Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Fun With "Reply to All..."

My wife just exclaimed, "I wonder why people reply to all on emails when they don't need to address everyone?" I found this humorous, and it got me thinking back to one particular instance of "Reply to All" for me.

Back when I was taking Chem 201 there was a lot of nervous freshmen and sophomores in the class. I was a junior, and I was rather knowledgable about chemistry, so I didn't worry. Furthermore, these nervous freshmen would miss classes constantly, and in their despair, they would send out emails to the class all the time, begging for help, for notes, for clarification, for anything, really. I found this rather annoying. This went on for most of the semester, and my frustration at people missing classes and wanting help/handouts was building.

One day I decided to type a message and Reply to Everyone in the class. My message was short and simple.

Did you all see our professor lick the chalkboard today?

Of course, this was completely made up, but I thought it was rather funny. One or two people replied to me, curious and wondering about it, but I didn't reply back.

The point of this post: when replying to an email, make sure it's directed at who you intend and not at everybody. Everything is much better this way.

7 comments:

Captain Joe said...

Heh, I hear ya on that, mate.

Two years ago I worked for a nationwide insurance company in underwriting, and made quite the blunder with the 'send all' button in Outlook.

There are e-mail groups stored in the network like 'Floor 1', 'Sales', 'Claims', 'Call Centre', and so on... Anyway, a woman sent out a message to our floor saying she'd lost her umbrella, has anyone seen it. Reasonable enough. This was followed by a request from someone else looking for their sunglasses, Again, not a problem. These kind of emails happened everyday.

Being the somewhat class clown that I am, I sent out a follow-up with a picture of Gimli from the Lord of the Rings, saying just simply 'AND MY AXE!' I know, hilarious, right? Requesting if anyone's seen my lost axe...

I then clicked 'Send All', and emailed it to roughly 11,000 people nationally, including the CEO and his executive team.

Needless to say, I got called to task on that particular blunder.

I heartily endorse being careful with e-mail.

marky said...

Oh my word, I just done a send to all email yesterday. Somebody was complaining about one of the guys using the toilet, and how they should do the stinky in their own house. So, I sent this to everybody.

To all staff members:



I’ve been made aware that someone has made a smelly in the executive toilets. This is wholly unacceptable. If you thought that these toilets were for defecating in, then it is with heartfelt joy that I move to quash such insidious rumours. The toilets are not for emptying your bowels. If you wish to empty your bowels, please do so on your own time, in your own home, or alternatively, a bucket can be purchased from the trade counter. Our cleaner Sadie, is of a certain age were the shock of finding a log, either still floating in the toilet, or hanging half in, half out, can have serious repercussions on her health and well being. So please think of this before you decide to crank one out. If anybody is found out to be in the toilet for any more than two minutes, a warning flare will be released. On release of said flare, you have precisely twenty seconds to vacate the toilet area. Failure to do so will result in the door being forcibly opened, and the offender being frog marched off the premises with his/her tweeds round their ankles.

I am disgusted at the smell emanating from the toilet. This can only be blamed on the poor diet of my fellow employees. I implore you to refrain from shopping in Aldi or Lidl, and to stop buying Tesco’s value range. Only buy fruit, vegetables and nuts from quality purveyors of nosh, such as M&S or Waitrose. I have personally been on a Fruit and nut diet for three months, and I can say without a lie that my number two’s smell like Alpine. In fact, yesterday when I pimped, I swear it sounded more like a yodel than a fart. I know that money is tight; I understand buying healthy food isn’t a goal most of you people have in your lives. But please, instead of buying crack or spending your meagre wages down the local public house, invest in pot pourris, clean underwear and proper healthy food. For all our sakes.
Yours Faithfully

A. Nial Warlord.

Sailor Matt said...

Great letter, Mary! Any funny responses?

I, for one, find the 'AND MY AXE!' email funny, Cap'n. Too bad it went to 11,000 people.

We used to have 'send all' problems on the boat. If you walked away from your computer while still logged in, someone would come along and send a disgusting email to the rest of the ship about some dirty sexual act you like to do (usually the story was almost completely untruthful). Then you've got 5,000 people laughing at you, saying "hey, that's the Sheep 'n Metal Pole guy!"

WV: lamsh. What Sean Connery calls a baby sheep.

marky said...

Great letter, Mary! Any funny responses?
===================================
Who the hell is Mary? You lookin for a fight? Naw, nothing worth writing about. A few people came back with stuff, but nothing that I'd post on such a discerning gentleman’s blog.

Sailor Matt said...

Hah! I almost peed myself. I can't believe I didn't notice the Mary thing. Too funny. Sorry 'bout that :)

VW: stmanksa- something you slap or beat out of someone. "I'm gonna beat the stmanksa out of you if you call me Mary one more time!"

Captain Joe said...

Oh dear, I can see Mary becoming your new online alias, Marky. Be mindful of spelling blunders, too, I guest.

-Catpain Hoe.

logankstewart said...

Wow. I couldn't get the image of Gimli out of my mind last night as I tried to sleep, saying "AND MY AXE!" Very funny there, Cap'n.

Marky, I had to read that letter twice and aloud to fully appreciate everything in it, and for my wife to hear, too. It just leaves me wondering what sort of job you have and whether or not folks found your email ammusing.

I, for one, never found other people meddling with personal email accounts fun or entertaining, especially when certain types of emails are sent.

Aye with spelling blunders, too. I don't think I noticed the Mary thing, either.