Man texts entire Shakespeare plays to scammer

BRISTOL, England, March 19 (UPI) -- A British man who lost $133 to an online scammer said he is getting his revenge by sending the man Shakespeare's complete works via text message.

Edd Joseph, 24, of Bristol, England, said he paid $133 to buy a PlayStation 3 gaming console online, but the seller never made good on their deal, the Bristol Post reported Wednesday.

Joseph said he turned to Shakespeare, whose characters often executed their own elaborate revenge plots, and discovered he could cut and paste entire plays into a single text message that would be split into many smaller messages by the recipient.

"I was really annoyed and I was trying to think of ways of being more in the position of power because I felt so helpless about it," Joseph said. "My first thought was that I could try and pretend I had found out where he lived but it was all a bit of a cliche and it wasn't going to worry him really. Then it just occurred to me you can copy and paste things from the Internet and into a text message. It got me thinking, 'What can I send to him?' which turned to 'What is a really long book?' which ended with me sending him 'Macbeth.'"

Joseph said he has thus far sent 22 plays, including "Macbeth," "Othello" and "Hamlet." He said the plays have so far resulted in a total 17,424 text messages.

Joseph said he has unlimited text and data plans, so his scheme isn't costing him any extra money. He said the scammer isn't too pleased with his revenge plot.

"I got the first reply after an hour, and then a few more abusive messages after that. His phone must have been going off pretty constantly for hours," Joseph said. "But recently he has taken to calling me and giving me abuse on the phone. I tried to ask him if he was enjoying the plays, but he was very confused. I'm going to keep doing it. If nothing else I'm sharing a little bit of culture with someone who probably doesn't have much experience of it. I'm not a literary student, and I'm not an avid fan of Shakespeare but I've got a new appreciation you could say -- especially for the long ones."