Fun Fact: The term "spam" was first applied to annoying crossposting of posts (particularly commercially oriented) on Usenet to multiple newsgroups. It later was applied to unsolicited emails, beginning with an email sent by a Digital Equipment Corp (DEC) salesman to a mass of email addresses related to ARPANET -- including mine at the time. This is generally viewed as the very first email spam.
The term "spam" in this context comes from a 1970 "Monty Python" skit. When I interviewed Python's Terry Jones years ago, he told me he was very proud that Python had contributed the term "spam" to the technological world.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE
- - -
Lauren Weinstein
npub1lq…knf7e
2026-06-25 15:22:57 UTC
Author Public Key
npub1lq68asmanu3etxax9hvrj8au4h585lq8zgzujmufqsewtsz85mkskknf7ePublished at
2026-06-25 15:22:57 UTCEvent JSON
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