"MAKE.MONEY.FAST" is a title of an electronically forwarded chain letter which became so infamous that the term is now used to describe all sorts of chain letters forwarded over the Internet, by e-mail spam or Usenet newsgroups. In anti-spammer slang, the name is often abbreviated "MMF".

History

The original "MAKE.MONEY.FAST" letter was written around 1988 by a person who used the name Dave Rhodes. Biographical details are not certain, and it is not clear that this is even the person's actual name. It is often said, such as in the FAQ for the net.legends Usenet group, that Rhodes was a student at Columbia Union College, a Christian college in Maryland, who wrote the letter and uploaded it as a text file to a nearby BBS around 1987.

It is also often said that Rhodes was convicted of some fraud-related crime and that as part of his sentence he had to create an anti-spam website, but no evidence of this has been found. Sites that appear to be such a site, for example http://daverhodes.etee2k.net, are apparently hoaxes.

The scam reached the Internet, where it was forwarded over e-mail and Usenet, although it was not until spamming became a major problem in 1994 that "MAKE.MONEY.FAST" exploded. It became one of the most persistent spams in existence and multiple variations have come into existence, often by spammers who change the subject of their email to "This really works!" or "You are a winner!"

Mechanics and legality

The letter encouraged readers of the email to forward one dollar in cash to a list of people provided in the text, and to add their own name and address to the bottom of the list after deleting the name and address at the top. Using the theory behind pyramid schemes, the resulting chain of money flowing back and forth would supposedly deliver a reward of thousands of dollars to the ones participating in the chain, as copies of their chain spread and more and more people sent one dollar to their address.

The text of the letter originally claimed to be "perfectly legal", citing Title 18, U.S. Code, Sections 1302 (which deals with postal lotteries) and 1341 (which deals with mail fraud). The U.S. Postal Inspection Service cites 18 USC 1302 when it asserts the illegality of chain letters, including MMF:

letters are illegal if they request money or other items of value and promise a substantial return to the participants. Chain letters are a form of gambling, and sending them through the mail (or delivering them in person or by computer, but mailing money to participate) violates Title 18, United States Code, Section 1302, the Postal Lottery Statute.[http://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/chainlet.htm Chain Letters

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It also asserts that "1egardless of what technology is used to advance the scheme, if the mail is used at any step along the way, it is still illegal." The U.S. Postal Inspection Service asserts the mathematical impossibility that all participants will be winners, as well as the possibilities that participants may fail to send money to the first person listed, and the perpetrator may have been listed multiple times under different addresses and names, thus ensuring that all the money goes to the same person.