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October 4, 2006

Spamming MySpace Could be Bad for Rectal Health

The Register recently had an article on the US passing the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act. The act, named for the son of America’s Most Wanted host and child-protection activist John Walsh, actually passed back in July, so it's not a new story, but still one that has implications for anyone doing business on the web.

One important part of the law states that anyone who knowingly "embeds words or digital images into the source code of a website with the intent to deceive a person into viewing material constituting obscenity shall be fined under this title and imprisoned for not more than 10 years".

If the deceived person is a minor, the punishment is even worse. Intent to deceive a minor into viewing "material harmful to minors on the Internet shall be fined under this title and imprisoned for not more than 20 years."

I've been reading a lot of threads over on Earners Forum lately (great resource), including the section on MySpace Marketing.

Now anyone who has used MySpace knows it's pretty much

  • 14 year old kids
  • bands promoting themselves
  • strippers, escorts and porn stars

It's the uncomfortably close proximity between 14 year olds and strippers/porn stars that should have MySpace marketers concerned. One common technique employed for making money on MySpace involves:

  • Setting up an phony account using pictures of an attractive woman.
  • Using a bot to send out automated friend requests.
  • Once you've accumulated a large number of friends, send out a comment or bulletin to them telling them to come check out your profile, which contains affiliate links to adult webcam or dating sites.

Problem is, how many of those people you've added to your friend list are under 18? Probably quite a few. By encouraging them to click on your links, are you therefore intentionally deceiving a minor into viewing obscene material? Quite possibly.

Everyone's talking about the great marketing opportunities available through MySpace and YouTube. Unfortunately, both of these sites have a significant amount of content that's disturbingly close to kiddie-porn. And the laws in this area aren't likely to get any looser anytime soon.

Just a note for MySpace spammers to watch their ass (literally). MySpace and adult is a dangerous mix. Graywolf points out that Jenna Jameson's MySpace profile doesn't actually seem to link to her adult sites. Maybe her attorney already gave her the memo.

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