I can understand frustration with spam. Fortunately I have AOL and I hardly ever get spam.. They have a huge database of people who can instantly alert AOL to problem posts. As soon as the computer program recognizes that a certain number of people are reporting spam from a certain address, then that address is instantly and completely blocked, forever. It won't even get a chance to go to the spam folder.

Some other services are supposed to be pretty good, too, but I have no current knowledge about who does what.

The reason you get spam is because somehow a spam mailing list provider service has gotten your email address. How did they get it?? Because you gave it to someone, somewhere. Like these -
1) Entering contests - not all of them, but there ARE disreputable online companies.
2) Completing a survey that asks for an email address.
3) Someone selling a much-forward email that has your address somewhere on it. AVOID EVER FORWARDING chain mail.

Once, there was a yahoo group gal who sold email addresses of people who joined. How did I find out? Twice, I joined one of her groups, with different email addresses that were ONLY for this particular group -- and then I NEVER posted to the group and no one but me (and the owner) could even SEE my email address. But both times, with these brand new addresses, never used except to register for this gal's groups, were both receiving porno spam within days. ---- Should point out that I have belonged to scores of groups and forums thru the years, and this is the ONLY time anything like this happened.

Just visiting a website will NEVER give you spam. No cookies can find your email address(es) on your computer. Not possible. Most sites use cookies to
1) identify you in the future as someone who is a repeat visitor.
2) let them know how many pages you visited and how you got to them (this is about giving them feedback about the website navigation)

But to touch on something that many people do not know about -- what adware does to your computer -- it SLOWS it down tremendously. How do you get it? It came bundled in that cool free software you excitedly downloaded. Like these -
1) Examples are those great screensavers you see ads for so often.
2) All those cool things that sit in the notification portion of your task bar. Like that cute Weather Bug, and a score of other things.

Downloads from reputable companies or like you can download from TuCows.com and CNET.net will not have any adware or spyware.

Adware is CONSTANTLY working, sending reports to the company, page address by page address, just where you have been, what you have seen. Now, those messages don't tell the company who YOU are. The company can't pair the reports to your name or email address. But all the constant messages being sent (an the annoying pop-ups that are the result) can drive you mad and slow your internet browsing speed to a crawl.

What to do? Find several spyware detectors, download and run them. But then you have all these things usually loading up automatically at boot. <sigh>

What I suggest is going to AOL and downloading their security package. A McAfee created firewall and anti-virus (checks for and downloads updates daily) AND spyware detector. The spyware detector comes on for just a few seconds when you log onto the internet, looks for stuff, then does a deeper search once a week.

When your anti-spyware removes the adware, the fancy screensavers and those cute and helpful little gizmos will ALL STOP WORKING. Because the only reason the company "gave" them to you was to increase their bank accounts.