MARKETING SLEAZE!

What is the sleaziest marketing tactic you've encountered recently? Here are some of our favorite candidates:

• Spam - a perennial contender - GET RICH NOW! HOT SEX! (And no matter how sleazy or revolting the message might be, advocates of the constitutionally guaranteed right to invade other people's privacy will be delighted to learn that internet service providers like Erols/Starpower are doing absolutely nothing to filter out unsolicited bulk mail. For more about spam see http://www.dailyoutrage.com/crusade/)

• Computer Calls - No human being wants to be hung up on when interrupting people's dinner with a marketing call, so brilliant marketers have automated the process - now when we answer the phone it's a computer on the other end. And if we don't answer the phone, the computers leave messages.

• Pop-Unders - That ad on your computer screen - where did it come from? Pop-up ads appear when you visit a site, so you know how the ad was generated, but users tend to instantly minimize the screens. So the current trend is to use "pop-unders" which appear, at some point, when you've left the site you visited - but its usually not obvious what site is generating them.