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May 06:
Never trust pirates.

Scene: My brother Calvin and me walking around Virra Mall's 1st floor lobby*.

Calvin: "Ate, look! Spider-man DVDs."

True enough, there were plastic DVD cases with the Spidey image plus Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst's names plastered on the cover.

Note: Spidey opened here simultaneously with, and even a few hours ahead of, US theatres and Arn and I even discussed that it's great that the "pirates" won't have enough time to make their illegal copies, for a change.

Me: (surprised) "You're right! Howdtheydothat so quickly?"

Calvin: (to the vendor) "Can we test your Spider-man DVD?"

Vendor pops disc in. A giant spider appears on the TV screen. And then, Dan Aykroyd.

Me: "Waitaminit, that's not Spider-man."

Vendor: "Ma'am this is Part One of Spider-man. What's showing in theatres is Part Two."

Cal and I just shook our heads and walked away, pitying the poor, trusting people who will unknowingly buy "Earth vs. The Spiders" instead of what they were initially after.

Lesson: Never trust the pirates. On a larger scale, never trust marketing in general.

*Virra Mall as you may have figured by now, is notorious for selling pirated DVDs, VCDs, and software. Yup, right in plain sight.

***
I got a really nice note from Nikki who, as it turns out, is the girl behind Skylight, the winning personal site at the last Philippine Web Awards. I was actually one of those assigned to judge that particular category and her site just simply stood out among the 300+ entries. Go and see why.