As voters, we'll be given the onerous task of deciding which group of self-centered individuals will qualify for a comfy chair in parliament, along with a long and almost obscene list of perks and benefits.

Now I'm not going to take aim at any particular political gang (oops -- I mean "party") or any individual MP because, as most regular readers will know, I consider all politicians to be much alike in their overwhelming desire to put their own interests ahead of those of the voters.

Well maybe there is an exception -- the Green Party seems to be genuinely concerned about the fate of the nation and its people. Unfortunately their method of addressing the problems seems to involve us all wearing open-toed sandals, smoking whacky-baccy and riding bicycles -- hmmm, not for me.

But what has all this got to do with the Net and hi-techery I hear you say...

Well, if reports I've received are to be believed, it appears that at least some of those who lust for election to parliament are getting ready to send out vast quantities of spam (oops -- I mean targeted email marketing messages) in an attempt to boost their chances.

Of course you and I know that using spam in such a way would likely backfire big-time. But then again -- most of *us* know the difference between an email address and a URL and most of us know that emailing someone doesn't mean attaching an MS Word document to an otherwise empty message -- right?

Readers Say (updated hourly) From Yesterday... Paying for web entertainment... - Allister Web as entertainment... - Jake Confused... - James Entertainment: heaps exist, but... - Dominic Entertainment on the web... - Dave Web for Entertainment... - Camryn Have Your Say

Let's face it -- the ranks of our politicians are not exactly filled with the truly Net-literate and Net-smart, are they?

It's very likely that, even as I type this, party officials are bouncing off the roof with glee as they realise that they can "target" that list of 35 million email addresses they bought off the Net simply by only using those which end in dot-NZ.

If you don't believe me, then read Andrea Malcom's excellent piece on IDG.Net.nz today.

Just look at some of those quotes:

Alliance: "In the last three years access to email has grown dramatically, particularly for younger people. Obviously it's cheaper, easier and instant and I think it's more effective than junk mail."

National: "IT is a huge tool. Email is so much cheaper and more effective and it can be targeted."

And I've heard that ACT are planning to use email as a integral part of their campaign in the lead-up to the election -- although when I spoke to one of their MPs recently he denied that they'd be spamming. Apparently they have lists of people who have elected to receive this information. Hmm... this seems hauntingly familiar -- like the excuse which appears on the bottom of so many of the spams I get each day:

"You are receiving this email because you have visited our website or expressed an interest in our product. This is not spam"

It will indeed be interesting to see which party or individual is stupid enough to piss off a huge number of Net users by dumping their unsolicited political rhetoric en-masse into voters' email boxes. Perhaps we could run a sweepstake?

And now a timely reminder -- I still have the domain name politics.co.nz up for sale. What a great investment that would be for some eager political party or publisher wanting to capitalise on the antics and election of our parliament. Come on, who wants to own "politics" on the NZ Internet? :-)

Have your say.

Aardvark's Garage Sale
It's time to clear out the closet here at Aardvark's country residence so I'm having a bit of a garage sale. I need to spend a whole lot more time and money on my jet engine R&D activities (now that the defense industry has shown a very real interest) -- so I'm trying to scrape up some more cash.

I'm selling my pulsejet manufacturing business. This would be perfect for either a semi-retired engineer/machinist who wants to earn some pretty good money building these things and exporting them to the world -- or an established engineering shop who want to break into a new (very export oriented) market. I can provide an ongoing stream of orders through my website and since I've run out of time to meet the demand, the sale will include a growing "waiting list" of new customers ready to place their orders.

Anyone interested in any of these things should drop me a line.

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