Lo and behold - it was spam for some stupid drug. Now I know why my email spam has dropped by about 2,000 messages a week. In the week of December 7th, 2003 I received 3,069 messages. Last week I received 64, 137 messages. In the course of the year I noticed that my inbox steadily increased by about 2,000 messages per week. Now it's slowing down.

The sad part is that very few of these messages are, in fact, legitimate. Most of you are going through the same garbage day in and day out. I also believe there are very few filtering systems that work as well as MailWasher Pro. Some do a half-assed job that either loses all your important email or you still receive a ton of crap. In the place of email messages, they are attempting to spam comments on the channels. And others make you and your subscribers jump through unrealistic hoops to receive an email.

When I purchase a utility for a certain task, I expect it to do just that. It's been interesting going through the reports each week to see what's been happening. I also have a record of all the mail that has been sent my way should I require it.

Another great thing about MailWasher Pro is that you can try it out before you buy it. But only for one email account. So pick your busiest account and give it a try. You won't be sorry.

The same company that developed MailWasher Pro also created a program called Benign. I bought it a week ago and have been very happy with it. Once you set it up (which is very simple to do - I like simple) it works in the background to protect you from viruses, trojans and the like. I mean I do have McAfee Virus Scan and MailWasher Pro but there is always the chance that some new, sneaky and nasty thing can come to you by email.

With Benign all the html messages can be stripped, your images will be scanned - it will protect your Inbox before you download the harmful message. It runs in the background so once you've set it up the way you want it, you won't have to do anything else with it. It runs in the background to protect you.

Considering the amount of money we 'spend' on nonsense, it is surprising that many won't take the protection of their computers seriously. I certainly can't afford to have something come into my system and destroy everything I've worked to build in the last four years.

And as for the 'comment spammers' ... I'm happy to report that the incredible Jim Gray, co-founder of Quikonnex is taking care of that situation as I write. Those creeps will be a thing of the past here at Quikonnex. Let's hear three big cheers for Jim Gray! Yeh! Yeh! YEH!