Viagra, luxury watch and weight loss pitches still flooding e-mail inboxes

Unwanted commercial e-mail, or spam, declined significantly after a major spam-hosting service was shut down in early November last year.
Unfortunately, spam volumes have gradually crept back in the last two months, according to Symantec, a maker of Internet security software.
On Nov. 11, multiple network providers shut down access to McColo.com hosted systems, based on abuse complaints. Silicon Valley-based McColo Corp. rented out servers to clients, including spammers. Spam traffic dropped 65% a day after McColo was shut down.
But now spam volumes are back to 80% of their pre-McColo shutdown levels, Symantec says in its January report called “The State of Spam.”
Spam typically accounts for about 80% of e-mail traffic.
Like many Internet users, I’ve got multiple personal e-mail accounts.
My account with Yahoo Mail is for correspondence with family and friends and some business uses. I use my account with Google’s Gmail for commercial e-mails and newsletters. I’ve also got a couple more I use when some outfit wants an e-mail address, but I don’t want to give them a good one.
In my experience, Yahoo does the best job filtering out spam e-mail. I just don’t get that many spam messages in my bulk e-mail folder.
My Gmail account is a different story. I started getting spam right away, even before I started using that e-mail address for anything. Google does a good job directing these messages to a spam folder, but I still see them.
The junk e-mail to my Gmail account falls into three main categories: sexual (Viagra or penis-enlargement sales pitches), luxury watches for cheap, and weight loss cures (endorsed by Oprah Winfrey!).
The high-school boy in me does get a kick out of the subject lines for the penis-enlargement scams. Here are a few:

“Every locker room will envy you”
“So massive it scared her”
“You'll call it Peter the Great”

I also receive pitches to get university degrees based on my “life experience.” Sounds great. “No examination, no books, no study.” Even better. “No one is turned down.” This explains those occasional news stories where a reporter gets a college degree for their dog.
“The more degrees you have the better your chances and prospects in life. That is the way life is. It is a competitive world,” one e-mail states.
Time to buy my MBA.

Monster truck show just got too exciting for me

Earlier today I filled out an online survey from Feld Motorsports, operator of the Monster Jam monster truck shows. Now I wish I could change some of my responses.
I received the e-mail survey because I had been to a Monster Jam show last year with my young son, who likes monster trucks.
The e-mail survey request, which I got Friday night, said Monster Jam wanted my opinions because “we are hoping to create an even more exciting customer experience at our shows.”
Attendees at the Monster Jam show Friday night in Tacoma, Wash., witnessed a horrific accident that killed a 6-year-old boy and injured another spectator. Debris from a monster truck flew into the grandstands and hit the boy and a man, according to the Associated Press. I didn't read the story until this afternoon.
I had been thinking of taking my son, now 5 ½, to the Monster Jam show next month in Rosemont, Ill. In the survey, I even said I was very likely to attend another Monster Jam show soon. I’d answer the survey differently now.
The Disney on Ice show looks to be more our speed now.

(Photo from Feb. 16, 2008, Monster Jam show at the Allstate Arena in Rosemont, Ill.)

Marriage in trouble? Try a new electronic gadget. (No, not that kind)

Consumer electronics executives often refer to certain products as “marriage savers.”
At press conferences and in product demos, these executives, usually men, will talk about how a simple-to-use device will settle conflicts between spouses. Members of the press, usually men, nod knowingly or chuckle.
At the Consumer Electronics Show last week, a Toshiba executive made the claim about a new TV that uses Dolby Volume. This technology provides a consistent volume when watching TV or movies on DVD. It automatically turns up the volume on quiet dialogue and turns down the volume for loud commercials. With Dolby Volume, viewers won’t have to constantly adjust the volume while switching channels or watching a movie.
“This really works and I think it’s going to save my marriage,” said Scott Ramirez, vice president of marketing for the TV group at Toshiba America Consumer Products.
At CES 2008, General Motors Chief Executive Rick Wagoner said his company’s OnStar service is a marriage saver, because – as everyone knows – men won’t stop the car to ask for directions. “We’re not just saving lives, we’re saving marriages,” he said.
With OnStar, users can ask for directions or call for emergency service or roadside assistance. The in-dash system also notifies authorities automatically after a crash.
The “marriage saver” description has been used for GPS navigation devices, universal remote controls, PC backup drives, cordless TV headsets, Netflix family-member queues, and digital video recorders like TiVo.
A study released last September seemed to show that DVRs save relationships. The study, by NDS, said 79% of 1,000 DVR owners reported that DVR technology has improved their relationship. U.K.-based NDS is a leading provider of set-top box software for cable and satellite TV services. Media giant News Corp. owns more than 70% of NDS, according to Hoovers.
If only all marriage conflicts were as easy to solve.
(Photo above shows the TV Listener infrared cordless television headset system from Unisar. The manufacturer calls the device … wait for it … “The Marriage Saver.”)

He’s young, handsome, charismatic, and the media love him.
He’s not an American Idol, a basketball phenom or a movie star. But he’s everywhere in the news and pop culture these days.
He’s President-elect Barack Obama, who’ll be sworn in on Tuesday Jan. 20 as the nation’s 44th president.
Companies of all stripes are rushing to cash in on Obama’s superstar popularity.
Topps, the sports trading card company, has come out with a set of President Obama collector trading cards. The box is inscribed “Inaugural Edition,” implying that there could be follow-on sets. Each pack ($1.99 suggested retail) contains six cards and one sticker. The complete set is 90 cards and 18 stickers. Privately held Topps is based in New York City.
Obama graces the cover of the latest issue of “The Amazing Spider-Man” comic book from Marvel Comics. In the comic, Spider-Man foils a plot to replace Obama with an impostor at the inauguration. The real Obama thanks Spidey with a fist-bump, of course. Marvel Comics is a unit of publicly traded Marvel Entertainment of New York City.
Obama also appears as a butt-kicking fighter in a downloadable update to “Mercenaries 2: World In Flames” for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and Sony’s PlayStation 3 video game consoles.
Obama is a playable character who can fire grenade launchers, blow up buildings, and hijack tanks. Hail to the Chief, indeed. “Mercenaries 2” was developed by Pandemic Studios and published by Electronic Arts.
This week, a Hillside, Ill., man is auctioning on eBay a luxury Chrysler sedan Obama drove before winning the White House. Starting bid: $100,000. Obama leased the steel blue 2005 Chrysler 300C Hemi in 2004 and swapped it for a Ford Escape hybrid in 2007, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. That’s something you’d expect for a car previously owned by Elvis.
Time Out Chicago magazine reports that Obama’s name has been used to sell everything from “thong underwear to a line of snacks called Obama’s Salty Nuts (a tongue-in-cheek reference to Jesse Jackson’s hot-mike threat of castration).”
The cover of the latest issue of Time Out Chicago features a Chicago Bulls jersey with Obama’s name and the number 44. The magazine is now auctioning off the custom-made jersey on eBay and donating the proceeds to charity.
Newspapers and magazines have gotten a boost in sales, thanks to Obama commemorative editions.
Expect to see a lot more memorabilia in the news on inauguration day. Stores in Washington, D.C., are packed with T-shirts, buttons, tote bags, posters and other items for the estimated 2 million visitors in town for the event. How about “Hot 4 Obama” hot sauce or an Obama bobblehead? Those are available too, according to Bloomberg.
Most of this stuff, including the so-called collectables, won’t be worth much years from now. So forget about those Obama collector plates or commemorative coins as investments. Experts say anything produced as a collectable really isn’t because so many copies were made. The really valuable items are the most scarce – memorabilia from Obama’s senate campaign or items autographed by him, experts say.
As for me, I think I’ll just pick up some “Yes Pecan!” ice cream from Ben & Jerry’s. The ice cream company is owned by conglomerate Unilever.

Sparrow upstages senior Microsoft executives

To get a glimpse of the future, you need to see how young people are using technology.
Last week, a demonstration during a Microsoft presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show provided such an opportunity.
A 12-year-old girl named Sparrow Buerer showed how to create a video game using a new application called Kodu. Microsoft designed the software to teach programming to kids.
The tweener stole the show from high-profile Microsoft execs Steve Ballmer and Robbie Bach by using a game controller to build a game scenario at blazing speeds.
The keynote crowd, amused by her superfast programming skills, burst out laughing in amazement. Her quick clicks on the controller played out on a big screen as she zipped through menus and made selections too fast for the crowd to follow what she was doing.
Sparrow created a new mini-game on the fly and played it against Bach, president of Microsoft’s entertainment and devices division. The simple game involved gathering shiny rocks and taking them to a little house. In gamer lingo, she “pwnd” Bach, beating him easily.
The crowd gave her an enthusiastic round of applause for her efforts.
“Now that’s a generation-defining experience,” Bach said afterward.
Kodu will be released this spring on the Xbox Live Community Games channel and will help people of all ages program their own games.
Kodu is built around a game-friendly programming language that is simple and icon-based. Players can choose from 20 different game characters, including the Pac Man-like Kodu main character, and use an interactive terrain editor to create a game world. The game features nearly 200 visual building blocks and an image-based creator menu. Kodu can be used and played on either a PC or an Xbox 360.

Apple news alert!: Alaskan seafood delivered to your home

PR Newswire, a major press release distribution service, blew it big time today on one of the most important tech news stories of the year.
About 4:30 p.m. Eastern time, trading in Apple’s stock was halted pending a news announcement. These types of alerts are always big news – a huge acquisition, a change in leadership, a scandal, etc.
Journalists around the world held their breath, waiting for an electronic news release to pop up on their screen. Most assumed it had something to do with Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs, who has been in poor health.
Then, at 4:38 p.m. Eastern, the news we’d all been waiting for popped into my Outlook inbox. The e-mail from PR Newswire had the subject line “Apple Media Advisory.”
OK, this is it, I said to myself.
I clicked on the e-mail to see the news the world had been waiting for.
What the heck?
“Holland America Line Serves Up Authentic Alaska Cruise Souvenir,” the headline read.
Did Apple buy a cruise line? I read on.
“Guests who cruise in Alaska can relive the culinary experience of the Great Land with Fresh Ketch, an Alaskan seafood feast delivered at home for friends and family to enjoy. The innovative ‘home excursion’ brings a taste of Alaska home through a partnership with seafood specialists, Alaska Fresh Ketch.”
Huh? Is this the special diet that Jobs had talked about to counter his hormone imbalance and severe weight loss?
“Fresh Ketch serves up the ultimate in Alaskan souvenirs – wild Alaskan king salmon, halibut, smoked salmon and king crab,” the press release said.
Sounds delicious. But what has this got to do with Apple?
Absolutely nothing.
At 5:02 p.m. Eastern, PR Newswire sent out the correct news release with a note.
“Please disregard the Holland America release you received earlier. PR Newswire sent the release in error and regrets any inconvenience this may have caused,” it said.
Attached was the actual Apple news.
Jobs announced that he is taking a medical leave of absence until the end of June. He said his health issues are “more complex” than he originally thought. He said he would still remain involved as CEO on major strategic decisions, but that Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook would be responsible for Apple’s day-to-day operations.
Meh.
Now about that salmon …

(Photo credits: AP for Steve Jobs at Macworld 2007, KingSalmonGuides.com for Alaska salmon photo.)

“30 Rock” story line about porn video game ripped from the headlines

Last year on the critically acclaimed NBC comedy “30 Rock,” lunatic comic actor Tracy Jordan, played by Tracy Morgan, hit upon the idea to combine his two passions: video games and pornography.
The show parodied the movie “Amadeus,” portraying Jordan as a tortured artistic genius, while a jealous coworker played the Salieri role. Ultimately his porn video game was a huge success. On the show, that is.
The idea of a porn video game is nothing new. Others have attempted it, but they’ve pulled their punches when they realized the hurdles of getting distribution. They ultimately opted for a Mature rating, the video game industry’s equivalent of an R movie rating. The rating of Adults Only is the kiss of death for getting distribution for video games through traditional channels.
But now a startup company, D-Dub Software, is attempting to defy the odds. It’s produced a story-based adult video game, called “BoneTown,” where characters do drugs and engage in explicit sex.
The Albuquerque, N.M, company launched the game in October and has been slowly rolling it out. D-Dub promoted “BoneTown” at the Adult Entertainment Expo Jan. 8-11 in Las Vegas.
Andrew Hall, a.k.a. “Hod,” the chief executive of D-Dub, said the PC game has been in development for four years. But creating the game was easy compared with the difficulties of financing and distribution, he told me.
Venture capital firms were put off by the subject matter, so Hall used family connections to get funding.
D-Dub also couldn’t distribute the game in traditional video game outlets because they sell to kids. So it’s been selling the game in adult video stores. It also has been reaching out to the target market of men in their 20s and 30s through men’s magazines like Maxim and Playboy.
So far, “BoneTown” has been getting most of its sales in Europe, where people are less uptight about sex than in the U.S.
The main point of the game is to get players to laugh, Hall says. In an industry full of violent video games, humor is a rare commodity, he says.
Speaking of laughs, Hall was familiar with the “30 Rock” story line.
“It just points out that many people have seen the lack of this category of video games,” he said. “We made this game because it’s a game we wanted to play. We wished there was a video game like this out there.”

Porn video game on “30 Rock”

Tracy Jordan hatched his idea for the porn video game in season two, episode 13. The episode, called “The Uncanny Valley,” first aired on April 24, 2008, according to TelevisionWithoutPity.com.
Frank, a writer on Tracy’s show, says that the game is doomed to fail, just as past attempts have.

“History’s greatest perverts have tried: Walt Disney, Larry Flynt, the Japanese,” says Frank, played by Judah Friedlander.
But Tracy says he was born to invent a game where “characters get weird with each other for golden points. I’m like Mozart. You’re like that guy that was always jealous of Mozart.”
In season three, episode one, we find out that the video game was a huge success. The episode, “Do Over,” aired on Oct. 30, 2008. Again, thank you, TelevisionWithoutPity.com.
Tracy says the game, called “Dong Slayer,” sold 61 million copies at $60 each. He calls his video game “the most profitable thing since the war on terror.”