E.T., Phone 1-900-GREEN BABES!

From MSNBC's science columnist, some thoughts on how we might want to contact any aliens bopping around out there:

Such messages usually use intricate coding, including hieroglyphs that refer to the wavelength of the hydrogen transition and mathematical functions. But Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the California-based SETI Institute, suggests that you needn't bother with all that cosmic cryptography. Streaming a cached copy of the Internet should do just fine, he says.

"What we should send is the content of the Google servers on a light beam," Shostak told me. "Don't worry about the coding. That's like the artists in the Lascaux cave worrying about how to paint an antelope so that anthropologists could figure it out 17,000 years later."

I'm going to have to give this some thought. First off, I suspect aliens might get the wrong idea about human reproductive techniques. Study the Internet, and you're going to have the Mothership landing with a stock of almond-flavored oil, alien-shaped rubber dohickies and handcuffs to trade with the natives. Plus, what if they're disappointed that all Earth females don't look like Japanese anime chicks, all big eyes, long legs and impossibly huge breasts? Well, I guess if they landed at the Academy Awards we could dodge that bullet.

I can see it all now...PEOPLE OF EARTH! WE COME IN PEACE! WE WOULD LIKE TO MEET THE PENIS ENLARGERS...AND CAN WE ARRANGE REFINANCING ON OUR PLANET? RESISTANCE IS FUTILE! AND WE'D LIKE OUR $40 MILLION FROM THE MINISTER OF FINANCE OF GHANA! WHERE IS MATT DRUDGE???