Enjoy all this spam I have to offer; don't mind that I make more $$$ than you probably do. 
[quoteurl=http://www.ctnow.com/news/specials/hc-sp1scelsonjun30.story?coll=hc%2Dheadlines%2Dhome]Spam King Living High In The Bayou
June 30, 2002
By JOHN M. MORAN, Courant Staff Writer
SLIDELL, La. -- Running east from New Orleans, Interstate 10 slips alongside marshland dotted with weeping willows and billboards touting the "Swamp Tour" and "Gator Fest."
Thirty miles later, the highway arrives here in the bayou town of Slidell - a busy suburb of strip malls and subdivisions that bills itself as "Louisiana's Best-Kept Secret." It is also home to Ronnie Scelson, one of the biggest spammers in America.
Lunchtime finds the 29-year-old Scelson sitting cross-legged on the floor of his storefront TV repair shop while he munches on a takeout meal of boiled crawfish and spiced shrimp.
Clean-shaven and slightly pudgy, he's dressed in black jeans and a black short-sleeved jersey. Around his neck, he wears a gold necklace with a pendant of Scooby-Doo, his favorite cartoon character.
Scelson, a night owl by nature, arrived at the cinder-block shop only about an hour earlier. In the backroom, he nods toward two floor-to-ceiling racks of computer equipment - part of a system he uses to blast out e-mail advertising for Rolex watches, herbal supplements, insurance policies and more.
"With e-mail, I can guarantee you 80 million people," says Scelson, a self-taught computer repairman turned professional bulk e-mailer. "I can touch more people in a day's time than the Super Bowl can."
<snip>
Bulk e-mailers generally avoid anti-spam groups as much as possible. But Scelson has joined in the debate over unsolicited commercial e-mail. "I've gone into newsgroups and fought to prove that spam can be done right," Scelson says.
A look through the Internet message groups dedicated to spam discussions offers a glimpse at the animosity between the two sides.
In online salvos, Scelson has called anti-spammers "self-appointed dictators" and "cyber-Nazis." His critics have fired back equally colorful insults, calling Scelson "Ronnie the Rodent" and describing him as a "scamming thief," a "liar," a "cretin," a "terrorist sunuvabitch" and "100% true-blue opportunistic spamming scum."
Scelson knows that many dislike his way of making a living, but he's determined to persist.
"As far as the anti-spam organizations, they just basically want to get rid of e-mail [advertising] altogether. ... If they didn't ask for it, they don't want it. And it's not that simple of a business."
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[quoteurl=http://www.ctnow.com/news/specials/hc-sp1scelsonjun30.story?coll=hc%2Dheadlines%2Dhome]Spam King Living High In The Bayou
June 30, 2002
By JOHN M. MORAN, Courant Staff Writer
SLIDELL, La. -- Running east from New Orleans, Interstate 10 slips alongside marshland dotted with weeping willows and billboards touting the "Swamp Tour" and "Gator Fest."
Thirty miles later, the highway arrives here in the bayou town of Slidell - a busy suburb of strip malls and subdivisions that bills itself as "Louisiana's Best-Kept Secret." It is also home to Ronnie Scelson, one of the biggest spammers in America.
Lunchtime finds the 29-year-old Scelson sitting cross-legged on the floor of his storefront TV repair shop while he munches on a takeout meal of boiled crawfish and spiced shrimp.
Clean-shaven and slightly pudgy, he's dressed in black jeans and a black short-sleeved jersey. Around his neck, he wears a gold necklace with a pendant of Scooby-Doo, his favorite cartoon character.
Scelson, a night owl by nature, arrived at the cinder-block shop only about an hour earlier. In the backroom, he nods toward two floor-to-ceiling racks of computer equipment - part of a system he uses to blast out e-mail advertising for Rolex watches, herbal supplements, insurance policies and more.
"With e-mail, I can guarantee you 80 million people," says Scelson, a self-taught computer repairman turned professional bulk e-mailer. "I can touch more people in a day's time than the Super Bowl can."
<snip>
Bulk e-mailers generally avoid anti-spam groups as much as possible. But Scelson has joined in the debate over unsolicited commercial e-mail. "I've gone into newsgroups and fought to prove that spam can be done right," Scelson says.
A look through the Internet message groups dedicated to spam discussions offers a glimpse at the animosity between the two sides.
In online salvos, Scelson has called anti-spammers "self-appointed dictators" and "cyber-Nazis." His critics have fired back equally colorful insults, calling Scelson "Ronnie the Rodent" and describing him as a "scamming thief," a "liar," a "cretin," a "terrorist sunuvabitch" and "100% true-blue opportunistic spamming scum."
Scelson knows that many dislike his way of making a living, but he's determined to persist.
"As far as the anti-spam organizations, they just basically want to get rid of e-mail [advertising] altogether. ... If they didn't ask for it, they don't want it. And it's not that simple of a business."
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