Ladies and Gentlemen … this is your co-passenger Taji speaking. Please bare with us as the site is going through upgrades and you WILL be experiencing some turbulence. Last night for a few hours we had a “User Has Exceeded his Bandwidth Quota” sign on the front page and the hosting company didnt seem to be very happy with us… but ultimatly that’s good news from Fernando / Brian and the rest of the Voiceover-casting team cause that means their feldgling site (which I originally found out about through a Spam mail Brian was sending…. you didn’t think I’d let you off the hook for that didja B?) is getting hits and becoming more and more popular with the VO Community.

And hey since I’m in such a good mood I’ll post that Spam email Brian originally sent me (and probably a whole bunch of others on the site) to give us the heads up of the existence of the site… and which caused the ire and anger of my voice over site of choice at the time Voices.com…. and I’ll post their email as well … Hey I’m here to air out the laundry and present the facts… past , present .. and inshallah (God Willing) Future.

As a refresher … here is Brian’s First email:

_______________________________

Hi  !

Now the voiceover marketplace has a new free social network community. I’m inviting you because you sound like a great voiceover professional. (really brian?)

Join Voiceover-Casting.com and create your free profile now.

Make friends, stay connected with other voiceover professionals, producers, clients; and apply for voiceover jobs for free.

We are waiting for your registration. If you are already a member, update your profile and post new demos.

Brian Hudson
talents@voiceover-casting.com
voiceover-casting.com

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Notice the lack of a name! not Hi Mahmoud!… just Hi!!… man at least your attempt at spam wasnt very professional… shows a decent guy at heart!

here was Voices.com’s reply back then (March 4th 2009):

Vox Daily

Looking Out For #1: You’ve Got a Friend

Posted: 03 Mar 2009 09:48 PM CST

What do you do when spam becomes a problem?

This passed week, we have experienced an unprecedented amount of spam and we’d now like to address this publicly for the sake of our members.

To learn more, read on.

Spam

Over the last week, Voices.com members have shared their concerns with us about being solicited through the website’s internal messaging system by a company inviting them to join a social network for voice talent.

After a couple of days, the emails stopped which was a welcome relief, giving us the impression that it was over, however, it appears they are back at it.

To be absolutely clear, this company is in no way affiliated with Voices.com and we are very sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Please be assured that these spammers do not have access to your account information or contact information unless you have provided them with it yourself. Since they are using the internal messaging system at Voices.com, they cannot view your email address.

What We’ve Done To Date

๏ Emailed the offending spammers requesting them to stop
๏ Suspended their accounts
๏ Deleted offending accounts and banned email addresses
๏ Telephoned their offices in Sao Paulo, Brazil to no avail
๏ Been answering concerns on a one-on-one basis by email, phone and live chat

Within hours of the first registration and spamming activity, I sent a personal email requesting that they stop and informed them that their account was suspended until they could provide evidence that they were not trying to mine our customer base. This email went unanswered.

David also emailed and phoned. Both of his attempts to communicate went unanswered.

In response to our efforts to deter these people, they’ve continued to create more accounts with different email addresses and usernames to bypass the system. We’ve tried nearly everything save showing up at their office is Sao Paulo, Brazil and speaking with them in person.

What Can You Do?

Our advice to you is to ignore any messages you may receive that invite you to join the social network.

If you have joined this site under the impression that it was being operated by Voices.com, I recommend that you delete your account at that social networking site as we are in no way affiliated with that organization. I have already heard from some members who have done just that and removed their profiles from the voice talent social networking site.

Thank You For Your Support

I wish to thank all of you who have emailed or called with your concerns. Your kind words and patience during this ordeal have been greatly appreciated. We care about our members and take these things very seriously. I trust that our efforts will bear fruit, and God willing, these activities will cease.

Best wishes,

Stephanie

©iStockphoto.com/Tatiana Popova

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Like I said although as a Site we started with some dubious ways of promotion… so far its grown into a wonderful community of people brought together by their love of this business (and Brian’s spam emails!)

Also funny story…. I got the Voices.com warning about the Spammer (aka Brian) before I got his email… so I was actually looking forward to it cause Stephanie peaked my interest! Either this is some elaborate marketing scheme of genius proportions between stephanie and brian…. or a nice coincidence that worked out well for Fernando… Brian and the team at Voiceover-casting.com

Ok thats enough investigative journalism for me today… I hope you enjoyed the post!