My line of work keeps me close to the pulse of the whole emailing “thing”. I, of course, work for a legitimate email marketing platform (much like Don Corleone worked for a legitimate olive oil importer, I suppose), but the less reputable senders try to find a lot of tricks to get their message through to you.

Two tricks in particular don’t make any sense to me. Like most blatantly stupid concepts, there is a point of view from which they make sense, but I know of almost no one, even most stupid people, that will fall for this.

The first little trick is one to get that very important message to the top of your in-box, so it doesn’t blend in with all the other spam. Say… Most people sort their in-box by date! I’ll set the message for a date in the future! Brilliant!

Now, apart from the fact that most of these do nothing else to hide that they’re just spam, and that it doesn’t work because they all do it so it ends up being self-defeating, it’s just a silly thing to do. Or, at least, if you’re going to do this to us, do it in an entertaining way:

From: Spammer@spam.com
To: you@youraddress.com
Date: Jan. 12, 2036
Subject: Warning from the future!
Message:

Greetings,

We hope this message reaches you in 2009.

We are a conglomerate of scientists from 2036. We must plead with you to buy this 30,000 tons of pig iron. If you don’t, the consequences in our time will be dire!

etc, etc…

The other one that’s really starting to bug me is getting all this spam from myself.

Look, I know we can all set whatever “From” address on an email that you like. And that a lot of places do set exceptions to email filters for their own addresses, but do you really expect me to believe I’m sending myself male enhancement ads?

Again, you should at least have fun with it if you’re going to do it:

From: you@youraddress.com
To: you@youraddress.com
Date: Jan. 12, 2009
Subject: Bet you think you’re going to sleep every night
Message:

Hah! Sleep…

I’ll level with you… I’m your other personality. When you think you’re going to sleep, that’s just me taking over and going out to party.

It’s a lot of fun, but I got to let you in on this, because we’re just not getting any. If you ever want to “wake up” next to a beautiful woman whose name you don’t know, I need you to go buy this male enhancement product!

Etc, etc

Better yet, combine the two! Here’s a message I’d almost be obliged to follow:

From: you@youraddress.com
To: you@youraddress.com
Date: Jan. 12, 2036
Subject: I’m the future you! Help!
Message:

These scientists hope they can get this message through to you…

I’m your future self, and I have a dire warning for you. If you don’t buy this male enhancement product, the future of the entire human race is in danger from a violent plague that kills all men but you.

The problem is that even as the only man left, all the girls still laugh at the size of your… of our unit.

For the sake of the future, you must… get… bigger.

etc, etc…

All right, spammers. There’s your good idea for the day.