Like a lot of folks on Twitter, I have a search column open that notices mentions of my name. It mostly catches spammers linking to places my books can be downloaded for free. But lately, there's been something weird:
Here's how that tweet looked originally (about two weeks earlier):
So the strange spam tweets:
- Have one letter randomly removed
- Have two letters randomly substituted
- Lost the + in C++ and replaced with spaces (common when being passed through a URL)
- Are using the exact same URL as before, so this isn't some weird attempt to be paid for clicks
- Have usernames that appear to be random strings
So there's something going on here, something spammy, but I don't see how they benefit. Is it to dilute an otherwise all-spam stream with some "useful" links? Should I report them to Twitter? If anyone knows, please clue me in.
Kate