Why doesn’t myspace want me to block spammers?
- I get an email from a new “friend” and have to click the link.
- I have to log in manually, because myspace is too stupid to provide me with a link in the email that will log me in and/or keep me logged in from last time. The link already has “id=901C2C3E- C4C7- 4B01- 8C3A- B8E67467D47F” in it, and it still couldn’t log me on.
- I’m shown the invitation and have to click through to the profile.
- I click “block user”.
- Java script pops up a confirmation panel and I have to click “OK”. Yes I really want to block this user. If I did it accidentally, I could always go unblock them.
- Another page reloads to re-confirm that yes, I really want to block this user. I click “block this user”.
- Back on the invite page, I take one more click to “mark as spam”.
There could easily have been a “mark as spam and block user” button there, and with auto-login, it could have taken me two steps. Why doesn’t myspace do this? Because they’re stupid? Yes, that’s true. But I think the reason they don’t is they like spam users. It drives up their “usage” stats, and makes them look somehow still relevant.It’s January 1 – and I have one spam friend invite. Come December 31 2007, I’d wager I’ve had 200 more. And hopefully, the slow to the party print media will have pronounced “MySpace is Dead”!