>Forwarded Message
>=================

Today was the last straw. I got another copy of the "Disney is going to give 13,000 people a free vacation if this message annoys at least 10% of the Internet population" spam. I don't know how these things get started, but I've decided to start my own, and I'm counting on all of you to help pass it on. You won't get a free copy of Windows98 for doing so, but if enough copies of the message get out, I will consider NOT killing the last person who sent me the Disney spam.

Here it goes.

Email Facts Of Life

  1. Big companies don't do business via chain letter. Bill Gates is not giving you $1000, and Disney is not giving you a free vacation. There is no baby food company issuing class-action checks. You can relax; there is no need to pass it on "just in case it's true". Furthermore, just because someone said in the message, four generations back, that "we checked it out and it's legit", does not actually 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 .
    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. Nieman Marcus doesn't really sell a $200 cookie recipe. And even if they do, we all have it. And even if you don't, you can get a copy at:
    http://www.bl.net/forwards/cookie .
    Then, if you make the recipe and decide the cookies are that awesome, feel free to pass the recipe on-- sans the Nieman Marcus story.
  4. We all know all 500 ways to drive your roommates crazy.
  5. We all know how many usenet posters it takes to change a lightbulb.
  6. 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?
  7. There is no "Good Times" virus. In fact, you should never, ever, ever forward any email containing any virus warning unless you first confirm it at an actual site of an actual company that actually deals with viruses. [Or, even better, check CERT at http://www.cert.org .] And even then, don't forward it. We don't care.
  8. If your CC: list is regularly longer than the actual content of your message, you're probably going to Hell.
  9. If you're using Outlook, IE, or Netscape to write email, 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 Nieman Marcus Cookie Recipe anyway.
  10. 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.

Pass it on...

******************
Alexander Fernando