[vmelkon]

It seems as if there are some people creating an account and spamming threads that I have posted to.
When they make a post, I get a email notification.

One day, I had 10 email notifications.

What is going on? Why is a site about chemistry so interesting to the spammers?

I'm going to disable email notification.

[Arkcon]

Well, I've only turned it on manually for at most 3 threads since I've been on, because I don't really need that much info.  When logged in, comments to threads I've commented to have a different icon, so I can find them easily.

The admins and the mods [I'm one of the new ones :pats own back: ] do the best we can, but its a tougher battle than you'd expect.  One of the most important qualifications for a Mod, above and beyond chemistry knowledge, and a sufficiently stable personality in the face of some really stubborn posters, is being able to log in at a time when another Mod can't.

[Borek]

Why is a site about chemistry so interesting to the spammers?

Every site is interesting. Be it blog comments, be it a forum, everywhere where you can post a message containing a link, spammers will try. It is a part of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spamdexing techniques.