At least four of the nine women chosen by Playboy editors for their hottest blogger contest are actively playing to lose. None of them would let us run their emails from Playboy.com's editors, but there's a clear pattern: Playboy emailed blogstars like Xeni Jardin for a chaste headshot photo to go into an article about sexy bloggers. The emails didn't explain that (a) it was a poll, and (b) the point of the poll was to get the winner to pose "topless or nude" — no G-rated shoots — for the magazine's website. Only sex writer Violet Blue seems openly thrilled to be in the running. Here's an idea: Everyone vote for Violet. Spare the rest of us the awkwardness. [UPDATE: TechCrunch has one of the emails.]

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