How long have you been scambaiting?

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Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 6:22 am

Just wondering how long you've been baitin'!

I'm very very very new to this whole thing...
I didn't even know scambaiting existed until like four days ago...already have a couple lads I'm working on.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:00 am

I've known it for a few years but was quite hesitant to start doing it myself at first... Why? Safety-issues. I was just 16 when I started reading a few of the baits on the homepage (somehow missed the forum back then), so I didn't think it a safe sport and thought I'd have to do it without the help of a community.
Two months back I discovered the forums and tried to register, that didn't really work though, so I kept trying and succeeded one month and two days ago. Have been baiting since.

ETA: Welcome to this wonderful place that makes any free time you have spontaneously disappear, as I've personally experienced...

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:10 am

Been baiting for a few years now but only recently discovered this site and had no idea there was a community of like minded people.

As the previous poster said... get ready to lose a lot of your spare time...

This is very addictive... the crack cocaine of the internet.. except it is for a good cause.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:11 am

Master of Puppets wrote:

I've known it for a few years but was quite hesitant to start doing it myself at first... Why? Safety-issues. I was just 16 when I started reading a few of the baits on the homepage (somehow missed the forum back then), so I didn't think it a safe sport and thought I'd have to do it without the help of a community.
Two months back I discovered the forums and tried to register, that didn't really work though, so I kept trying and succeeded one month and two days ago. Have been baiting since.

ETA: Welcome to this wonderful place that makes any free time you have spontaneously disappear, as I've personally experienced...

HAHA
Yes, I've spent quite a bit of time on this site and others like it, setting up my little 'operation'. It's really not a good time for me to be doing this either, consdering i'm in the midst of exam season at university...

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:17 am

Yes.. well remember: baiting first, RL later! errrr... RL first of course

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:34 am

Following a link from the computer maganize c't, I found this site in August 06. Until then, I thought reading stories of people trying to find degree confluence points with GPS thingies was the most fascinating sport on the internet Embarassed

Reading all Shiver´s baits and most of the others in the Letters Archive sweetened that autumn for me, but I haven´t started seriously until June 07. Mainly because I didn´t get a mentor. So, get a mentor Very Happy

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 9:37 am

Many years ago on another non related forum someone had posted a link to here and if you wanted a good laugh to read Shivers letters. Instantly saved the site to my favs and whenever i needed a bit of cheering up i'd read one of his escapades Laughing

Always wanted to be a Baiter probably from the first few times i visited and not be someone who just stood back. Sadly as many will know my IT skills are woeful and this brought up concerns of how effective i would be. So i just kept reading the Stickies etc and am having great fun now and the odd panic attack when some IT issue crops up.. Thanks to advice from people on this site i can usually resolve it and move on.. As MoP has said RL does kinda get thrown out of the window but i have started to prioritize my RL with baiting.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 12:01 pm

I did some totally amateur and untrained baits in 2004, and then a friend put me on to Scamorama and I began learning from experienced baiters.

Just three years ago I followed a link from Scamorama, found the Eater, and marvelling at the talent herein, signed up at once.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 3:22 pm

I discovered Eater in '06 thanks to a friend. I had complained to her about all these "crap" e-mails I kept getting(at the time I had never heard of scambaiting). She pointed me here and suggested I post one or two in surplus. I lurked for close to a year before taking the plunge. Haven't had any free time since. Smile

Frumpy's advice is sound. Get a mentor, I would have been lost without all the great help from mine.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 3:26 pm

started back a few years ago, i`ve stopped now. i did start up again. but stopped. i`ve been real busy at work.

i still look in on the forums a few tims a week.

best bait was 8 or so months. no real / decent trophies though.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 3:54 pm

Someone tried to scam me when I was a single mother - I pointed out the us postal money order site, the scam they had listed almost word for word...that pissed me off he was trying to take advantage of a broke single mom...

Fall of last year my 17 year old son turned me onto shiver & companies bait/trophy reading...and I was facinated

At first I thought I'd just read, but I couldn't help it and started baiting myself, that was around November...

Been having fun since Twisted Evil

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 4:37 pm

I've been doing this on and off for over five years. I had heard about 419 emails in 2001 but it wasn't until two years later that I got one. I was mad as hell learning about 419 and even madder that they contacted me.

I wanted then to write back and string them along, but didn't out of concerns for my safety. When I stumbled upon Scamorama in 2003 then I learned I wasn't alone in wanting to bait them. After two months of reading baits and Alex Kerensky's message board, I decided to take the plunge.

I keep doing this, I think, for the entertainment. I also like to collect fake checks and money orders.

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:48 pm

Alerted to the baiting community and potential comedy potential through TMF - http://boards.fool.co.uk/Message.asp?mid=10966697&sort=whole

Seriously baiting since Jan 09 when my family advised me to come home from work in the evening and not carry on working...

Now I'm obsessed with two things...

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2009 8:39 am

4 or 5 years for me.

I first joined Eater back around Xmas 2004 under a different name but went dormant for a year or so and returned with the date below my avatar.

All that exists of my previous brilliance is one post with my old username from May 2005 marked "Guest".

Incidentally, the one old post I can find has me advocating cash-baiting (it had just been banned). Oh, how young and naive I was back then (still incredibly talented though).

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2009 9:34 am

not long enough, I now realise I've wasted all of my adult life

I first came across this site in July of last year from a link on a football message board and I was stripped and ready for action within days so far I've amassed a paper fortune of over $300 million and with my share of [creep mode]Yastrebs[/creep mode] $250 billion I may well retire Wink

Elite Baiter Joined: 02 Jul 2006 Posts: 1702

been baiting a few years now, I mostly go with straight baits hence i dont post many of them as seen one seem em all kinda thing.

What i do for the past couple of years is build ever more frustrating websites for lads to sit there waiting... and the occassional tool that drives them mad as well.

After a while everyone kinda drifts into there own speciality, and its brilliant when you see it all put together and someone posts a trophy.

When i joined a trophy was a pic or a driving licence, but since then members have really outdone themselves, and trophies such as x-wing fighters.

I wouldnt be surprised if baiting has opened a brand new industry of wood carvers lol.

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2009 11:20 am

WOW, I have come here due to an article in the very same magazine that brought us FrumpyBB Very Happy

Perhaps we should grant the Heise publisher one year PREMIUM membership as a small "thank you" Wink

But must have been another issue as my postings go back to 2005. I had three very active and funny years of baiting then Cool

I have (more or less) retired since 2008. Now I enjoy all the spare time and the status of an old daffy gramps playing the wise old man giving advise to others Cool

Baiting Guru Joined: 19 Apr 2007 Posts: 3123

2 years in 4 days time Very Happy

Trophy Videos · Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2009 12:40 pm

"Hello. My name is SlapHappy. I am an addicted Eater trophy whore. I have not stopped laughing for the last three years...."

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2009 6:13 pm

Since about a month before I joined Eater (not counting years of telling scammers to leave me alone*).

*Note, this has not been seen to be effective. Evil or Very Mad

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 3:20 am

couple of months in earnest. Dabbled every once in a while before that, never seemed to get anywhere (might have been a lack of effort, too).

Mentoring here rocks. I've learned the easy way how to straight bait, while at the same time running 5 or 6 other lads as 'experiments' outside of the mentoring thing. I guess I just became one of those guy's Oga, even after killing two of his bank accounts and chopping his dolla.

safe, stickies, mentor. Three words all newbies should heed. I'm glad I did all three Smile

Oh, and people here are actually really receptive to dumb sounding questions. I know I've asked a number of em. Premium membership is an absolute bargain, and helps in a small way to help keep the wheels on. Idea

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 9:00 am

I am a few days off my first Eaterversary.

My specialtys are religious and trophy (banners) baiting.

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 10:17 am

I'm baiting since Feb 2006.

There was a news article on a website about a victim of a 419 scam.
In a comment, someone else posted a link to eater.

I read the letters and I did need only 3 days to stop laughing.

I thought, it would be a good idea to start scambaiting myself. Some kind of saying "Thank You" to eater for all this fun I had reading the stories.

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 12:43 pm

I have been baiting for years - predating the start of eater.

My first 419 bait started from a fax sent to my dad's company in the early 80s when I was a teenager. He showed it to me as a ridiculous scam, and didn't realize I started postal correspondence with the scammer (I had a number of international pen pals at the time). Ummm, I did use my real name but I claimed I was a rodeo cowboy and rock star, etc. etc. Fortunately I lived in the middle of nowhere so I never had any scammers visit me, and I quit replying out of boredom after a few exchanges.

In college I got into the habit of baiting MLM scamsters - unfortunately again using my real details. I worked in a few mall-based retailers during this time, and these guys would cruise around, acting like customers, appearing "impressed" with my customer service and asking if I ever wanted to get into business for myself. It became very easy to spot these guys but I discontinued this activity when I started receiving threatening phone calls!

then a little later I rediscovered the 419ers, and some early chatter about baiting them in the usenet group news.admin.net-abuse.email where I was an obsessed lurker (at that time my interests were more about the technical aspects of anti-spam operations). I'm pretty sure there were a few pre-eater discussion sites (eg Alexander Kerensky's board on b2g4), all now defunct or useless as far as I know.... made my way here and they've never managed to shake me loose.

Posted: Thu Apr 16, 2009 5:29 pm

I have not baited long enough. Wink

Actually, never knew anything about it until I found eater. Very Happy

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