#99 _An After-Halloween Scary Story

Do your kids get this stuff?

I always go into AOL once a week -- at least -- and clean out the mail boxes. Of course we have a special mail bank just for our spam testing, but our family account has the Design Center and User Group Network addresses, as well as addresses for the kids. I go in there and clean out all the smut, sex, teen gays, and other evils that we'd really rather not have our teens taking advantage of. I know what you're going to say: that I'm being naive to think I can protect them from such garbage. I know -- but I feel compelled to at least get rid of as much as I can. If you're a parent, you probably know what I'm talking about.
__ Usually I don't even look... after dumping 200 to 300 spams a week you sort of get used to knowing how to spot the offending Subject lines. For some odd reason though the title "The Book" caught my attention.
__ I was stunned when I opened the email. It was sent by someone within the AOL system and promoted "The Legendary Anarchist Cookbook" ... I read on with growing shock:
"Known as the world most forbidden information source and outlawed in many nations this book was thought to be banished from the face of the Earth. A military bound person's life long handbook!"
I couldn't believe such materials were being mass-mailed to whatever email addresses these low-lifes could dig up.
__ Sure, there must be a place for such information somewhere in the world. And, I'll be the last to indicate encroachment on anyone's first amendment rights. But I ask you -- what use would my teenagers have for such chapter headings as: "How to Kill Someone with your Bare hands, Pipe Hand Grenades" or "Explosives Vols. 1- 5." Even more overwhelming than the subject matter was the realization that thousands possibly hundreds of thousands of households, high schools and college dorms had received the very same post.
__ The ad went on to describe a 220-page book of nightmares from Pipe Cannons to Smoke Bombs. Then the sender brags "We give the cookbook away free on disk to anyone that wants a copy." then laments "... we do not make any money on this, only to provide our service to the people of America. The cookbook should never be sold and only passed along from one person to another. We are a group of people out to help others that seek the information on what the world hides." Of course there is a $14.00 S/H fee attached.
__ When the news tolls bombings and shootings and the countless incidents of wrong this society seems to inflict on one another is it any wonder we shake our heads and sigh what is this world coming to? Do your kids get this stuff???

Fred Showker

Sidebar: A reader responds... "But it doesn't cost me anything"

PS: This was not intended to insult you or make you mad. Remember that our first consideration and obligation is to YOU... not your advertisers. Please write and let us know what you think!

Fred Showker is director of The Design & Publishing Center on the web at http://www.graphic-design.com/, and is a co-founder of both The User Group Forum on America Online, and The User Group Network at http://www.user-groups.net/. He has been a user group activist and supporter since 1984.

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Fred Showker, nationally recognized designer author and speaker, is a 25-year veteran of the graphics industry, with his own firm Showker Graphic Arts & Design. Heís an associate editor for the Mug News Service (MNS) as well as Home & School Mac. You can see Fred in action at any of his Design & Graphics workshops around the country sponsored by Dynamic Graphics Educational Foundation, InHouse Graphics, PrintFest and others. You can chat with him directly on America OnLine, where he is ìAFA Shwkrî, a forum assistant in the User Group Forum (UGF), or in eWorld as co-host of the WORKING SOLO forum.
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