This Week in IT History: Get Some Green!
You know how sometimes if you're using a paper calendar or a datebook, yo umark an X for the days that have passed? You might use a big black Sharpie X for this dark day in IT history: On April 12, 1994, marketers Canter and Siegel sent out the first commercial spam message on Usenet. They were shotgun-aiming for people who needed a green card to stay in the U.S.
Personally, I think Spam gets a raw deal here, since for someone like me, Spam is a delicious canned meat that will likely keep me alive long into a nuclear winter. Instead, we should come up with special names that incorporate Canter and Siegel in some way, to commemorate the darkness they introduced into the IT world. Suggestions are welcome.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 04/12/2011 at 11:59 AM