How to you recognize spam? How do you properly respond to spam? How do you avoid being a spammer yourself? The Steem Pope is here to advise you on all of this and more!

Spam in the internet sense is irrelevant or inappropriate posts, messages, and comments. Spam posts are usually frequent and devoid of substance. Spam messages are unfortunately common on Steemit.chat, and often include begging for votes and followers. Spam comments are copy/pasted on posts over and over, often by bots instead of actual human input. If it's irrelevant or just doesn't seem like a substantive response, it's potentially spam.

There are pitfalls, though. Steemit has a lot of users for whom English is a second language, resulting in a language barrier that can come off as nonsense at first glance. Odd comments are often also from people who only have seen spam replies, and may think it's the norm here among serious members of the community. And we have people who are just plain internet n00bz.

So how do we sift the wheat from the chaff?

Is it comment spam?

1. Reply to potential spam comments asking for clarification. If they respond to comments, it's a good sign.
2. Check the commenter's account by clicking on their name to see what they offer for a bio. Check when the account was created. See where they say they live.
3. From their account, click to see their comment history to find out how often they are commenting, and whether the comments are all the same.

Is it post spam?

1. Comment! Ask for clarification and see whether there's a real human response!
2. Again, check the user's account to see whether they're new, or just not fluent in English.
3. Do a Google search for a sentence from the post. Place it in quotation marks to search the exact phrase. See whether it's plagiarized from another site.
4. For photos/art, try a reverse image search. If you don't have an app/extension, go to images.google.com and paste in the URL for the image itself to see whether it appears elsewhere on the web.

Is it steemit.chat spam?

Unsolicited vote-for-vote offers and upvote/follow begging are always spam. Reply stating as much and ask that they stop. Block them. If you suspect impersonation of an established long-term user or other fraud, contact the steemcleaners-public channel. Never send STEEM, SBD, or other cryptocurrencies, and especially never send your passwords and private key information to anyone because of a chat message!

Now what?

If you have done your due diligence in investigating the suspected spam, you have probably learned one of to things:

A. It is apparently a n00b, someone who is learning English, a misunderstanding on your part, or otherwise an honest mistake involving a real user who was not intentionally trying to spam anyone.

B. It appears to be spam.

Not this. The other kind of spam. Image credit: Wikipedia

If you find someone who is a n00b or not fluent in English, consider offering constructive criticism or just plain conversation. We need to nurture our users who are here to contribute to the platform. Better to risk occasionally upvoting a spam comment than risk driving away potential upstanding Steemians.

If it appears to be spam, you probably don't have the weight on Steemit to address it properly yourself. @steemcleaners can help, though! They even have a website where you can report suspected malicious behavior for further investigation on top of their steemit.chat channels. Just don't do anything stupid like spamming them or filing malicious false reports.

But I am a noob, or English is a second language!

Make substantive comments. Read the comments under other posts and see who is actively engaging with the author. Practice making good comments, and concerse with other xommenters. Don't be afraid to just lurk while you learn, and find a community of other posters who can help you. Rome wasn't built in a day, and you won't become a whale (much less a dolphin like me) overnight. Be patient, and treat others as you would be treated yourself.

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If this sermon was helpful, please consider commenting, upvoting, and resteeming it to others! And, as always, if you have committed sins against Blog, you can receive papal absolution by sending Steem or SBD to me along with a comment containing your confession!*

*Neither eternal salvation nor temporal peace is guaranteed by the Steem Pope's absolution of blogging sins.