LIKE this if you hate death.

Or if you love cute fluffy animals. Or if you're against cancer. Or if you think child abuse is wrong.

Unless you live in a monastery, there's a fairly good chance that you've seen something like this on Facebook.

So why should you not do it?

Apart from the fact that you're stating the bleedin' obvious and annoying all your friends who will see the item pop in their news feed, there is an altogether more compelling reason.

These types of requests are created by scammers who want to attract as many likes as possible from as many gullible people as possible in as short a time as possible.

They say that the love of money is the root of all evil (don't ask me who "they" are, but they're full of nuggets of wisdom like this), and that is certainly the case here.

A Facebook page with thousands of likes is a valuable commodity for a business that wants to reach a lot of people quickly for marketing purposes, and as such there is something of a black market for them.

Do a quick Google search on "Facebook page for sale" and you'll see what I mean.

Anyone who wants to make a quick buck simply has to create one of these pointless heart string-tugging pictures/videos/statements, spam them into the Facebook-o-sphere and wait for them to rack up the likes.

Once they have enough people on board, they are sold to someone who changes their details and uses the account to promote their business or cause.

Not only is this highly annoying, it often involves people misappropriating pictures - sometimes unwitting victims (who may be children or people with genuine illnesses) are stunned to find they have gone viral for the sake of someone making some quick cash.

Even more annoying are the "type 111 and watch what happens" posts. It's a picture - what did you think was going to happen?

The answer is, of course, nothing. All you've done is add more popularity to someone's scam and made yourself look like an idiot. D'oh!

There are plenty of better ways to make yourself look like an idiot on Facebook without filling the pockets of scammers.

Try updating your status while drunk, or even better, post a video of yourself.

Or take a picture of your dinner, tell people what you've had for breakfast (accompanied by "om nom nom" or somesuch nonesense), post a vague attention-seeking statement ("I can't believe what just happened - I don't want to talk about it"), or tell everyone that you're bored.

Thanks for sharing. No, really.