Spamming the World

摘要

Al ralsky would like you to have thick, lustrous hair. He also wants to help you buy a cheap car, get a loan regardless of your credit history and earn a six-figure income from the comfort of your home. But according to his critics, Ralsky's not a do-gooder, but a bane of the Internet―a spammer, responsible for deluging e-mail accounts and choking the Internet service providers (ISPs) that administer them. In real life, the 57-year-old father of three lives in a middle-class suburb of Detroit. He started bulk e-mailing seven years ago, when he was flat broke. To buy his first two computer servers, he had to sell his 1994 Toyota Camry. These days Ralsky sends out more than 30 million e-mails a day and raves about the possibilities of marketing on the Internet. "It's the most fair playing field in the world," he says. "It makes you equal with any Fortune 500 company."