E-mail Etiquette and Facts of Life
 
1. Big companies don't do business via chain letter. Bill Gates is not 
going to give you $1000, and Disney is not going to give you a free 
vacation. There is no need to pass it on "just in case it's true". 
Futhermore, just because someone said in the message, four generations 
back, that "we checked it out and it's legit," does not make it true.
 
2. There is no kidney theft ring in New Orleans. No one is waking up in
a bathtub full of ice, even if a friend of a friend swears it happened 
to his cousin. If you are hell-bent on believing the kidney-theft ring 
stories, please see:  
http://urbanlegends.tqn.com/library/weekly/aa062997.html.
 
And I quote: "The National Kidney Foundation has repeatedly issued 
requests for actual victims of organ thieves to come forward and tell 
their stories. None have." That's "none" as in "zero."  Not even your 
friend's cousin.
 
3. Neiman Marcus doesn't sell a $200 cookie recipe. And even if they 
did, we all have it. And if you don't, you can get a copy at: 
http://www.bl.net/forwards/cookie.html.
 
If you then decide the cookies are that awesome, feel free to pass
along the recipe without the Neiman Marcus story.
 
4. We all know all 500 ways to drive your roommates crazy, irritate 
co-workers and creep out people on an elevator.  We also know exactly 
how many engineers, college students, usenet posters and people from 
each and every world ethnicity it takes to change a lightbulb.
 
5. Even if the latest NASA rocket disaster(s) DID contain plutonium that 
went to particulate over the eastern seaboard, do you REALLY think this
information would reach the public via an AOL chain-letter?
 
6. There is no "Good Times" virus. In fact, you should never, ever, 
ever, ever forward any E-mail containing any virus warning unless you 
first confirm it at an actual site of an actual company that actually 
deals with viruses. Try: http://www.norton.com.
 
7. If your CC: list is regularly longer than the actual content of your
message, you're probably going to Hell.
 
8. If you're using Outlook, IE, or Netscape to write E-mail, turn off 
the "HTML encoding." Those of us on Unix shells can't read it, and
don't care enough to save the attachment and then view it with a web 
browser, since you're probably forwarding us a copy of the Neiman 
Marcus Cookie Recipe anyway.
 
9. If you still absolutely MUST forward that 10th-generation message 
from a friend, at least have the decency to trim the eight miles of 
headers showing everyone else who's received it over the last 6 months.
Besides, if it has gone around that many times I've probably already 
seen it.
 
10. Craig Shergold in England is not dying of cancer or anything else
at this time and would like everyone to stop sending him their business 
cards.  He apparently is also no longer a "little boy" either.