About this product

Product Information

The General Mills CD-ROM computer game cereal promotion was among the more controversial electronic issues during the summer of 2000. In late July, cereal boxes began appearing on grocery store shelves containing one of five popular games: Amazon Trail 3rd Edition, Carmen Sandiego Word Detective, Clue, LEGO Creator, and Who Wants to be a Millionaire. As was advertised on the box, each CD also contained additional software, including a Merriam-Webster Dictionary and an offer from the Internet service provider Lightdog. The first four titles also contained a non-advertised copy of Zondervan Publishing House's New International Version of the Holy Bible. The inclusion of the bible was not noted on the cereal box, nor on the disc sleeve, nor on the surface of the CD-ROM itself. Moreover, when the user began to explore the additional software included on the disc, an otherwise uninformative "NIV" icon appeared on the list of available options, still with no indication that a copy of the Bible was included. Only by clicking on the "NIV" icon, and beginning installation of the Bible software, did the user learn what was being installed. Yet even this was not the end of the process. After installation, users were encouraged to register their new digital copies of the Bible to receive free "Inspirational Readings," plus a five dollar rebate on the purchase of other Zondervan products. None of this would likely have caused much controversy if General Mills had simply mentioned on the product boxes that a copy of the Holy Bible was included with the game software. The company did not, however, and suspicion immediately arose that the promotion involved a surreptitious attempt to trick unsuspecting children into clicking on the mysterious "NIV" icon and begin reading the Christian holy book. While General Mills apologized, the company also implied that it was an innocent victim of the situation, with no prior knowledge that a copy of the Bible was included in the software is was distributing. This contention was strongly disputed by a July 22, 2000 article in the Detroit Free Press which quoted persons both inside and outside the cereal company who had worked on the project. The article further stated that General Mills had spent ten million dollars on the promotion, and that it was only at Disney's insistence that the Bible software had been excluded from the Who Wants to be a Millionaire discs. Four cereals were issued containing the Who Wants to be a Millionaire discs: Corn Chex, Golden Grahams, Multi-Grain Cheerios Plus, and Rice Chex. Discs for each of the other four games (plus the Bible software) could be found in eight other General Mills cereal brands.