Subliminal Spam Using an Animated GIF

JohnGrahamCumming writes "Everyone's noticed the recent flood of image spam (including the SpamAssassin developers who are working on an OCR-extension to beat it), but take a look at this spam containing a subliminal message flashed every 17 seconds to try to entice you to buy the stock being pumped. Does this work? Warning: link shows the actual spam; don't blame me if you lose money on this stock!"

Nope.

[Phroggy]

This really has nothing to do with subliminal messages, and everything to do with trying to defeat OCR software. I was seeing animated GIFs exactly like this where the "buy" frames were just blank, before they started adding "BUY!" to those frames.

Except....

[madaxe42]

Outlook doesn't support animated gifs (nor most CSS, but that's another matter...!) - I received one of these this morning but all it showed was the 'buy buy buy' frame - my response was 'what an utterly utterly pointless spam'.

For the impatient

[Southpaw018]

Here's the four frames extracted.
Main image [moofit.com]
Subliminal image 1 [moofit.com]
Subliminal image 2 [moofit.com]
Subliminal image 3 [moofit.com]

The subliminal images are shown for a fraction of a second every few seconds.

Re:Not subliminal!

[chriscoolc]

Not to help them out, but next time they need to leave the main text visible in the subliminal images.

Not quite subliminal

[Anonymous Coward]

How many people would actually sit and look at this image for 17 seconds? It only takes a fraction of a second to realize it's junk.

Did the blogger even READ the wikipedia article linked to? It says "These messages are indiscernible to the conscious mind". I can almost count the number of BUYs in the image.

I bet this is more of an attempt to get around OCR spam detectors that don't support animated gifs.

Interesting

[mugnyte]

  I seriously doubt the capbilities of a GIF to recreate a true subliminal advertisement. It's a bit dependent on the screen position, machine load, audience's focus, etc. With a movie or a a captured TV audience, it's a bit stronger. Also, this isn't a metaphorical allure, but simply a crude flashing.

For some things subliminal messages can work. [sleeplearning.com] For others, it is well-known to be completely ineffective. [about.com]

I doubt this is going to be much of a difference in SPAM, and is rather a sales differentiation point for a mass marketeer. Somebody is paying extra for this, for sure.

New slashdot business model

[mnmn]

(1) Send out spam using a new technique
(2) Post on slashdot telling people about the spam
(3) Get enormous viewership
(4) Profit!

Just wait for the new Viagra technologies slashdot articles.

No, it doesn't.

[DynaSoar]

> Does it work?

Rarely and barely. Under very controlled conditions, with very careful measurement, a very slight effect which lasts a very short time can sometimes be found. However, most of the conditions under which people attempt to use it are so uncontrolled (ie. the entirety of whatever environment you're in is affecting you) that there'd be no way to detect the usually tiny effect. If anyone claims it has effect in such a situation, they have no clue how it works, and are probably trying to sell advertising to someone who is so desparate that they have even less of a clue.

The reality of the matter doesn't keep it from happening. Greed drives people to try things that would make even a habitual lottery ticket buyer snicker. For many years (and still, as far as I know) advertisers of tobacco and alcohol would have grotesque death images airbrushed into their magazine and billboard ads. This was based on the dual assumption that subliminals work, and Freud's theory that there was a ubiquitous "death wish", and it was stronger and more prone to manipulation in people who used these substances.

We've dispresnsed with the first, given that magazines and billboards are hardly "controlled" environments. Freud dispensed with the second before he died, years before this was ever attempted.

Despite overwhelming odds against it, advertisers still paid to have these images inserted into their ads. I know of one couple who worked at a commercial art house in New York who made $125,000 together in 1978 doing nothing but these. Large corporations will gamble large amounts way out of proportion for any real return just to grab a tenth of a per cent from competitors. John Sculley's biography about his Pepsi days talks about this greed effect (though not subliminals).

The very first "attempt at subliminals" (the "popcorn and Coke" experiment in a movie theater) was a hoax. Like all such material, it is properly filed on snopes.com, along with the rest of the story. http://www.snopes.com/business/hidden/popcorn.asp [snopes.com]

Re:Cause for concern?

[parallax]

No, there is no cause for concern.

I did a Ph.D. on the use of preattentive perception (read "subliminal") on just-in-time memory support. This was the "Memory Glasses" project that got a bunch of media attention a few years ago -- you may have even seen me pitching it to Alan Alada on PBS's Scientific American Frontiers "you can make it on your own" [pbs.org] episode.

The long and short of it is that, yes -- properly encoded, "subliminal messages" can jog your memory, but no, they don't otherwise work as sug,gestions or influence your behavior. If you're curious, you can actually read my dissertation on the Memory Glasses [devaul.net] and find out more.

There was a lot of hype in the 70's and 80's about the evils of subliminal marketing, but it was all based on junk science with forged data.

Also Doesn't Work (Wikipedia)

[dch24]

The article on Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] is actually pretty good. There may be some transitory or faint effects caused by subliminal messages. Advertisers have been trying to capitalize on this possibility for 49 years.

If subliminal messages had any significant effect we would know about it. They've been trying for years.

There have been interesting claims at subliminal messages in popular music. KAKE-TV in Wichita, Kansas, used a subliminal message to attempt catch the BTK killer, but it had no perceptible effect.

I'd say subliminal messages don't work.

For a good laugh, read their SEC filing

[Animats]

Here's their most recent quarterly SEC filing. [sec.gov]

Fun highlights:

• Urbanesq.com Inc. ("Urbanesq") was incorporated August 25, 2000 under the laws of the Province of Canada. Effective October 18, 2001, Urbanesq completed a merger with Koala International Wireless Inc. ("Koala"), a public company incorporated in the State of Nevada...changed the name of the Company to Trimax Corporation...
• On July 29, 2005, the Company entered into an Exclusive Supply agreement ... provided the Company with the exclusive right to sell Switzerland based Ascom broadband over power line communication access products ("Products") in Canada and non-exclusive rights world wide, which the "Partner" represented that it had secured itself from Ascom. ... Subsequent to the signing and the advancement of funds for the "Exclusive Supply Agreement" the company was made aware that the product supplier had no right to grant a sub-license from Ascom. Furthermore, the supplier was previously in default and was never in any position to grant any sub-license on its own license.
• The Company has not earned any revenues from limited principal operations...
• Total Current Assets: $105,115. Total current liabilities: $536,870.

So, after six years, the company has zero revenue and couldn't even get set up as a second-tier reseller of broadband over powerline products. Which is probably why the stock is at $0.38 and headed down.

If you go back to older related SEC filings, you can find the story of the "Hipster portable Internet access device" (didn't happen), and the previous history of Koala International Wireless as a vitamin company under the name "Kettle River Group" (also a flop).

This stock is not "poised for a breakthrough". Except maybe in the down direction.