In reply to room34.

I’d add Akismet to the list as well. I don’t mean to dismiss the need for an anti-spam solution, but a plugin that pushes for a subscription shouldn’t be part of the default installation IMO (I know you can use it for free on commercial sites, but it’s against their TOS). The Akismet shipped with WP.org can be a barebones “community edition” that’s free to use. I have personally switched to the comment blacklist maintained by splorp on github and it catches almost all spam in comments and contact forms.