Reg to attend 3rd Annual Nigerian Email Conference

Get rich quick scheme: Those readers interested in the potential fiscal benefits of unsolicited e-mail marketing might like to join key members of the Register Strategy Boutique in Nigeria this November for the 3rd Annual Nigerian EMail Conference.

We can heartily recommend this event - hosted by Mr. Laurent Mpeti Kabila, a senior assistant leader of the Revolutionary United Front of Sierra Leone - which will examine how best to liquidate the huge sums of money which regularly sit sadly unclaimed in African bank accounts.

Highlights of the event include:

• Keynote Address: Dr. Hamza Kalu's adds some historical perspective in his keynote address: "From Postal Scams To Email Scams: We Have Come a Long Way Infant Child."
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• Debate: Attend a lively debate between Lady Mariam Abacha and Mr. Godwin Oyathelem. Topic: "The effectiveness of using all UPPERCASE characters."
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• Statistics: Dr. Kayode Naiyeju presents his ground-breaking research: "Analyzing response rates using analysis of variance: That pesky R-squared value," as published in The Nigerian Journal of Applied Statistics.

The event takes place on the 7-9 November 2003 at the Abuja Sheraton Hotel & Casino. The registration fee is a modest $995 per person. Send your bank's name, account number, your name, address, telephone number, and fax numbers. Please note again that this transaction is strictly confidential and as such should be kept secret. Be rest assured that this transaction is 100% risk free.

Kindly send the requested information (in complete confidence) to:

Nigerian EMail Conference
c/o Abuja Sheraton Hotel Abuja
Ladi Kwali Way Abuja, NG PMB 143.

Update

We have just received a letter concerning this 419 shindig, which we reprint here in full:

Dear Register,

Thank you for mentioning Nigeria so much in your press releases, you must have a great deal of interest in the country and be quite familiar withthe people, country and cultures. I do however have to take issue with the article above:

Your article does not make it clear that it is in fact a hoax, that there is no such conference taking place.

The fact that you say that you are attending said conference only gives the impression that it really is taking place.

If you are trying to be helpful (by informing people of the scam and making them aware of it) then that is entirely to your credit. In fact I've read several previous articles to that effect that were very constructive.

The lack of clarity in this particular article only gives the impression that your publication has ulterior motives for focussing on the '419' scam, and that being informative isn't actually what is on your agenda.I'm left with no choice but to presume that you are attempting to smear Nigeria, by giving the impression that a conference on criminal activity is taking place within a few miles of the heart of Abuja, the Federal Government capital, thereby implying implicit government approval of such activity.

You may feel that because you are only linking to a website which purports to be advertising this event, you are not actually misinforming people.

However the fact that you haven't made clear that the entire article is a joke only reinforces the impression that it is genuine, and I'm sure our associations lawyers will see what levels of culpability you can face. I will be sending a copy of this message to the Nigerian Embassy in the UK, as well as the CRE and the PCC. You could, however, pre-empt this by simply pointing out on your article that the article is in fact a joke.

I look forward to your response.

Best Regards,

Michael A Fabikun
MK Nigerian Association

Fair enough, here's our response:

Will that do?