Local company spams top SA bloggers!
This evening I noticed quite a bit of comment spam from a website called ButItSellIt.co.za, which is a South African domain, owned by Jean Painter licensed under the company Keep It Simple Trading CC. (more..)
Within 10 minutes of receiving this spam, I received another three emails from subscriptions I had to posts on WP Guru, Mark Forrester and Adii!!!
This type of spam totally kills the blogging realm in my opinion, each time I think about subscribing to a post, I will think twice because of this annoyance! This will result in less comments and conversation amongst blogs :/
Who else has been caught by this?
About the author:
Christopher is the founder of iMod - Most of his time is spent building websites and pushing the limits with Search Engine Optimization. You can follow him on Twitter @ChristopherM
Chris M has written: 4148 posts.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 10:07 am
I’ve been getting variations of that sort of spam for years – akismet usually blocks 99.9999% of it but every now and then one will get through by using sneaky text and not hyperlinking in the comment. It happens once every few months though only, and I usually just delete them as soon as I see them.
It’s annoying as hell, but most likely isn’t the company direct – many companies hire ‘marketing services’ which promise them increased traffic, and they then try to get this traffic via blog, forum and directory spamming. The problem is, BuyItSellIt is just one of millions of companies like this all over the world, so other than akismet and approval of comments / checking comments daily, there’s nothing much you can do about it.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Me! Freaking spammer.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 10:11 am
I had also 6 comments from that guy on my more popular posts. Looks like he used a tool called wordpressmassinstaller (result from a whois to his IP).
I’m not sure if he’ll be successful with his strategy…
Aug 18th, 2008 at 11:18 am
Very irritating turning on my computer this morning and finding these spam comments, from a South African company, all over my blog. I’ve just deleted them now and banned the IP address they came from.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 11:33 am
Damn annoying, I hope someone does something about this, because I’m getting really annoyed with this sudden urge by South African companies to start spamming!
Aug 18th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
I get on average about 10 request from Chinese companies wanting me to sell their products on my site. Thats excluding the normal SPAM. I guess the difference is that the majority of that spam is ‘manual’ as individuals search the web for stores, and try sell their wares.
Blog spam is another story all together, and its a common strategy – blogs seem to be the biggest SPAM target, and I now hear google is looking to exclude Blogs from the SERP.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
So irritating. If you want to generate link-love, put in the work:- find RELEVANT blog posts and leave RELEVANT comments.
Aug 18th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Agreed! I just hate the fact that it’s made me think twice about subscribing to comments on peoples blogs, which is something I always do!
Aug 18th, 2008 at 9:06 pm
I got 4 comment spams from the asshole too.
I also looked up his whois info on co.za.
Then I wrote him a personal email describing what’s in store for his future.
I have yet to have a reply, because he is a COWARD and a PUSSY and a dirty rotten low life little SPAMMER.
What I recommend is that all of us affected bloggers should sue his ass and claim R100 per spam comment received. Either that or we could get together to just club his ass.
I think I might find the latter more satisfying.
Aug 19th, 2008 at 12:14 am
I also got nailed with these frikkin spam comments this morning.
Of course, it would be even more hilarious if it was a “nefarious seo spammer” working for BidOrBuy trying to take out the competition ;-)
Aug 19th, 2008 at 12:51 am
@Richard – It’s bloody annoying isn’t it! Ye, the latter would probably be more fun ;)
@James – You too.. sheesh, seems like we all got blasted in a foul swoop!
Jan 6th, 2009 at 8:11 am
I made a payment to J Painter for a order I placed on his website. Its been two weeks now and I have not heard anything from him. By the looks of how this guy opperates his business, I have just lost over R400.00.
Jan 6th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
That’s a huge shame Hugo :((
Jan 6th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
@Hugo: Well, that figures. I suggest you blog your experience so that anyone googling him will be cautioned not to deal with him.