Oh, I BET you want me to click that link!

​Over the past week or two, I've conducted a kind of experiment to see who will spam me when I post things on Twitter. I have been baiting spammers into sending me replies to my blatant requests for information about iPads or sex. It's really kind of hilarious to watch them scramble to "warn you" they have found naked photos of you online or they are offering me a free iPad.

All I have to do is click a link. Sure, spambot. Sure.

The hilarious part of the way Twitter spam works is that it is triggered by searches -- mostly done by programs lurking around the nether regions of the web -- that look for specific keywords and respond with automated responses. It doesn't matter if the response is accurate or not, which makes it even funnier. For example, if you went to get kindling for the fire, you might get a response offering you a free electronic reading doohickey. Fancy.

Another thing I've discovered is that sex doesn't really work with Twitter spam. Perhaps the online porn industry has enough users already and now has the virtual equivalent of a velvet rope up between you and Asian lesbian sex orgies. Figures.

Anyway, after this highly scientific experiment in which I learned a lot, I give you the five fastest ways to get spammed on Twitter.

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The Twitter world blew up when Gisele Bundchen, supermodel wife of not-so-super QB Tom Brady, endearingly defended her man to boorish Giant fans, throwing his teammates under the bus in the process.

But that is apparently not the most important thing to know about Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen. The most important thing, if Twitter is any guide, is that this married couple has sex.

That was a recurring theme surrounding the Super Bowl, tweeted by comics, normal people and three Web sites that have "Humor" in the name.

Revel in it all:

@TweetsLMAO
Even though Tom Brady lost the Super Bowl he still gets to go home and bang his Super Model wife Gisele.

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Oh here go hell come.

​In some alternate universe, the streets of Houston are currently bathed in Miller Lite, Reliant Stadium and every bar in town is a watch party, with even the homeless folks are wearing soiled Texans jerseys. But alas, our Houston Texans only made it into the second round of the playoffs, and here we sit together, watching two teams from up north -- ew -- battling it out in Indianapolis for the Vince Lombardi trophy.

Welcome to Super Bowl XLVI, between the New England Patriots, led by dreamboat Tom Brady, and the New York Giants, led by Eli Manning, whose brother Peyton's shadow has been looming over the proceedings the past two weeks. This is a rematch, pitting the same two teams from Super Bowl XLII in 2008, which I lost $20 on. On the bright side, well there is no bright side.

If you are already watching NBC's pre-game programming, how much do you hate Pizza Hut right now, and/or did you finally break down and order something? The plugging and commercials are relentless. HD is also not doing the 60-year-old Bob Costas any favors either. But that redhead in the Century 21 ad? That's making watching the two hours before the game worth it.

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​Most everyone gets that you can't shout "fire" in a movie theater or crack jokes about bombs on an airplane. This sort of thing will get you in a mess of trouble. But, apparently, jokes made on Twitter can also get you in trouble, particularly if you are a foreigner using slang we don't get in 'Merica or quotes from our own television shows.

A pair of British tourists on holiday (that's Brit-slang for vacation) stateside were detained and ultimately sent packing back to England because of tweets they posted prior to their arrival which contained the phrases "destroy America" -- destroy being a colloquial English term for "get drunk and party in" -- and "diggin' up Marilyn Monroe," a reference to an episode of that oh-so-American of institutions Family Guy.

They were detained by TSA agents who asked them why they wanted to destroy our beloved country (*hums the national anthem*) and were searched looking for shovels in order to "dig up" the iconic starlet. I wish I was joking. They couple was kept overnight in holding areas with people accused of drug trafficking before being put on a plane back home. The link above has a snapshot of the actual form denying access on which the agent wrote that the accused had posted on his "Tweeter website account." Wow.

In an effort to protect our fellow citizens and those of you who might like to plan a vacation in our police state, we offer you five tweets you might want to avoid.

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​There are times when we all want people to just shut the hell up. This is even more true online, where people often seem to say things we could never imagine them saying in person. The problem is magnified when your list of "friends" expands from the people you actually hang out with to the long list of virtual buddies you make on social media Web sites like Twitter.

It starts out all innocent. You see that someone added you. You think, "He seems cool. Some of my other online friends follow him. Yes, I will add him to my follow list." Then, all hell breaks loose. You realize the guy is mostly fine twittering about his dog and the killer grilling he does on the weekends. Whatever. But, then he goes to a weeklong IT convention and decides to live tweet every...damn...seminar.

You want to cry. You want to hurt him. You want to #crushhimintooblivion. Well, my (virtual) friend, you're in luck because there are several ways you can temporarily block this normally...uh...normal twitterer.

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OH EM GEE

​I'm pretty sure I speak for just about everyone when I say the sh*t people say videos have gotten not only annoying, but ridiculous. I swear, any day now someone will come out with "Sh*t people born in Texas but raised in New York by adoptive parents with a stay-at-home mom and an accountant dad who works for a small firm in midtown who now live in California with their vegan dog say" video.

I'm not sure if it is a testament to the popularity of viral videos or the fact that most of us have WAY too much time on our hands, but this sh*t has gone on way too long. For Houstonians, we seemed to steer clear of the fray until CultureMap put out its "Sh*t Houstonians Say" last week (or two years ago in Internet time).

They followed this week with "Sh*t Socialites Say" featuring Shelby Hodge because God knows what we want to be known for here in Houston is socialites...and Shelby Hodge.

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​Anyone who spends an extended period of time on social networks like Facebook and Twitter understands that there are certain offenses that are nearly unforgivable. Just as in real life, there are lines that don't need to be crossed. You might be slightly more tolerant of them online simply because they aren't in your face, but annoy any of us one time too many and that's it, you're done.

While these offenses may or may not rise to the level of being fully blocked, they certainly meet the criteria for un-following and/or de-friending. I'll admit I've likely been guilty of at least one of these, but there's a difference between a one-time transgression and a full-blown disorder. Here are the ten quickest ways to get un-followed or de-friended.

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​Google announced that as of April 19, it will shut down Picnik, an online photo editing tool acquired by the company in 2010, and bundle some of the editing tools into their over-arching Google+ platform. The staff of Picnik remains with Google and apparently is working to add features from the editing software into Google+, but the photo tool, popular particularly among those uncomfortable with the complexity and price of Photoshop, will be shut down in April.

Flickr, which offered one-click editing options using Picnik, announced it would remove that capability and replace it with its own set of tools on January 13, but no one was certain why the move was made until now.

For those who used Picnik regularly and who either don't want or need Photoshop, the change leaves them needing an alternative source for online photo editing, a service often utilized by bloggers and amateur photographers.

If you are down in the dumps over the loss of Picnik, here are eight alternatives to help salve your wounds. Note that there are some great free editors like Picasa (also owned by Google) and Gimp (open source) available for download, but for the purposes of this, I am focusing on online editing tools.

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​We have some great commenters here on Hair Balls, and it's time we paid some damn attention to them.

So we'll be highlighting a Comment of the Day each morning, from the previous day's work. Maybe two comments, even.

This will all be determined by a highly rigorous scientific formula involving wit, clarity and whatever else we feel like at the moment.

We listed five of the most annoying types of tweets and Facebook updates.

We asked for other candidates, and several good ones were offered.

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​We all know that certain people just overshare. These are people for whom the acronym "TMI" was invented. They walk into a party and immediately begin telling anyone who will listen about their violent ex or their bowel issues. The good thing about these people is that you can walk away from them and avoid them when they enter your quadrant.

In social media, it takes a little more effort to completely remove these people from your path, especially if they are friends or people you consider important enough not to block, like family members. But the status updates on Facebook and posts on Twitter that cause us to recoil in fear are a little different than crazy Uncle Ned talking about black people. In social media, it's a more subtle version, but no less annoying.

We discussed this at length and came up with the five that irked us the most.

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