Damn spammers, again

Now they're registering with my gallery, just to upload viruses. So, another rule change: now all new members of my gallery have to be personally approved by me, and they require email verification from you as well. I usually check my email only once a day so it might take up to 24 hours for you to register with my gallery. I know that's a pain, but it's the only way to keep the spammers and hackers out.

It's a damn shame, too. When I opened my new site, everything was open. You could join my blog, join my gallery, sign my guestbook, all without having to get authorized or even provide an email. Now everything is locked down and by permission only, thanks to the spammers. My blog spam filter catches hundreds of messages every week.

The more I think about it, the more the internet is like the Wild West. At first, there was little here except some simple natives living their simple lives (mostly university researchers emailing each other and looking up weather reports on Gopher). Then the White Man (corporations) started moving in and developing the place. The opportunities for growth were amazing. Small prospectors (dot-coms) started staking claims and many of them made it rich. This led to a gold rush, in which way too many people moved out west (literally and figuratively) thinking they too could strike gold. Meanwhile, bandits realized that this was a land of opportunity for them as well. Spammers, phishers, hackers, worms, pirates, file sharing all proliferated.

Finally, the feds decided to send in the cavalry: the FBI now has a cybercrime task force that rides the open plains to hunt down bandits. Often the bandits will hide in Mexico (or other foreign countries) to escape The Law. Local deputies are also deputized; ISP's who will lynch alleged file sharers (cut off their service) without the benefit of a legal trial.

That leaves small homesteaders like me--people who aren't looking to strike it rich, but just want to live honestly on their little plot of cyberspace and call it a home page. (I don't actually have Koplowicz.com as my home page but you get the idea.) The bandits come around once in a while and I can't wait for the cavalry to show up. So I put up a fence and bought a shotgun. No one gets through my gate unless I want them to. And I'll always beat them on the draw.