Captchas

I've been coming up against captchas lately. One day I had too many blog posts on one of my sites, and every post over the limit requires a captcha to go on. They're a drag, but apparently necessary, and effective against spam.

I could look it up, I guess, as to precisely how it works. A computer supposedly can't read it, it takes a person. But I'm a person and I have a hard time making them out. Some of the ones at blogger are so squeezed together and twisted around that they're virtually indecipherable. But I have a theory -- sometimes it works this way -- that if you take a more intuitive approach to it, they're actually easier. When you start reasoning it out, weighing the alternatives, for me, that's when I get them wrong.

It's funny, though, if you get it wrong a couple times, they give you a slightly easier one. Maybe it just seems that way and is a coincidence, but there are definitely some easier ones.

Who are these people with automated programs and what are they doing to crack the captcha?