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October 20, 2003
Pass this on :-)
Do you get lots of those wonderful "pass it on" emails? There are the Urban Legends (Missing kidneys, Mobile phone viruses), Feel Good Stories (Man survives fall from tower) and the Offer Too Good To Be True (Bill Gates mainly). Naturally as seasoned internet-using junkies professionals, you all immediately send such emails to 95 of your former best friends. Well Rachel Pascoe has had enough of it (copy of article in extended post if you can no longer see it online).
My attitude towards mail goes something like this - is it addressed to me (my email, my name) and not known to be SPAM then I read it. If it is from a mailing list I subscribe to (NPDS, NewtonTalk, Perl, etc) then I read it. If it is about my blog or Newton then I read it. If it is addressed to lots of people but not spam then it is probably work related and can be ignored safely. Otherwise it will be (a) an urban legend, (b) from nigeria, or (c) a nigerian clone.
There are a few different types of chain emails. The wish one (scroll down the page, make a wish and if you send it to 20 people, it will come true), the sympathy story (my name is Timmy and I live in a well - but if you send this email on, my town can afford to get me out of here), the Guinness World Recordsone (this chain letter has been in existence since 1872. Keep it going and everyone will get your names in the records) and the friend one (I love all my friends, so I forwarded them this email with many colours and smiley face pictures on it so they'd know how much I love them).
If you're going to send an email, at least make it interesting or something amusing or something to do with business - or even original. Isn't that why email was invented?
I doubt that people actually want to get this rubbish sent to their inbox 50 times a day. One person sends it to a whole bunch of people, the next sends it again to some others, and so on.
My dear friends all love sending me emails, so I get the same thing in my inbox at least six times a day.
I honestly don't care if some imaginary dead person comes to my house. Maybe I'll give them a can of deodorant, just to be polite. I don't care if I'm in the book ofGuinness World Records. They don't publish everyone's name anyway.
I don't care that if I don't send an email to two or more people I'll never meet my true love. I appreciate my friends' gesture to show how much I mean to them, but couldn't they come up with something original and more sincere?
By the way, if you send this column on, some mysterious philanthropist will give you a dollar every time someone else sends it. But if you don't, you will suffer from some strange phobia that doesn't exist.
If you send this column to two to nine people, you might find true love with a hot, sexy hermaphrodite one day.
Should you send this column to 10 to 19 people, you will get 10 to 19 punches from the people who are getting annoyed with you. And if you send this column to up to a million people you will have a happy, rich and carefree lifestyle for the rest of your life and die an old person. Happy?
Posted by Ozguru at October 20, 2003 09:10 AM
Comments
I am a very sick boy little boy. My mother is typing this for me, because I can't. She is crying. (Don't cry, Mommy!) Mommy is always sad, but she says it's not my fault. I asked her if it was God's fault, but she didn't answer, and only started crying harder, so I don't ask her that anymore. The reason she is so sad is that I'm so sick. I was born without a body.It doesn't hurt, except when I go to sleep. The doctors gave me an artificial body. My body is a burlap bag filled with leaves. The doctors said that was the best they could do on account of us havin' no money or insurance. I would like to have a body transplant, but we need more money. Mommy doesn't work because she said employers don't hire crying people. I said, "Don't cry, Mommy," and she hugged my burlap body. Mommy always gives me hugs, even though she's allergic to burlap, and it chafes her real bad. I hope you will help me. You can help me if you forward this e-mail. Dr. Van Nostrem from the clinic said if you foward this e-mail then Bill Gates will team up with AOL and do a survey with NASA. Then the astronauts will collect prayers from school children all over America and take them up to space so that the angels can hear them better. Then they will go to the Pope, and he will take up a collection in church and send the money to the doctors. The doctors could help me get better then. Maybe one day I will be able to play baseball. Or maybe just use my lungs and heart, when the doctors make them. The doctors said that every time you forward this letter, the astronauts can take another prayer to the angels. Please help me. Mommy is so sad, and I want a body. I don't want my leaves to rot before I turn 10. If you don't forward this e-mail, that's OK. Mommy says you're a mean heartless shithead who doesn't care about a poor little boy with only a head. She says that, if you don't stew in the raw pit of your own guilt-ridden stomach, she hopes you die a long slow horrible death so you can burn forever in the tar pits of hell. What kind of goddamned person are you that you can't take five fucking minutes to forward this to all your friends so that they can feel guilt and shame for the rest of their day, and then maybe help a poor, bodiless nine-year-old boy? Please help me. This really sucks. I try to be happy but it's hard. I wish I had a puppy. I wish I could hold a puppy. One time I had a puppy but he ate my leaves. Thank You. The boy with just a head. And a burlap sack for a body
Posted by: Richard Sheppard at October 20, 2003 09:10 AM
