One of the annoying things about spam has been that it’s often like having someone rude butt into a conversation in order to completely change the topic to something they’re interested in. Well, with blog spam the spammers have finally gotten smart and are now trying to place comments that actually look like they’re trying to engage with the blog post. The result is comments like:
It was certainly interesting for me to read the article. Thanx for it. I like such themes and everything that is connected to them. I would like to read more soon. BTW, pretty good design you have at that blog, but don’t you think it should be changed from time to time? I mean it :)
or, the rather more smarmy sounding:
This is second incident that I am scanning anything about modifying websites with the system. It seems that you are an super expert blogger. Your post is an excellent example of why I continue coming back to study your good quality content that is forever updated.
All that spammers care about, I gather, is that their link appears at the bottom of the comment (I have removed these, of course). The results are mixed – clearly the comments have to be very general if they are to be placed automatically. Still, some of the spam is so nice and positive that the hand slows a little before tossing it into the bin. You know the compliments are empty but they are still ever so slightly pleasant to read.
Just Another Deisidaimon 
Tom Rees
November 15, 2010
You blog post gives excellent insite in world of promo marketing. Really is too good and I often come back to it to discuss with colleagues.
http://epiphenom.fieldofscience.com/
Konrad Talmont-Kaminski
November 17, 2010
And here’s the bit of perfect irony – Your comment was flagged as possible spam! Clearly, wordpress detects unearned compliments and flags them. Both the spam and the measures against it are improving amazingly quickly.
island1
November 28, 2010
I’m convinced artificial intelligence will emerge from a spam database and composition program. All those billions of spam emails and posts being generated every day, eventually the system will get so good at it that it will be indistinguishable from a person. I’m just worried that we’ll all ignore it when it does arrive, assuming it hasn’t already.
Konrad Talmont-Kaminski
November 28, 2010
The AI has already emerged and has been employed by Saatchi & Saatchi.
Konrad Talmont-Kaminski
November 28, 2010
My mistake, the company involved is this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapient_%28company%29