I began receiving disquieting emails from my readers in the Spring of 2003. I'd published my encyclopedic book, Ultimate Diet Secrets in the Fall of 2002 and followed that up with a condensed version, Ultimate Diet Secrets lite, a sort of "just the facts, nothing but the facts" version of the bigger book. The message, however, for both books was the same: there's one fact, and one fact only, that determines bodyweight for each and every one of us. What's this fact? The balance between the calories one burns and the calories one eats. Now, it's much more complicated than this in actual practice. That, of course, has been the downfall of the "just eat less and move more" dictum, as correct as it is, offered by most health professionals. But, weight control information isn't driven by the professional health industry; it's driven by marketing, and the key interest of marketers is to pick people's pockets. If the confusion were to end, the weight control industry (business) as we know it would come to a grinding halt.

Because weight control is such an enormous problem for most people, they've come to believe that its solution must be very complex, not simple, as it is in reality. The falsely-held belief in the idea that bodyweight control is complex is what opens the door for the thousands of weight control choices that flood the marketplace.

As I worked with my readers, it became apparent to me that most of them wanted to focus on diet as the key issue and strategy to be discussed. I knew, of course, that diet, or, rather, that the TYPE of food one ate, was only a part of the weight control solution. I taught my readers that how MUCH one ate was far more important than WHAT TYPE of food one ate. No matter, people keep focusing on WHAT TYPE of food they should eat. Now, I'm not saying that it doesn't matter WHAT TYPE of food one eats, I'm saying it isn't the most important factor. That being said, please be clear, I'm a supporter of the low-carb diet and I wrote extensively about it in my book(s).

Also, be clear here too: the most popular low-carb guru was Dr. Robert Atkins, but Atkins got much wrong when he designed his strategy. In my work, I thoroughly analyzed where Atkins went wrong and corrected those errors when I designed my own, highly effective low-carb diet that I presented in my book as a part of my "menu of strategies" to help people solve bodyweight control issues.

What I wasn't prepared for was the glut of emails that I began receiving about impact and non-impact carbs. To answer my reader's inquiries, I drafted a Word document that I could send back to them explaining exactly what was going on as a function of marketing -- not science -- but marketing. I recently checked the stats on the first draft of this article, and the Word summary shows that I wrote it on May 4, 2003. Why do I need to tell you this? Because something even more incredible is happening at this time, January, 2004. But, let's hold that idea for a minute and take the time to read what I wrote in May, 2003; and then I'll enlighten you about The Great American Diet Hoax: The Net Carb Scam.