amusing signs on my drive to work outside a (presumably) very right wing house expounding me to not vote for Obama as he kills babies (eg supports abortion) were still there this morning, though.
And erm, is it a slow news day?
Yep, in NC Too (Score:2, Insightful)
Awesome! (Score:2)
Next, can you figure out what scam artist posted all of those "Real Estate Investor Seeks Apprentice 20k Per Month" signs last year? All the signs used to be identical, but they now show things like "Buy Foreclosed Houses" instead.
Not exactly a 'conspriacy' (Score:2)
But it is just another form of spam marketing. And as the article notes, the 'big national' dating sites are of little use if there are only one or two members within 200 miles of where you live.
That said, maybe /. should start a dating site. :P
*Applause NOW* (Score:3, Interesting)
Great primary research and very entertaining. Reminds me of the p-p-p-p-power book scandal. Gotta wonder if he had a slow day(s) with his business to do this.
They are in Dallas and Irving, TX too (Score:3, Insightful)
DallasSingles.org, LasColinasSingles.org. Isn't it illegal to plop these signs on public land? I hate this crap.
I always thought they were NSA and CIA messages (Score:4, Funny)
I thought secret agents about various towns would go to these websites and put in their "special" information. Then they could get secure messages back and forth. If someone else used them, they just got some boiler plate thing. I thought the whole thing was a vast government project. Like those CIA numbers stations.
I'm disappointed to find out it's nothing more than spam for a "dating" site. Really kills my faith in conspiracy theories.
Wow Long Story...excellent (Score:2)
Excellent novel...I swear it reminded me of Snow Crash because of the immense detail.
There is some crazy detail in this story and I must give credit to the author. You deserve a shiny metal for an article that long and well written....and excellently researched
You might be the next Neal Stephenson of the spam novel world XD
Good read... (Score:3, Insightful)
Friend got scammed (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Which URL? (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Is my understanding correct that all you want for Christmas is a PSP? (A PSP? A PSP?)
Re:Slow News Day? (Score:5, Interesting)
Let's think this through:
1. Anyone who wants to get more Obama can go to news.google.com and read through several dozen international news sources, as well as the Huffington Post and Fox "News", and get more than enough of the regular headlines.
2. Slashdot, as a news aggregator, is finding slim pickins on the tech side, as Obamamania sucks the oxygen out of every other news story. Cool for us political wonks, not so cool for CowboyNeal & co.
3. This really is a nationwide conspiracy. Every tiny suburb and exurb of Dallas is frequently spammed by these guys. I thought they were a local outfit, so it's very interesting to see the extent of their reach.
4. The way the guy investigated is cool, and I'm sorely tempted to upgrade my own DomainTools.com account to "paid" status, now that I know that it really works.
5. Last, but CERTAINLY not least, it's about a DATING SITE. Dating, as you may have heard, is part of the mating ritual of Homo Sapiens Solaris, aka "those of us who have emerged from our parents' basements". It involves meeting FEMALES, which is kind of an awesome concept when you think about it. Opportunities for +5 Funny moderations abound (deserved or not).
I think the "Together Dating" guerrilla marketing behemoth, with its sign spam [causs.org], is reaching the same shallow end of the gene pool that buys enough v1@g@ra to keep our inboxes full of e-spam. Pretty sad. Especially when there's a free dating site [plentyoffish.com] that almost certainly generates better results. But I guess some folks think, if you don't pay for it, it's not worth anything. Hopefully, those folks won't be asking me for a date.
Re:Who you gonna call? (Score:4, Funny)
Ghostbusters.
Duh.