Audiogon sellers, please stop and read this thread

From my experiences listing on C'list over the years (non-audio) these types of emails are all too common: it doesn't matter what you're offering, they follow the same pattern of misspellings, vagueness/lack of specificity relative to one's offering, punctuation gaffs, that over-funded cashier's check, etc. They often outnumber the legitimate contacts... more of an annoyance than anything else.

But why is this happening here now? The interesting thing to note from some of the previous posters is the appearance and increase in these scamming contacts subsequent to the change in this website's interface... is it something in the programming code that now allows automated "bots" to crawl the site, harvesting information in the ads and then generating the emails. Can anyone with an IT background here comment on this conjecture, or is this all done via direct, manual entry?

Tholt wrote:

Operatenore, there is indeed a way via a link on the Craigslist generated emails to flag the responder as spam. Perhaps this is a recent addition. I used it a couple times on an item I had for sale within the past few weeks.

I appreciate this clarification as requested, Tholt: I'll be looking towards - what will be for me - this additional feature in the coming weeks. Boy, C'list has sure gotten on top of this kind of thing... just hope it works efficiently.

Thank you.

Awww.... thank you(!) member Jedinite24 for the acknowledgement: just tryin' to get a handle on what the implementation of the "new" a'gon has wrought on us all, regardless of length of term.

Between the numerous offerings from zero feedback members with "stock" photos - as someone previously noted in this thread - the scamming (two out of three of my recent offers were summarily "attacked",) has increased. After the decade+ existence of this venue, it seems more than coincidental: whereas my previous tracking blocker yielded from the "cgi" (cgi.audiogon.com) implementation of this site no more than one per page, the "app", i.e. app.audiogon.com, is up to nine(!) I'm unsure if this is coincidental, which I why I hoped that someone more technically savvy than I would contribute...

I believe, though, there was something of a misinferrence regarding member Tholt's post, or a misimplication: C'list allows one to flag a post/offering (of goods/services) that one deems to be fraudulent...(?) (that's a whole 'nother can of worms other than the obviously redundant/prostitutional/"other" categories. There is no way, in my most recent experience - as most people are contacted through their hidden emails - that one can alert C'list to warrantedly fraudulent contacts (someone please correct me if things have changed in the last several weeks...)

Thanks again Jedinite24,

operatenore