Given how juvenile and contentious the flamewars that explode in our comment section can be, I probably shouldn't post this story. But I can't help it. Here goes:  Judging from a recent marketing push, Microsoft is trying to lure ladies into using the 360. I'm not talking about hot chicks, either. I mean guidance counselors, hairdressers, and housekeepers. You know, like your mom.

Microsoft employed the services of House Party, a collection of people who have signed up to be "brand advocates," and sent 1,000 ladies $150 pack of Xbox swag in exchange for hosting a party with at least ten friends or relatives. The Soccer Mom Party Packs (as I call them) contained Xbox trivia game Scene It? Box Office Smash, an Xbox universal media remote control, a three-month subscription to Xbox Live and 1,600 Xbox Live points.

How did the ladies like it? Aimee Maldonado, a 40 year-old guidance counselor at a high school in Yonkers, N.Y. said, "It's cool because the kids in my school were like 'oooh,' they think I'm so cool."

I know a lot of you readers are likely to focus on using this story as a launching point to insult the 360. I, however, am more concerned about how incredibly creepy it is that people are willing to become salesmen to their friends and family just to get a little bit of free crap.  Seriously, that's the sleaziest thing I've ever heard.

Also, what kind of a guidance counselor says, "The kids in my school were like 'oooh'"? For that matter, what grownup calls things "cool?" Learn to express yourself properly, Aimee Maldonado of Yonkers. And stop trying to sell stuff to your friends. What is the world coming to?! Hey you kids! Get off my lawn!

It's a (relatively) free country, but let's please argue about these things rather than the PlayStation 3 vs. the 360, okay? It's been years already; no one will ever win!

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