Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm -- Bacon

Out of all the phrases I use to describe unwanted emails from companies I've done business with and/or bad jokes/chains from friends /relatives, Flotsam and Jetsam is probably the only one printable in the Post. Spam is fairly easy to accurately filter out that stuff is not.

Does the US have a code of conduct for spam?

Just this afternoon I got an email from Ancestry.com (basically the Mormon's genealogy business) offering me gardening books, and the promise that I would get more such offers over the next 3 weeks.

Now they do have a separate opt-in for partner emails (which I have never opted in for) but they seem to have decided that although their company "does not sell, rent or otherwise distribute the personal information you provide us to third party advertisers" they can act as spam-agents with alacrity by mailing on their behalf.

The only way to stop the spam part of their output is to turn it off altogether, which means that I would no longer get the useful information about the product I bought.

It may not be bacn, but it's certainly not kosher...

I think Bacn is fine; Bacos would be better. It's not spam - nobody actually LIKES spam; but Bacos are a little more likeable - they're still a far cry from bacon or ham (which in the spam metaphor signify emails you'd want) but Bacos are sometimes ok to have on a salad when there's no bacon or ham to be had. Whereas spam should never be consumed, on a salad or otherwise.

The term was actually coined just this past weekend at PodCamp Pittsburgh 2. There's a video of the two guys who came up with the term at http://www.bacn2.com explaining why they feel it's a problem.

I know there's been some disagreement about whether it's a good term or not, but there seems to be general agreement that it is in fact a problem, and it seems to me to be a concise way of referring to non-priority e-mail that I intend to read at some point.

I remember spam sounding goofy at first, too.

Here is the story of Bacn:

http://www.thisisportable.com/blog/2007/08/20/bacn-how-it-all-got-started/

Yeah, have to say I like bacon (the food) so think its a bad term for unwanted but approved e-mail.

Dryer lint is pretty good. I like lunchmeat, bologna, MRE and liver/livr as the term for it.

Rob: Like spam, bacon is trayf.
Not good.

Dave> It's not spam - nobody actually LIKES spam

I like spam. Slice it and fry it a little crispy in olive oil and yum. And it's well known that spam is quite popular in Hawaii--there it can be found in many forms including even spam maki (rice and nori rolls).

As for email, I use a unique email address with each online service I opt in for. Whenever it becomes clear they've given it away to bulk emailers (for example, when I started getting porn spam at the address I gave only to gradfinder.com) I terminate the address.

What interests me about this is that when this happens, the email turns from bacn, or whatever you want to call it, to spam, based not on the content of the message, but on the person who sent it. It's the depersonalizing effect of having one's email address sold to some anonymous bulk emailer that makes it intolerable, and I think it's their disregard for the humanity of each recipient that makes spammers so repugnant. Receiving spam switches on some latent, collective sense of violation at having our individuality annulled: they don't care who we are--we're numbers to them, and they treat us like corpses with credit cards rather than real people. It's offensive.

On a more positive note, I think I'll go to Giant tomorrow and get a can of real spam. Hormel may be another faceless corporation, but they make a good product, and they don't try to cram it down my throat. Therefore I shall reward them, and my gustatory senses will be pleased in the process.

I just call it "junkmail" and my bayesian filter is surprisingly good at separating it out from the emails I want to see immediately and the emails I don't care if I never see.

Ready for the answer on this one guys? Ah, seems so simple and yet elegant in so many ways.

"B-mail"

Benefits: its EZ! rhymes with email, has the connotation of B-Movies, B-list, etc.

It came to me in that special room of reflection visited after 2 cups of coffee this morning. You know, the place where magazines are read and truth is revealed, although usually on Sundays.

Hey, do I get the trademark? Or maybe a book deal?

B-mail works for me.

But I won't buy your book.

It just amazes me that some one at the washington post wrote about the term that we have come to love, Bacn.

For those of you that are anoyed by it...Lighten up.

Why not hot dog? It seems perfect to me:

* It is a type of processed meat (like SPAM)
* Most hot dogs are not very good, though not as bad as SPAM
* There are some hot dogs that are actually pretty good

Bacn is a horrible way of describing it--especially with the missing vowel. Bacon should be the email that is a treat. There is nothing more irritating than words that are intentionally misspelled or contracted weirdly. They make me hate the Internet.

Another option is to go with one of the other menu ingredients mentioned in the Monty Python spam sketch.

- Spam, egg, sausage, and spam
- Spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked beans, spam, spam, spam, and spam
- Lobster thermidor aux crevettes with a Mornay sauce garnished with truffle paté, brandy and with a fried egg on top and spam

I could go with baked beans. Bloody Vikings...

Dang, someone beat me to the trayf comment.

No one wants to eat bacon, dude, totally not kosher.

The spam song made me think it should be called "parsley" - unwanted garnish.

Parsley garnish is good for freshening the mouth after the meal.

You have to specify what kind of parsley you're talking about. Italian flat-leaf parsley is great, but the curly kind is useless.

- RP

Rob, I think you already have the perfect name, LINT.

Parsely is a good generic term, because there might be some good flat-leaf in there amongst all the curly stuff.

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