.info should really be .spam

Has anybody else noticed a trend?

[drshields]

It seems to me that approximately 90% of .info sites out there are spam sites. I know before even clicking on them... I know that google/yahoo/msn etc don't discriminate against against the TLD; but maybe they should. There's a good chance that "search-words-here.info" will be a spammy site with nothing but a bunch of garbage content and Adsense Ads.

[walkman]

since we're painting everything with a broad brush: how about penalizing ALL the domains with the word "blog" in it? Most are not useful, and the try to cheat SEs by link exchanges...

[crescenta]

Hey, wait a minute! I'm developing an .info site and there's no way it's spam! Just a fun little personal site. I got the info because it was cheaper than the .com, and I'm well . . . cheap. ;)

[drshields]

Don't both .com and .info sites cost about 6 bucks? I thought people were taking the .info sites, because the .com's were all gone. Although I have seen some very weird .info domains (spam sites) that just a bunch of random letters and numbers.

[wildbest]

...There's a good chance that "search-words-here.info" will be a spammy site with nothing but a bunch of garbage content and Adsense Ads.

The main reason behind is the never ending .info promotion. You may get .info domain only for a couple of bucks. Spammers legally use .info domains in the "from" field of their spam emails or experiment .info MFA sites. They do not care if that .info domain will be banned or confiscated by the registrar as they can always register the next .info domain practically for free.

[rich42]

The people who put spam filters together are quite aware how often .info is associated with spam.

I would not send out an email message with a .info URL in it and expect it to get received more than 50% of the time.

I would much rather be mikeswidgetstore.com than widgets.info

[gpmgroup]

There are a few professional spammers who generate emails with fake headers in the format [e-mail]. We get the bounce/delivery failure emails :(
The links on these spam emails are more often than not to a .com site

[Rosalind]

I got the info because it was cheaper than the .com, and I'm well . . . cheap. ;)

That's probably the best explanation as to why the .infos are more likely to be spammy. You wouldn't put blacklistable junk on an expensive domain.

[jmccormac]

Purely on a numbers basis, the .com gTLD should be the more spammy. A few years ago, the .biz gTLD was more associated with spammy operations but .info was not. Without actualy stats, .info being a spam haven is just a theory and as gpmgroup pointed out, spammers can fake the From: and reply-to: addresses.

Regards...jmcc

[drshields]

I don't typically regard most .biz sites as being 'spammy' but then again, I see a LOT more .biz sites than .info sites. I think performing a whois on some generic domain names would show that .info is registered many times over .biz... It's kind of sad; I feel the direction that domain names + content are going is that .com's and .net's will be the only real, viable domains, and the .info's, .net's, and .us's will just be spammy junk.

[sdsinc]

Economics of spam?
.info can be had for slightly more than $1 while .com usually costs more than $6.
But many spam messages are faked anway.

[monek]

There are companies giving away .infos for free like 1and1 (I hope I don't get screamed at for promotion again). I think that has a lot to do with spammers deciding to use them too.

On the business side of domains its a smart move in my opinion. People pick up the freebies and use them. Registrars make it up in hosting sales and future registration fees.

[gpmgroup]

I had a quick look at the extension that links in spam point to (rather than return/sender address often faked)

Here is the top 20 by volume for the last 24 hours

Note those at the top of the list are pumping 10X the quanity of those at the bottom.

.net
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
.com
IP Address
.net
.info
.com
.com
.cnt.br
.org
.com
.com

its taken from a wide sample set, individual experience will vary depending on which spammers list your address is on.