MSN are trying to attract users away from Google with yet another competition tie-in. No sooner has The Big Snap snapped shut, everyone’s favourite, albeit slightly older, archaeologist hones into view and becomes the subject of the latest MSN search competition. In fact it’s actually the Big Snap competition but with Indiana Jones in place of Dick & Dom (which has got to be a major improvement).
To enter all you need to do is do a search using MSN. Any search can win one of the many prizes on offer. When you search at the top of the results page you’ll see a banner, if the rotating stones turn green then you’re a winner. You’ll also be told the number of prizes left and when the last prize was won.
Is it worth playing?
Well top prize is a “VIP holiday prize package for 2 people to New Mexico”. You’ll be able to visit the film location for Indiana Jones and receive a VIP guided tour by the on-set manager. The prize includes spending money and 7 nights at the luxury Hacienda resort, Santa Fe. The rest of the prizes are Indiana Jones merchandise and there’s 1000 mobile downloads, which it seems make up the bulk of the giveaways.
It’s a bit of fun, but you might have more chance of finding The Holy Grail than picking up the holiday. Still, if you fancy one Last Crusade then try a few searches, for example ‘Temple of Doom’ - you might just find some buried treasure.
The promotion ends at 8am on 26th June 2008.
Popularity: 19% [?]
The quality of competitions and prizes on offer in recent months has been raised by some compers, but few can grumble about the goodies on offer in the brand new Hello Softie game from Andrex. They’re giving away 916 prizes including a £25000 family car, 10 x Family Holidays to Orlando, 5 x cash prizes of £10,000 and 50 x 12 foot trampolines. A big thanks to Mars King Size for spotting the competition.
To take part you need to get 5 trivia questions right to earn 5 golden feathers. If you get a question wrong you lose a feather, but as this promotion is in association with MSN you’re giving access to help with the answers.
Once you’ve done your 5 questions you then move on to the instant win element of the competition. Select 3 panels from the 9 shown and if you match all three symbols then you’ve won the prize. If you don’t win you can always have another go!
With so many big prizes on offer this will no doubt attract a lot of interest. Interestingly Andrex have included a robot check CAPTCHA between the questions and instant win section, which is actually great to see.
The competition runs until the 17th August 2008.
Popularity: 14% [?]
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April 29th, 2008
10:53 am
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What started off as a mystery text message has now developed into a serious data protection issue for postcard compers. On the 19th April 2008, Midastouch reported that she’d received a random text message from ‘Dave’, who we’ll call the mystery mobile man. She soon learnt that the mystery mobile man had found her details, including mobile number, off a postcard that they’d bought off eBay. Further details emerged that the postcard was one sent to PO Box 222, Hayes for a Pick Me Up Magazine competition last year.
Loquax compers, concerned by this event, turned detective and soon discovered postcards can be bought on eBay. One enquiry about the postcards being sold resulted in one user being told that the postcards have “all been used as comp entries so have address in panel, stamp and answer and address of sender on left hand side” and that the most common source was “Take a Break”.
In order to find out more some users bought postcards off eBay. In one set they discovered postcards dated from 2003 “that are from chat and take a break competitions” and that “there has been no attempt to cover up the sender details”! Furthermore the postcards had been “given to a charity in order to remove the stamps to raise money”.
Another set of postcards has raised more concern though as they contained postcards for competitions running around Christmas 2007!
In a time when identity fraud is prevalent, handling houses for competitions have to ensure that they treat entries in a responsible manner. This is a major data protection issue and currently attempts are being made by users to gravitate the issue from a comping level to a more national stage.
The time and effort put in by a number of compers to unearth this situation has to be commended. Hopefully it will result in postcards from offline competitions being disposed of sensibly, and keeping within data protection laws.
Popularity: 4% [?]
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April 11th, 2008
9:55 am
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We like finding strange competition stories and this one from This is South Wales highlights why honesty is the best policy, but if you can’t be honest (shame on you) then keep your mouth firmly shut, especially on the web!
According to the report the original winners of an all expenses paid wedding became divorced from their prize after comments were made about their ‘wedding’ (icWales). The promoters decided to withdraw the prize and redraw the winners, which was good news for Denise Davies and David Thomas.
They now will enjoy their £3000 wedding prize when they get married in September 2009.
When entering competitions honesty is always the best policy as you never know what lies around the corner if you win! However, if you have been naughty learn from this experience and don’t go announcing it across the web. You just never know if a promoter is watching!
If you see a quirky competition related story in your area, let us know!
Popularity: 3% [?]
It has always been our intention to make Loquax more than just about competitions, and over the last few weeks we have been tidying up other areas of the site. One area we’ve been working on is the Offers which also includes an area for Discount Codes.
Our codes section has been put together to make sure that we only show valid codes. We know there are other voucher code sites out there, but often these will get you clicking to find expired codes or even no code at all. We think that’s wrong for both user and the shop’s involved! With our system you can only find in date and codes that Loquax are permitted to promote to you.
By using this part of Loquax you do support the site, it won’t cost you anything and also save yourself some money as well!
As well as overhauling the discounts section, where you’ll find expiring codes and a full list of shops with valid codes, we’ve launched a new offers newsletter. This will be independent to the main Loquax newsletter we currently send out every week. It will only be sent a couple of times a month, so don’t worry about being bombarded with emails from us!
There’s no pressure to join the offers newsletter, but we do have £50 to giveaway in a prize draw, if you fancy the chance of winning a few pounds.
Popularity: 3% [?]
