Spam: The Joke's On You

Since spam appears to be here to stay, some have decided to make the best of it. There are a couple projects dedicated to making use out of mounds of spam, and believe it or not, they are actually quite funny.

The first is Spamradio, a decidedly bizzare project. The folks at Spamradio have developed a system that processes a seemingly never ending pile of spam and uses text to voice technology to turn it into audio files with light background music. The result is a 24/7 stream of spam readings. I can't imagine someone listening to this for more than an hour, but just listening to it for a few minutes sure cracked me up! Perhaps the next project should be to figure out how to convert mass piles of spam into a renewable energy source!

Another project, probably more popular than Spamradio, is thespamletters.com. This is an attempt at replying to spam, with a vengance. The author of the site, Jonathan Land, acknowledges that most FROM addresses that spammers use are invalid, but that doesn't stop him! He takes secret pleasure in talking back. He writes humorous responses to spam he receives and posts it on his site. And sometimes he even gets replies! This is not some small project either, because now the project has become a published book! No Starch Press has published a number of these responses in a book entitled "The Spam Letters".

Sometimes when we can't seem to get rid of something, we need to learn to live with it. And these projects are dedicated to doing just that! Next, Spam Art! :)