The Spam War

THE UNWANTED JUNK E-MAIL that comes flooding into our e-mail inboxes each day feels like a sustained attack from malicious, unseen enemies. 

Their offers of "herbal Viagra," cheap ink-jet cartridges, jobs working from home, bigger body parts, smaller mortgage payments, porn, wealth, beauty and more go unheeded by the vast majority of recipients. 

About a billion spam messages flow into Hotmail alone every day -- some 80% of incoming Hotmail messages are spam. And that doesn't count mail stopped by Hotmail's spam filters. 

The amount of global spam sent each day has increased by a factor of five in the past year, according to some estimates. 

It's obvious that spam "evildoers" are just scattering junk mail to the wind, trolling for suckers. But the net effect is needless aggravation, wasted time and money and the unspoken psychological damage of being unable to stop raw sewage from pouring into our personal inboxes. 

Spam is spoiling the Internet, reducing the convenience and value of e-mail and making people think twice about letting their kids go online. 

Legislation doesn't work -- e-mail can come from anywhere in the world. Filters are temporary because spammers figure out how to get around them. Lawsuits have done nothing to slow the onslaught. 

Yes, it's a war. They're attacking us. And we've got to fight back. 

We'll never end all spam forever. The goal is to make spamming an expensive, difficult and spectacularly unpleasant enterprise that just isn't worth the trouble. 

I've got some specific tips and ideas on how to protect yourself and annoy spammers at the same time, which I'll share with you in the next issue. But I'd also like to find out about YOUR favorite anti-spam techniques, products and services. 

Have you found something that works? If so, tell me about it! 

Head Games

Swedish design students Par Stenberg and Johan Thoresson have created a prototype product called the "Toilet Entertainment System," an interactive kiosk built into the tiles of a public bathroom stall. The system prints out news, sports and cultural information on toilet paper, which can then be "re-purposed" as regular toilet paper before you leave the restroom. Choose topics by touching the tiles. A "graffiti" feature enables you to use your SMS phone to print a personal message or do the high-tech equivalent of "writing on the bathroom wall." 

Faking Authenticity

The geniuses at Sony Ericsson Mobile Communication have discovered that there's no better advertising than the honest opinion of everyday users. So they've invented a con to fake good "word of mouth." A "guerrilla marketing" campaign developed by Fathom Communications started last week and involves actors who hang out at tourist attractions in New York and Seattle using the new T68i mobile phone, which features a built-in digital camera. The actors pretend to be tourists themselves and involve bystanders in their picture-taking and phone calls. Another scam features female actresses who hang out in bars and receive phone calls. The callers pictures come up on the screens, and the actresses engage random drunks at the bar in conversations about the phone. The actors never tell people they've been duped. (Hey, it works for street hustlers, why not Sony Ericsson?) The $5 million campaign is scheduled to last two months. 

Ethical Government Pays

U.S. government ethics laws required Colin Powell to step down from the America Online board of directors and sell his AOL stock 90 days after assuming the office of Secretary of State. He sold the stock April 1, 2001 at a price of $35.15 per share (for a profit of $2.6 million). As of yesterday, AOL Time Warner was trading at $10.80 per share. 

Resistance Is Futile

A small Boston area web-publishing startup was told August 9 to hand-over its Star Trek inspired domain name to Paramount Pictures Corporation within seven days or face immediate assimilation. Wayland resident Barry Zellen, a web-publisher, Mike's List reader and certifiable "Trekie," launched in July a portal linking two dozen webzines and called it ToBoldlyGo.net. Zellen said in a press release that it's "crazy to say that any one corporation owns these words. They are part of our culture." Zellen uses a picture of the starship Enterprise on his web site, something Paramount also objects to. Zellen would boldly go to court to protect his domain name, but doesn't have the money. What do YOU think. Should a company like Paramount be able to "own" all the words it uses in the intro to one of its TV shows? Let me know at [email protected]. 

CEO Salary Search

The best financial advice Morgan Stanley Dean Witter will never give you is this: Get a job running Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. Executives at the company get millions of dollars per year in salary and bonuses, according to a new web site called eComp. Use the service to find out how much the top execs at YOUR company are making. 

Send Your Picture!

I'm thinking of launching a weekly "reader of the week" item. Send a photo of yourself -- and tell where you live, what kind of computers and gadgets you use and why you love Mike's List -- to: [email protected] 

Shameless Pitch for Money

This issue is sponsored by the readers who contributed since the last issue. Thank you Ted, James, John, Bruce, Max, James, Joe, Seymour, Timothy, Dale and Jody for sending money to support ad-free content on the Internet! If you'd like to make a contribution, please click here. 

Proof You Can Buy Anything on the Web

Folks, I'm not kidding! You can buy ANYTHING on the web. Including:

A Halloween costume for your dog 

A hat for your cat

A bicycle built for seven

English food

Artwork painted by elephants

A touch-screen watch

And even Austin Powers' Shaguar!

Shameless Self-Promotion

Craig Crossman's Computer America features Mike's List content on every show (and I join Craig live on the first broadcast Sunday of every month). You can hear Computer America on your local Business TalkRadio station or over the Internet each Sunday from 1pm to 3pm Silicon Valley Time. Don't miss Computer America!

Ad Creep

Acclaim Entertainment, the UK company that makes Turok games, is looking for five suckers willing to change their names to "Turok" for at least a year. It's part of an advertising gimmick they hope will increase "name recognition" for their upcoming products. They're paying �500, an X-Box and a copy of every Turok game to each idiot they select. In unrelated news, I'll be changing the name of my newsletter to, "Turok's List," effective immediately. 

Follow-Up

I told you in the last issue about the "see-mail" I got from Handspring. I've since received an apology, the Treo itself and some really good tech support from the company. I'll give a full report in an upcoming issue. 

I told you in Issue 29 about a Thai software program that repels mosquitos. I'm happy to report that Saranyou Punyaratanabunbhu's Anti-Mal has been upgraded to a new version 2.0 that shoos away cockroaches and rats as well. 

Gotta-Get-It Gadgets

A new MP3 player from Digisette called the Duo-DX is shaped just like an audio cassette tape. It plays MP3s in your tape player, as well as through the included earplugs. Nothing new you say? Well, it also records from your radio into MP3 format right on the player. The gadget costs $189. If you can't afford that, just buy a blank cassette tape, which has nearly all the same functionality for about fifty cents. 

Wacky Web Sites

Cancelled flights. Bad weather. Missed connections. There are plenty of reasons why I've slept in airports. But never because I thought it was a good idea. The folks at The Budget Traveller's Guide to Sleeping In Airports, however, do. 

Save the whales? How about, "Save the plastic flamingos?" Join the Society to Protect Artificial Wildlife. 

OK, forget the plastic flamingos, how about, "Save Martha Stewart?"

Warning: Poke the penguin at your own risk!

Here's a fellow that takes a picture of his face every day and posts it on the Internet. 

If you like out-of-this-world women from the sixties -- especially space chicks with complicated hair-doos, miniskirts and ray guns -- then you'll love the Ladies of Star Trek web site. 

Check the traffic before heading to work (or, if you work from home or live in the woods, remind yourself how lucky you are) on Highways.tv, the most complete resource I've seen for up-to-the-minute traffic information. (Here's the best page I've found for South Silicon Valley.)

If you're a professional reporter -- or just have trouble minding your own business -- check out InternalMemos.com. For $45 per month, they'll show you Corporate America's dirty laundry. 

Now you can enjoy pet ownership, but without the fuss and smell. Tune into the fabulous Litter Box Cam. 

 If you like talking to robots, here's your site. Random people have built "AIM bots" that converse with you via AOL Instant Messenger or over the web. Some of them are rude, others are vaguely interesting. Mostly, they're wacky. 

This fellow has so many mouse pads that he's built a couch out of them.

Have you been fascinated by the ancient art of pen spinning? Now you can learn the dark secrets of pen spinners everywhere.  

Last Week's Mystery Pic

No, it's not a frame from the new video game "Gwyneth Paltrow goes Postal," "Bill Gates' wife waiting on the front porch for him to return from Microsoft Geeks Bowling League night" or even "Bin-Laden in Drag," as suggested by some readers. It's a picture of the new villain "Terminatrix" robot from the upcoming Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines." The exclusive spy picture was published in the German magazine "Planet Movie." A hearty Mike's List congratulations to Malcolm Langille of Moncton, Canada, for being first with the right answer.

Mystery Pic o' the Week

What is it? Send YOUR guess to [email protected]. If you're first with the right answer, I'll print your name in the next issue of Mike's List!