You may remember a few weeks ago there was a story about Miss Bimbo - an online game popular with tweenies that encouraged surgical enhancements and diet pills.

In the interests of journalistic research I signed up for a Miss Bimbo account to see if the process really did let an under-18 girl named TechRadar grab an account, and lo and behold it did.

Of course after the original poke around the settings and options, it's fair to say that I haven't paid an awful lot of attention to our Bimbo doll or our Miss Bimbo account.

Mild shock

Once I'd been mildly shocked at the scantily clad girl that you are presented with and the 'goals' that accompany it, there really wasn't an awful lot that piqued my interest. Probably a lot to do with the fact that I'm not, by any stretch of the imagination, a tweenage girl.

Indeed, I have to confess that the whole debacle - and subsequent media outrage - had more or less slipped my mind. Or at the very least was cowering behind my outrage at Australia joining the governments forcing though 'anti-terrorist' legislation.

So, you can imagine my surprise when I logged into my email account this morning and was confronted by an email from the Miss Bimbo people. It's worth repeating in full, mistakes and all. It's titled:

Your Bimbo doll is dead :s

Hi TechRadar !

You know that you have a "bimbo"?
Its important to take care of it! She dead now! But you can save her again!
For remember :
Your email : Your password :
See you soon !
http://www.missbimbo.com
Virtual fashion game !

From the Silence of the Lambs-esque mixing of its and She, to the punctuation I think this numbers as the most sinister email I have ever received.

So, I went to Miss Bimbo's site to try and reincarnate my dead Bimbo. The media furore has forced some changes and the front page includes an apology for the media's comparison of Miss Bimbo to Paris Hilton adding: "We feel that this does a dis-service to the players whom send their bimbos to university, tea parties or chess tournaments."

Diet pills and surgery

Diet pills have been removed from the game and as for the surgery: "At this time we would also like to remind players that the Miss Bimbo team assume no responsibility or liability for any fashion faux pas, hair style disasters or boob jobs incurred in real life as as a result of playing the Miss Bimbo game."

Fortunately, tales of my Bimbo's demise appear to be greatly exaggerated and I have the following options:

Your bimbo very sick. For save your bimbo you have 3 solutions.

  • Pay resuscitation 2 000 Bimbo Dollars
  • Reset your account (free)
  • [Pay to] Bring your Bimbo back to life and you'll get 10 000 Bimbo Dollars

So all is not lost.

I questioned at the time whether this game was meant to be satirical - and like all good satire I'm still not sure. One thing IS for certain - the humour if it is satire will be lost on the target audience.