I warn thee. This is probably an “old man” post. I’m frustrated with spam and scams and the general preying off the incautious or overly optimistic and I simply don’t know how the average person navigates the world. I think of myself as clever. I barely survive.
And I’m not talking about doctor’s appointments and figuring our health insurance and arguing with contractors and parking in Washington DC. I’m talking about how no matter how many times I tell gmail that my local drive in theatre’s emails are NOT SPAM, they go to my spam filter (so how does ilyAIMY have a prayer of reaching our mailing list?!) but no matter how many times spammers use the exact same wording trying to get me to THE FIRST PAGE OF GOOGLE SEARCH RESULTS JUST CLICK HERE!!! these emails are NEVER caught?
And then… how about the scammers on Facebook? Mention that you’ve been hacked and you’ll get ALLLLLL the offers to “contact this page” or this person or click that link because they can help! And sold out shows? I’ve been marking messages as spam all morning.
I’d hate for one of our fans to fall for this bullshit, but Facebook, wtf – this should be easy. The only thing standing in your way is that you don’t require any kind of verification of accounts. I know you claim it’s about Privacy – but what about the Privacy of allllllll these people who’s accounts have been cloned? (or maybe they’re just made up) or the rights of alllll these people not to be scammed out of their money? I’ve been engaging with a 33 year old claiming to be my 80 year old friend just to see what the endgame was while I’m waiting for my claim against them to get through Facebook… they want me to contact someone to get my free money, of course.
For people who DON’T get these things all the time, where’s your warning? How do you learn before you’re burned? I worry about my mom. I worry about my friends. Be careful fellow entities. The bots cometh and they’re not here to help with grammar.
Sigh. In general I think I’m just in that awkward place where the momentum of the dream has run out but the drive to begin anew isn’t here. You know, that feeling that you don’t want your Life to be over but the Living’s done?
Roight. I guess it’s time for a new album.