cum grano salis — nobody likes a clever bastard

I saw some retarded shit in my access log that looked like another spam bot that needed to be blocked, but after a little research, it seems to be a semi-legit piece of garbage called Surphace. After a very brief bit of research, it appears as though AOL is responsible.

I had thought that all of the stupid VCs were done chasing stupid ideas with stupid names, but I guess they’re still at it. Oh! Wait! Maybe they were on to something! Surphace has a URL shortener! … and surphing! I wonder if it’s too late to sell a flaming bag of shit to some VC firm (or AOL). It would be better than this thing.

“Surphace Scout” is supposed to be really cool and smart, and specifically know how to find blog posts, but it doesn’t know what a sitemap is. Based on its behavior, it also doesn’t seem to know how to find an RSS link in HTML. If it does, it doesn’t know when to stop making requests. Five minutes of work away from not being annoying. Par for the course.

64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:42 -0600] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 73 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 195 598 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:43 -0600] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 139 488 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:43 -0600] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 27808 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 135 28336 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:45 -0600] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.0" 200 73 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 145 598 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:46 -0600] "GET /feed/ HTTP/1.0" 500 415 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 140 948 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:46 -0600] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.0" 200 73 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 149 598 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:47 -0600] "GET /atom.xml HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 147 521 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:47 -0600] "GET /atom.xml HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 143 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:48 -0600] "GET /index.atom HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 149 523 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:48 -0600] "GET /index.atom HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 145 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:49 -0600] "GET /index.rdf HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 148 522 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:49 -0600] "GET /index.rdf HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 144 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:49 -0600] "GET /rss.xml HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 146 520 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:50 -0600] "GET /rss.xml HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 142 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:50 -0600] "GET /index.xml HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 148 522 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:51 -0600] "GET /index.xml HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 144 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:51 -0600] "GET /index.rss HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 148 522 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:51 -0600] "GET /index.rss HTTP/1.0" 404 18513 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 144 18994 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:55 -0600] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 302 - "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 139 488 -/- (-%)
64.40.121.187 - - [13/Dec/2009:23:13:55 -0600] "GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 27808 "-" "Surphace Scout&v4.0 - scout at surphace dot com" 135 28147 -/- (-%)

AOL Can’t Get Anything Right by cum grano salis — nobody likes a clever bastard, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.