Pleasant Surprise !

This happened around the weekend. Out of thin air I received this email and thus the email thread:

"
From : Aruna x madhav19 at the raet %$^&*!# preiod com

Sent : Friday, April 15, 2005 9:59:03 PM

To : sbeashwar at the raet htomali preiod com

hello!

How are u?What are u doin now?May be u r in touch with a few of ur school classmates but I don't think there's any rapport with the school.

Hope ur music is still on.Pls. keep me posted.

Aruna maam,SSK.

"

yeah...! I have intentionally obfuscated the email address; beware of the mean world out there.

my first thought ! who is this intelligent spammer ? why in the world would my 10th standard math teacher try to get in touch with me :-)

My response:

"

Well, this is rather un-characteristic of the Aruna madam that I knew. Sounds more like a prank thrown by someone that knew both me and Aruna madam.

In anycase, I want to give you the benefit of doubt. With all due respect; please establish your identity by answering the following questions.

1. What was my 10th standard 1st midterm score on math ?

2. If that is difficult :-) tell me what was my street address when I live in abhiramapuram(I know that only she knows this and not any of my friends)

Or, is this the act of some super intelligent spam bot ?.... :-)

Vaithee

"Paranoia is Paramount"

"

got this reply :

"

Hello!
Iam the same Aruna maam(with or without respect)Butunfortunately I think I'll fail the test you've given me.The greatest mystery is 'what's so uncharacteristic'?? we had an alumni meet onFeb.thirteenth,your batch being represented by satish andHarikrishnan.
It was much later that Krithika's father came to school to re-establish ties on her behalf.

As I've succeeded inestablishing mail-contact with her,you happened to be the next victim.

I still can't figure out what' amiss in my mail.I can only give anirrelevant ans.to the qns. posed by you-----that I associated you as being a relative of Harini Kamesh!!
Though I can recall a visit to your house in abhiramapuram,I am unable to pin down on the street.
anyway if you feel convinced about the authenticity of my identity I would appreciate it if there could be some kind of a regular mail-contact atleast.
With best wishes,
Aruna maam.

"

My response:

" Oops.. please pardon my paranoic sensitivity !

Lot of things about your email led me to think that it was not genuine.

1. First, why would Aruna madam try to establish contact after 10 years ?

2. The irrelavant email address....(Some people still use the email facility provided by their ISP)

3. No subject line

4. The "uncharacteristic" part; use of chat abbreviations "u" "ur"..etc (she is not known to be this casual)

Moreover, my email box has been pounded with a lot of span of late. Particularly the classic Nigerian 419 scam has been driving me nuts, it invariably escapes all the freaking spam filter on the face of this earth.

....

....

"

the responses are actually reconstructed for the stupid hotmail does not retain sent emails by default. My immediate suggestion to my math teacher was to use my gmail address for correspondence. That reminds, yahoo too has increased it's email storage to 1GB but yahoo's email interface is so bad that you barely feel like using it, unlike Gmail, they give you the storage and also help you use it effectively.

Ok, what did we learn ?

Not all emails are spam particularly, not all those that seem like spam are spam.

Sometimes your knowledge about spamming becomes counter productive like in this case. Having said that, I've seen a lot people falling for the "Mr xyz you have won a ticket to Las Vegas" type emails.

No matter how intelligent a spam filter is, it will fail. This is a good test case for all those people trying to build a super intelligent spam filter.

The best spam filter known on earth for now is the one powered by the human brain. I can go on like this forever but, I can already see people trying to get on with their work which I will leave them to...so please carry on but, return later for more incessant rants, raves and reviews filled with repartee.

ok thats enough for today ! No no... not done yet :-)

I was watching this 6th ODI between India and Pakistan till 3 in the morning, I am now quite convinced that these matches are all spectacularly stage managed by the supremo of BCCI and the governments of both the states involved. India supposedly, being one of the best batting side in international cricket crumbles in 32 overs, all these seem like perfect non-divisive, harmonious politics...foul play, I mean (with much howling and gnashing of teeth). I am not going to blame them for wasting my time, that's my prerogative, I would watch India/Pak match even if it is setup, it's like watching WWF :-) I feel BCCI can make the matches more interesting if they can get Ganguly and Inzy shout at the microphone like the hulk hogans and the bambam bigilos pretending to be billegerent with ravi shashtri in between at his expressive best.

Ok, now this episode's contest question.. how many times did I use the word "Spam" first 3 entries will get the previlege to view an exclusive screening of my next post :-)

Now, this is desperation ! the height.