@Lorena, I was feeling for you since I too have received spam through Gokunming, until you started to sound like a brat.

Does it matter that you've had your account since 06? Does it matter that this is your first time receiving such spam?

How do you want it fixed? Maybe you can mobilized China's human flesh search engine to flush these people out and have them publicly castrated.

I mean are you SERIOUS? How is the webmaster suppose to control what other people send? In case you hadn't notice, this IS a PUBLIC forum, the send a message button is also public. If you want it fixed than I suggest you contact the webmaster to have your account deleted or register a throw away account, change your profile info to that account and be done with it.

BTW, really? I mean, really?? Registered in 06 and you've only posted 9 times? Not counting the 3 you used in here, that makes a grand total of 6?

@lorena
It's a classic nigerian 419 (?) scam as JJ pointed out. SPAM is inevitable - so just black hole (delete without reading) the mail and eventually the junk will blend in with the rest of the spam. Annoying (and I personally believe spammers should be executed) - but a fact of life in this virtual age.

As for missionaries - they've been in Yunnan for centuries. Last time Howard Dycke was here - he mentioned a remote (?) village choral group which can still sing entire arias (?) from Handel's Messiah (or something like that - Howard - please come back soon!). I believe they may have performed during one of his public events...but my mind is ancient and decaying.

Proselytization is the primary function of missionaries. To increase the effectiveness of their message - they attempt to bring benefits to the general community (in addition to creating lovey touchy feely cliques or groups)...generally speaking. So as long as they're not cultish and bring social benefit to the rural, the poor, widows and orphans - kudos.

Missionary groups tend to be supported from their home churches abroad - so this is a rather low-key form of investment along with somewhat subsidized businesses. The government knows what's going on and they watch carefully - but generally speaking - as long as they don't become a stench, attempt to interfere in government affairs, etc - they're generally allowed to sub-exist...kind of like the prolific off-the-grid language teachers "schlumming" around the city and province.

@lorena

It is probably a scam. And you may have received this email from a spam troller or a bot that goes looking for accounts.

Treat it is spam and the best thing to do is report it to GoK staff who will ban the account troubling people.

yeah i've been getting exactly the same email to my yahoo account for ages. just another african scam. goes straight to my spam folder, so i don't lose any sleep over it. it's really nothing to have a panic attack over.

p.s. lorena you sound like a bit of an idiot.

Excercise for the day - Jumping to conclusions.

Some clarification: The messages mentioned above by Lorena have been deleted around one hour after they were sent and the user banned. We unfortunately cannot 'unsend' emails, so notifications about the Private Messages that were sent out have still reached people's inbox.

Although we have been working hard to fight spam, scams and 'fake' accounts, real people with malicious intentions can still create an account, verify their email address and use parts of the website. We appreciate it when people report any of these cases by using the contact form so we can take appropriate measures when needed.

Please refrain from replying to any messages that seem out of the ordinary. The less response these spammers / scammers get, the less likely they are to try again.

Thank you for your understanding.

Got that mail too (think I've recieved 4 or 5 since getting on GoKunming, not too bad really compared to many other sites) and it's not missionary related. As Lao and others point out, it just like any other angle on the Nigerian scam. Their prime targets are middle aged to older Westerners, people with a good chance of being Christian hence it's worth a shot with the god references. You guys probably know I like to rant against the religious, but this case doesn't warrant it.

Yereth: Thank you very much for telling me the GoKunming team is aware of the problem and is taking measures to stop it from happening, that was all I wanted. Didn't think about using the contact form, next time I definetely will.

Texas Boy: Do I need to pay to have the right to point out something is not working...?

Tonyaod: Congratulations for having so much time to waste - and yet so little technical knowledge, cause lo and behold, turns out you can actually fix that kind of problem (I know, it's spooky...).
Chris8080:... pfff, not even worth it.

Lorena, reading through your posts in this thread I think you might have more pressing problems than a little spam mail.

Yes I do. And you obviously don't.
Ave