It happens all the time. One Comcast customer was dumped for using too much web service on a plan he purchased because it was "unlimited." The company told him the word referred to the fact he could be on his computer as much as he wanted, not that he could view as many pages and videos as he wanted. And then Comcast tried selling him a more expensive plan. Infuriated, he fought back, launching a fiery blog and a cutting YouTube protest to tell the world he'd been ripped off. And a consumer advocate was born.

In July, Sprint put a cap on its previously "unlimited" data card usage, following Verizon and AT&T. Now, 5 gigabytes is all you get unless you want corporate monkeys to shut off your supply. Americans aren't the only ones to suffer the bait-and-switch defended by dense legalese and bent logic in the Terms of Service contract: U.K.'s Vodafone puts similar caps on its "unlimited" mobile phone plan, as does Canada's TELUS.

Magazine and catalog publishers know that everybody hates blow-in cards -- the postcards that fall out when you read. Yet they keep on putting them in. I just got a new WIRED Magazine with three blow in cards and a fashion supplement I won't read, all bound up in a polybag.

Like many consumers, I'm tempted to send the blow-in cards back blank. Many people have suggested this over the years. But how much will it really cost WIRED and dissuade them from these totally annoying, eco-unfriendly tactics? How many people would it take to do it? According to Direct Marketing Magazine, they do it because the cost of blowing in a card that I'll ignore is about half the cost of sending out a letter I'll ignore. But the response rate is abysmal: only 0.35%. That means they have to do 300 cards to get one back. The 2006 story put the cost at $30 to $40 per thousand.

If WIRED conformed to all those norms, it would be spending about 3.5 cents per card put in the magazine and roughly $10 for every card it gets back. (It's offering subscriptions at only $8 year, but that's part of the fuzzy economics of magazines today, which are supported more by ads than sales.)

I checked with the post office to see how much postage they would pay for every card returned. A high volume mailer like WIRED has to pay several thousand dollars a year in fees, then 24.7 cents per card actual postage and .006 cents for processing under its special Business Reply Mail permit. So, basically it's a quarter for every postcard. Let's assume WIRED wouldn't consider the blow-in cards attractive if the cost doubled -- making it the same price as mailing a letter. What would it take for the process to cost $30 more per thousand? At 25 cents a pop, it means that 120 of 1,000 postcards would have to make it to the mailbox. That's what I think it would take to get the blow-in cards to stop: better than one in 10 people sending the cards back blank.

Are you up for joining me?

The recent upward surge in commodities prices has left no corner of the globe untouched. That includes the bastions of the beer drinkers.

Changes in global climate, a decline in hops growers and a recent fire in a hops storage facility have worked in concert to reduce the world supply of that most important of beer brewing ingredients. According to a story published by Wired, these events have breweries both large and small adjusting their beer making processes and ingredients in an effort to curb rising brewing costs. The Wired story quotes brew master Donald Gortemiller as saying, "When hops were $2 a pound, compared to $20 or $30 a pound now, it didn't matter. We'd throw them into the boil at various times. That was an inaccurate way of doing things. We're modifying recipes and using about 20 percent less hops."

Walletpop blogger extraordinaire, Bruce Watson recently brought to light the mounting concern over hops deficiencies in the brewisphere. He wrote: "I imagine that the hot nights of a post-global warming future will be particularly unbearable without the benefit of a nice cold one." Bruce has vowed to do everything he can to "Save the Ales." For my part, I have chosen an alternate strategy to Bruce's proactive beer saving efforts. I have surrendered my boarding pass to what was for me; "The one way aluminum train to Stupidville."

Believe me when I say that my self imposed abstinence from beer will leave plenty of the cold foamy beverages for the rest of you to share and enjoy. Let's just hope that the remaining hops growers are the people who are benefiting from these unfortunate beer ingredient price increases.

There are days when I'd just like to lie in bed. All day.

If you've thought the same thing, then, boy, have I got a deal for you. Wired reports that NASA is offering a study that will pay people $17,000 to stay in bed for 90 straight days.

Of course, there's a catch or two.

Is nothing sacred?

Madison Ave. apparently doesn't think so.

A special-effects entrepreneur has come up with a way to fill the sky with lush clouds as large as 4 feet across shaped like corporate logos, according to Wired. He calls them Flogos. Great. How clever.

Francisco Guerra, who's also a former magician, has developed a machine that produces tiny bubbles filled with air and some helium, forms the foam into shapes and pumps them into the sky.

You'd think a magician would know better. Aren't they supposed to hold the imagination sacred?

Naturally that biggest corporate dream maker - The Walt Disney Co. will use one of the machines next month to send clouds shaped like Mickey Mouse heads into the air at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla., Guerra told Wired.

After that, no doubt, the floodgates will be open. No more laying on a grassy knoll picking out whales and cars and palm tree-shaped clouds with your kids or partner. It'll be "Hey! It's Coke!" or, "Look Mommy, Apple Computers!"

May the winds of change blow fiercely.