But if you're that lucky stiff getting more real e-mail than sleaze, don't get too smug. The amount of spam going out over the Internet is expected to double every year until the surface of the planet collapses under the weight of misspent electrons.

People all over the world are trying desperately to find a solution to this problem. Just last month, Computer Professionals Against All Bad Things e-mailed a request for ideas to millions of addresses. (Did you receive one? It went out with several subjects, including "InkJet Cartridges!!!," "Re: Is This What You Want? $%3#54," and "You have nothing to lose but your tiny penis.")

The consensus was clear: We need laws—stricter, stronger, scarier laws than those currently on the books. Laws that will really intimidate the perpetrators. Perhaps its time to give such laws a try. After all, conservatives have been calling for tough-on-crime policies since the days of Richard Nixon (although he did seem to change his views on that subject rather suddenly).

Anyway, what follows are my own suggestions for laws that might actually stem the flow by, as W.S. Gilbert would say, making the punishment fit the crime. For these to have any effect, they would have to be part of an international treaty that would be immediately cancelled by President Bush on the grounds that they do not make the world safer for polluters.

But here are my suggestions, anyway.

• Bill Gates will be granted a monopoly on all ratware (spamming software). That way, spammers will be unable to send a commercial message to a million addresses without paying for a Microsoft license, running 18 additional Microsoft programs, and holding their breath every time they download a Microsoft bug fix.
• Those found guilty of mass-mailing ads that promise to enlarge or shrink particular body parts must submit to cosmetic surgery on said parts, performed by first-year medical students during spring break.
• A new law will require that spam only be sent to those on an international opt-in list. The only way to opt in is to be caught sending spam.
• Anyone sending mail promising to fix your credit will have his or her credit fixed, permanently.
• Spammers will be liable for up to $500 for every unsolicited message sent, $2,500 for every forged address on a message, and $75,000 for every subject line that doesn't begin with "This is worthless spam mailed to you by a sniveling piece of goat spit."
• To help innocent e-mail readers sue the people who are filling up their mailboxes, a single Web site will list the name, e-mail address, mailing address, and phone number of all known spammers.
• If you put spaces or symbols between letters or use intentional misspellings to get around Spam filters ("V I A G R A" or "freee monie"), you will be forced to spend the rest of your life with your first grade grammar teacher.
• Anyone who sends a message with the subject "Hey, handsome, wanna talk to me?" will be forced to man the advertised phones himself.
• If the subject of your message contains the statement "Find the Truth About Your Neighbor," your neighbors will find the truth about you.
• Those who send spam where the subject ends with a random collection of letters, numbers, and symbols will be hired (at minimum wage) to work for the CIA, looking for secret terrorist threats hidden in eye charts.
• If an unsolicited message promises "nude photos," the perpetrator will have to do his or her own in-the-buff modeling—but only after six months on the butter-beer-and-chocolate diet.
• Any spammer who forges the return address on an advertisement so that it appears to come from an innocent person will have to use his or her actual e-mail address when sending out a full confession to 83 million randomly generated addresses that are sure to bounce.
• If you send e-mail promising that people can lose twelve pounds in an absurdly short period of time, you will have an arm amputated.
• Any spammer who sends mail with the word game or gambling will be required to attend the next major computer show in Las Vegas, where they will sleep on casino floors with easy access to their life savings.
• If you send spam with the subject "Take control of your youth," you will be given full responsibility for my three kids.
• Spammers will have to find useful, constructive employment with AOL/Time-Warner, where they will provide continual, live, on-demand renditions of "You've got mail."

What do you think should be done to stop the spread of spam? Send your suggestions to spamideas@thelinkinspector.com. If I get enough responses that are sufficiently funny, I'll reprint them in an upcoming Gigglebytes.