Once in a Lifetime . . . is enough to find those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities cluttering your e-mail inbox. Where do they come from? Are they for real? Why are they targeting you? Here are the answers to those questions.

If you've been using the Internet for any length of time,there's a pretty good chance that one or two or 20 e-mailmessages bearing one of these teasers has landed in your in-box.The senders of these messages promise "financial freedom"or "independence from paychecks" with homebased businessopportunities ranging from envelope stuffing to designing Websites. And all that stands between you and freedom from your dulloffice job and mean-spirited boss is one small payment . . .

Financial freedom sounds great. But are these so-called businessopportunities too good to be true?

At first, Lesley Fountain didn't think so. After running asuccessful medical transcription service out of her Oceanside,California, home for 20 years, Fountain went looking for ahomebased business opportunity that would allow her to spend moretime with her young daughter. One day, she received an unsolicitede-mail message (a.k.a. spam) offering a seminar that would trainher to build lucrative e-commerce Web sites. Fountain spent nearly$3,000 to register for the seminar, only to find that the five daysof training left her ill-equipped to write the complex computercode required to build a working site.