Hello. Thank you for finding and reading this message. You may think that you chose to read this message, but really it is I who have chosen you. You see, I decided that you are a perfect candidate for a secret mission of the utmost importance. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to SAVE THE WORLD! That's right. You have seen it done a million times on television, in movies and in novels. Now it is your turn. Your mission has six objectives, and if you are able to complete all of them, you will have done all that you can, and you will be one step closer to a new world, a better world.

Objective One: TURN OFF YOUR TELEVISION. Television does nothing but fill your mind with the hopes and dreams of overstuffed executives and writers who do not care about you, the well-being of our planet or its inhabitants. Removing the television as a fixture in your living area is good, starting the process of removing it slowly as a fixture in your head. Turning off the TV is the first step in abandoning the idea that popular culture is an effective and meaningful existence. Televised media is the lowest form. Get news and current events from radio, newsprint and personal experience. With the extra time that you find while not watching TV, you are to do something to better yourself, your community or our world. Delve deeply into opinions and events that you previously perceived as wrong or unimportant. Study every terrible atrocity you can find. It is only after you have witnessed all the ugliness in the world that you will understand what is truly beautiful and what is ultimately important.

Objective Two: DENOUNCE YOUR ROLE AS A CITIZEN OF A COUNTRY. The idea of being a citizen of a country is nothing more than a way to gather people up on pieces of land and pit them against one another. Flags are things that are used to shrinkwrap people's minds while they are living and then used to cover their caskets when they die. The same is true of religion. The religious embrace on side, one group of people, and see all others as misguided and wrong. I assure you there is no better way to cause division and conflict than by maintaining these ways of thinking. History is all the proof you should need.

Objective Three: PUBLICLY AND OPENLY FLAUNT YOUR DIFFERENCES AND WEAKNESSES TO THE WORLD. If only more people would express themselves fully to those around them, we would all have a deeper understanding of freedom. Let your true self leak out all over for everyone else to see. For self-expression, like laughter, is contagious. Your sincere words and actions will be noticed by everyone and, at the very least, will make them think. Thinking is good. Thinking is what we want! The nature of our society is such that it is impossible for anyone to realize their full potential. It is your job to see to it that this unfortunate truth is changed.

Objective Four: TREAT ALL LIFE AS ONE IN THE SAME. Treat the person who cuts you off while you are driving with the same respect that you would give to anyone. We are all people, and until we begin to treat each other as such, there can be no progress. Treat the spider on your wall as a being, a being with interests, possibly a being with a family. Understand that there is no gender or sexuality, only the one that you create in your head. There is no race, only the one that you imagine or have been taught to know. Approach every being with supreme objectivity and understanding for its own reason for being.

Objective Five: STOP SUPPORTING ANY AND ALL PEOPLE AND CORPORATIONS THAT IMPEDE YOUR ABILITY TO ACHIEVE THE PREVIOUSLY LISTED OBJECTIVES. This means stop smoking. This means stop eating meat, eggs and milk, which are all products of pain and oppression. This means stop buying clothing that is made by oppressed workers, and do not reinforce unrealistic images of style and body type upon your own culture. This means taking the bus, riding your bike and walking whenever you can. You will find valuable alternatives to all of these things. When you are nervous, express your fear and anxiety instead of smoking a cigarette. See animal products for what they really are: unnecessary vices of a culture that fill the voids within their soul through their mouths. Use clothing to advertise only your own ideas. There is no use for any of the things that industries are shoving down your throat. With a little reading from the right sources, it will not be hard to find everything necessary to live a truly healthful and peaceful life. Anything you have been taught about these products' being beneficial to your health, your mind or to your social life is nothing more than a lie perpetuated by those who stand to profit from your false beliefs. Plain and simple.

Objective Six: PASS THIS MESSAGE ALONG TO SOMEONE YOU KNOW.

After you have completed all six missions (turning off your TV; not killing, eating or harming any life to the best of your abilities; not conforming to popular culture as a consumer or as a national citizen; being yourself and finally treating all life as it were sacred) please send an email to objectivescomplete@yahoo.com. If you are unable or choose not to complete these objectives, please pass this message along to a friend, a coworker or anyone else you know.

Completing these objectives may seem like a lot of work. After all, it may take a year to transform your life to complete these objectives. But what is a year of your life when the fate of the world is at stake? You will not only be changing yourself to become more enlightened, but you will also be including yourself as a member of a new revolution, a revolution of thought, of art and of self-expression, the next in a series of up and coming movements that will force the world to evolve. Thank you for your help. We could not do this without you.

This looks like one of those Spam messages my sister would send me..... and I hate Spam, you know I almost blocked her once for forwarding all the Spam she got to my inbox...

No offense to the thread starter though.

while we're wasting our time reading this, perhaps we should invite a few comments from our members on their personal opinions of what exactly separates spam from all the rest of the ones and zeros flying around out there...

I think it's personalization. IF someone send me an email, and it doesn't seem to be truly directed at me, or the person didn't type it up themselves, I usally consider that a sort of spam. A few jokes now and then really aren't, but when it becomes a daily, or sometimes even bi-weekly thing if it's every week, then it'd be spam too.

That's my way of thinking anyway. And when I read this, that's exactly what I thought, but I thought it'd sound a bit rude if I said that because I don't know this person, and it could have easily been typed by them in an attempt to gain world peace or something

Spam also is, to me, on a chat board when someone comes along and their single post is a link to their website about how great it is and everyone should check em out. However, if they post a few questions first, and then say, btw, I have a great board over at, www.geekme.com then that's probably OK, sometimes.

Cool

Is it me, or is it always easier to view the world of this thread through "rose tinted spectacles".

I mean, what kind of world would it be without sex, drugs, rock & roll - oh and don't forget meat! Big chunks of meat, that make you slaver down the front of your shirt, not your namby pamby well done stuff, but rip it's horns off, wipe it's backside, chuck it in the pan, count to 10, turn it over for another 10 count and shove in down your neck (via a nice porcelain plate - though only for the social niceties in life). Yum Yum

regards

John

p.s. what's spam? I thought it was that processed meat stuff that comes from a can, best eaten between two slices of bread, with butter and maybe a little HP sauce (and a side of salad)!!!

Objectives for a better Finegan's world:

1. rm -rf /* your Windows partition. You tell yourself you keep it there for thwe kids/family/dog/grandma, but who are you kidding, you just don't want to try to get Diablo II to run under emulation.

2. Suck it up and fork out for a ridiculously overpriced broadband connection. You keep thinking that cableTV or your Sport Illustrated subscription is of more value, and keep telling yourself that 2 seconds more load time per page is alright, but admit, your a junkie, DSL is Laotian Black Gold, and you need 1.5Mbs.

3. Start being a linux jackass. Every time your boss at work talks about how much XP is more stable than 2k, remind them harshly that they're making the horrible argument of "its so much less of a piece of @#^# than..." Hitting them over the head with "Running Linux" may do the trick, repeadedly, about the neck and head, until there are welts... that you could land a plane on.

4. Refund that Windows license. You know you've got one, somewhere, maybe under that copy of "Prince of Persia" that you haven't played since DOS 3.11. And refund it not in the namby-pamby way that most people have gone about it by calling their machine's retailer or somesuch. Wander up to Redmond and demand to speak to the Head of the Refunds Department. Make certain you have a diatribe or three handy.

5. Drink coffee, lots of coffee, and not that weak burnt garbage they serve at Starbucks either. I'm talking about the evil Kenya AA HCL evil blend you have to buy from the no-name cart around the corner where the espresso is served in ceramic buckets and the barista has to use tongs to hand it to you. Brand names, pack a day, raw red meat not even off the cow, 10 mile to the gallon cars, politically incorrect dinner conversations, big budget hollywood effects, pulp fiction in paperback and saturated fat in your celery, damning pier to pier not because you believe in copyright but because you just can't stand the network traffic, driving slow in the fast lane, whiskey with breakfast, and not because self indulgence is all that great either, but just because:

6. Forsaking all vice and the needless prostlization that comes from it makes you a complete prat!


Whoa... where did that come from. I just broke one of the bigger rules, don't post while fitshaced.

Cheers,

Finny!

Scene: A cafe. One table is occupied by a group of Vikings wearing horned helmets. Whenever the word "spam" is repeated, they begin singing and/or chanting. A man and his wife enter. The man is played by Eric Idle, the wife is played by Graham Chapman (in drag), and the waitress is played by Terry Jones, also in drag.
Man: You sit here, dear.
Wife: All right.
Man: Morning!
Waitress: Morning!
Man: Well, what've you got?
Waitress: Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam; spam bacon sausage and spam; spam egg spam spam bacon and spam; spam sausage spam spam bacon spam tomato and spam;
Vikings: Spam spam spam spam...
Waitress: ...spam spam spam egg and spam; spam spam spam spam spam spam baked beans spam spam spam...
Vikings: Spam! Lovely spam! Lovely spam!
Waitress: ...or Lobster Thermidor a Crevette with a mornay sauce served in a Provencale manner with shallots and aubergines garnished with truffle pate, brandy and with a fried egg on top and spam.
Wife: Have you got anything without spam?
Waitress: Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Wife: I don't want ANY spam!
Man: Why can't she have egg bacon spam and sausage?
Wife: THAT'S got spam in it!
Man: Hasn't got as much spam in it as spam egg sausage and spam, has it?
Vikings: Spam spam spam spam... (Crescendo through next few lines...)
Wife: Could you do the egg bacon spam and sausage without the spam then?
Waitress: Urgghh!
Wife: What do you mean 'Urgghh'? I don't like spam!
Vikings: Lovely spam! Wonderful spam!
Waitress: Shut up!
Vikings: Lovely spam! Wonderful spam!
Waitress: Shut up! (Vikings stop) Bloody Vikings! You can't have egg bacon spam and sausage without the spam.
Wife: I don't like spam!
Man: Sshh, dear, don't cause a fuss. I'll have your spam. I love it. I'm having spam spam spam spam spam spam spam beaked beans spam spam spam and spam!
Vikings: Spam spam spam spam. Lovely spam! Wonderful spam!
Waitress: Shut up!! Baked beans are off.
Man: Well could I have her spam instead of the baked beans then?
Waitress: You mean spam spam spam spam spam spam... (but it is too late and the Vikings drown her words)
Vikings: Spam spam spam spam. Lovely spam! Wonderful spam! Spam spa-a-a-a-a-am spam spa-a-a-a-a-am spam. Lovely spam! Lovely spam! Lovely spam! Lovely spam! Lovely spam! Spam spam spam spam!

Acid, was it the slack story you told us earlier?

Fin, I especially like your #3!

I consider spam to be random crap that I:
a) didn't sign up for
b) didn't get from someone that I know.

I have a yahoo account for the odd occasion that I might need to sign up to something that will then give my details to all and sundry and they'll send me spam... for everything else I use my ISP email, and for my friends, I use my LQ email - no such thing as spam there!

And I would definitely call this spam... but in true General Forum style, how far do you think we can take this from the topic?

*cough*dolphins*cough*

*cough*koalas*cough*

Don't make me do it! You know that I am more than happy to hunt the koala thread and bring it back to the fore-front!

Dolphins are the only mammal or animal that like to... oh wait, I'm not going to start that again..

Spam to me is:

1. Yes, something I did not sign up for but yet they still have the link saying to "unsubscribe from our mailing lists.. " which I don't understand cause I never signed up for it in the first place.
2. Something that does not have a return address or if you reply, its returned back to you.
3. My family or friends sending me goofy forward emails saying if you reply to 10 more friends, you'll get good luck.. or that sort of crap.
4. Forwarded jokes sent by family or friends, but these aren't so bad cause at times I enjoy them.
5. And last but not least, but relates to the first one.. Porn. They're the worst and get their own category.

Go ahead Tricky.... say it, say it!

Dolphins are the only mammal beside humans that like to what?!

......that like to play in the same pool as a killer whale

When dealing with suspect spam, I tend to reach for the HP sauce. It's the only thing that makes it vaguely paletable.

But for some reason I either get visions of a line of monks carrying planks of wood chanting

"Pie jesu domine" - hit themselves on the head with board - "donne eist requiem"

or John Cleese dressed as a roman centurion, grabbing "Brian's" (Graham Chapman) collar with the immortal line of "You're f*****g nicked me old beauty"

Perhaps, this says something about my sense of morality or paranoia! (Though I sometimes get visions of bill gates with his head exploding as well!)

regards

John

wibble wibble wibble fnurg!