[Warning – rant follows!]

I’ve just received what sounds like a wonderful invitation. In return for me doing a whole lot of free advertising (in blogs, twitter and Facebook), an otherwise eminently respectable Christian publishing house is letting me enter their wonderful competition. And the more I tweet, the more entries I get.

Prizes look great too – a free makeover for my church website. Software for Bible study – and there’s another rant coming about that, too – and worship backgrounds. Loads of good stuff.

Even the product that is being promoted looks interesting – although it doesn’t exist just yet; it’s technically ‘vapourware’. I’m deliberately using UK spellings throughout this rant – you’ll see why in a moment. I may well refer to things like ‘colour’, ‘favour’ and ‘licence’ just to make the point.

I’ll link to the product – just once – so you know what I’m on about. But please don’t start blogging about the competition; it only encourages them.

Why am I so cross? Because yet again – and this rant is about a different company – I’m being invited to enter a competition which is open to residents of the US and Canada only. And the only way to know this is to read that very small print in the ‘Terms & Conditions’ page that everybody skips.

The world does not end once you leave the 50 states!

It’s not as if it was difficult to send prizes to countries outside the US – most of the companies involved in giving prizes will happily ship anywhere in the world, and many of the prizes can be delivered electronically.

I know – there are probably laws governing this kind of thing. But for goodness sake – do the honest thing and put the exclusions somewhere obvious! emails like this have the opposite effect for me from the one intended; I’ll be inclined to recommend almost any product other than this one, even if it turns out to be good!

[/rant]