Today I was accused of spamming.
No, I wasn't sending email, or posting comments or links (or even plugging my blog). I was creating an account at about the same time that a spammer was creating an account on some guy's system[0] and the spammer's account(s) had spam info in the profile data (some online gambling site, may they rot in hell). The guy who ran the site was understandably annoyed and sent out the standard "I'll ban your account" email that doesn't really do any good (except maybe make someone feel better about them self) and unfortunately I was CCd on that list because he incorrectly assumed that I was the spammer.
Now, I kept my temper (despite a false spam accusation being tantamount to fighting words) and he kept his temper (despite a spam post on your system being tantamount to fighting words), and I calmly asked him questions about what IPs the spam post came from and I got to witness that lovely "oh crap" moment when he realized that my IPs were not the same IPs as the ones the spam came in off of.
Now the lesson here isn't that we can all get along together if we keep our tempers (Because quite frankly I have no desire to keep my temper in the presence of a spammer). The lesson is that we should make tools to automatically audit bad behavior so that we can track it down to the source and then feel justified in sending that well documented[1] abuse email off to places where it can do some good[2].
I've heard about a system which is used in a high profile sports title where the game is profiled through a number of demos every night and if a piece of code significantly shifts the amount of CPU time it consumes the monitor sends email to the people who modified the code in the last 24 hours[4]. This is (I think) the ideal solution. A nice system that automatically yells at people for you, so that you can get on with whatever you really want to do.
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[0] Incidentally, the site is a get-together site for people who graduated from my high school and is an admirable example of both altruism and utility. Well, it would be a better example of utility if the guy had the time to finish working on it.
[1] Well documented abuse reports are important. They prevent false accusations like this one. They also prevent you from looking really really unbelievably dumb when it's your offending code and you're accusing someone else.
[2] Or, much more apropos, enable you to either fix offending code that's checked in or send smarmy comments to whoever made the checkin[3].
[3] I was called into work on Saturday because a week ago one of my coworkers made a bizarre cut & paste error. Everyone assumed the fallout of bugs was due to a significant asset change that was in progress. Sometimes smarmy emails are appropriate.
[4] At least that's what the documentation claimed. It's an interesting idea regardless of what it actually did.
Posted by matt at August 30, 2004 11:09 PM