Dear Flixster.com,

I didn’t know who you were a week ago, and I suppose that’s what you were trying to overcome. I know you’re just lonely for friends, and I know that you just wanted to build a multi-million dollar domain so you can sell yourself and make your creators very, very rich.

But you didn’t have to resort to the level of a common, sleazy, spammer to do it.

You see, I write email marketing messages for a certain manufacturer, and we use a return address that all our mail comes from. We request that (genuine, opted-in) recipients add us to their address books so that they can continue to receive news about new products and special offers that we send without our messages being accidentally filtered.

Last week, this non-personal email address got an email, and the subject was:

Cindy T has sent you a personal message

Lo and behold, it wasn’t a personal message at all. Because this non-personal email address doesn’t know Cindy T, and Cindy T certainly didn’t send a personal note to this certain manufacturer. The “personal message”? (Yes, I clicked through for research’s sake) The message was this: ” Hey, this quiz was fun – do it so we can compare.” When a week later we got another “Personal Message” from another person, I did some research on the web. It seems that you’ve been a bad .com.

From what I understand, when people sign up with free web-based email addresses, you ask for their login information, and then you go and send emails to the people in their online address books. Please stop your scummy practices. If you want more people to visit your site, make a service worth using, ask people to tell their friends about it (or give them some incentive to), and quit sending junk mail to every email address you can get your hands on.

Rest assured, I will never use your site, nor trust you with any personal information of mine. I wil also never recommend you to my friends, and if the topic comes up, I will do quite the opposite: I will tell them to stay away.

Now, you may be in some legal gray area where you can’t technically get fined or sued for anything. I don’t know. I do know that you’re treading on thin ice here, and you’d be much more likely to gain a more loyal customer base if you treated them with a little respect.

Thanks for never sending another “Personal note” again,

Andy

No, I did not get a bag of crap today. Would I be feeling like crap if I had? Of the 5 times it popped up there, I was front and center at the time of the changeover for three of them.

Twice I got put “in line” and cancelled out. Then, hours later, more people bought all the craps that could have been mine. Grrr….

Don’t waste your life wooting. You’ll likely end up disappointed.

I started doing our taxes yesterday, and initial estimates (I’m still waiting on one W2) look like I’ll end up owing the government over $1500! Ouch! It’s one thing to have those taxes taken out of your check as you get paid, but quite another thing to have to write a check that big for things like…

Governor limo rides to work everyday and $100 million of unused flight tickets.

Oh yeah, don’t forget my (least) favorite one:

The Defense Department has uncovered its own credit card scandal. Over one recent 18-month period, Air Force and Navy personnel used govern­ment-funded credit cards to charge at least $102,400 for admission to entertainment events, $48,250 for gambling, $69,300 for cruises, and $73,950 for exotic dance clubs and prostitutes. (heritage.org)

Makes me sick.

If I have a fault, it’s that One of my many faults is that I can’t NOT finish anything. If I start reading a book, or watching a movie, or playing a video game, I have to finish it. This means that every once in a while I finish watching a lame or disgusting movie, or read something not worth my time.

Recently it meant that I finished playing the “Scarface” video game.

Parents, DO NOT let your children play this game. Adults: don’t play it yourself. Usually, I can justify violent video games to myself in some way, shape, or form (you know, it’s OK because you’re defending someone or rescuing something or fighting for survival). Scarface has no redeeming qualities.

It’s loaded with profanity, and all about killing gangs, selling drugs, and increasing your power and bank account. Along the way you “collect” women who increase your health, strength, etc. There’s no nudity, but plenty of graphic violence, profanity, and drug use. Stay away.

To be honest, I wish that I had never seen this movie in the $15 bin the day after Thanksgiving, or that I’d had the self-control to stop playing after I got started. People compare it to GTA, and if they’re anything alike, I’ll never play GTA. Never.

I wish they had a rating in the Movie/Video game system of “D”. Despicable.

Heck yeah, BigCrumbs.com is legit! I just got my account credited for $11.50 off a purchase I made at Target.com, which was in addition to the 10% discount that I got at the time of purchase. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend that you sign up for this site.

I found this great online program when looking for coupon codes the other day: it’s called BigCrumbs, and can save you some serious cash this Christmas. (Or any time, for that matter) You sign up for a free account, then whenever you go to shop at certain online retailers, you just make sure you click the link from BigCrumbs.com.

The online retailer tracks the incoming links, then automatically takes a percent off your order (For Target.com it’s 10%!). Then, BigCrumbs also gives you a rebate back in about a month, so you’re saving, plus getting cash back. Pay with Discover (or some other cash back credit card) and this really starts to stack up.

Better yet, it’s got a referral program where you can get a smaller percentage from orders that people place who you refer. Granted, this won’t make you rich, but it might save you a few bucks. Try it out, and use my referral link here:

Sign up for BigCrumbs.