From: Kennita Watson (kwatson@netcom.com)
Date: Mon Dec 16 1996 - 20:39:58 MST
>> The danger in the snowball and all chain letters is their exponential
>> nature....
>> well-connected people could end up getting dozens of copies without sending
>> out a single one -- no wonder chain letters have such a bad rep!
>
>Do you object to the viral nature of the information even when the
>content is interesting?
If it's _useful_ to most of the people who get it, maybe it's OK. But
I don't think that things I find _interesting_, or even fun, should be
sent to random people (includes majorly off-topic posts to mailing lists).
Maybe they don't want to play now.
>
>For an ideological life form like a chain letter to survive, it must
>have some sort of worthwhile content or it simply will not be copied.
**Snowballs**??!!? I suppose it's fun (worthwhile?!) for _some_ people,
but if you're going to fire them off, at least use a rifle instead of a
shotgun. I don't like it when I'm minding my own business and people
having a water fight get me wet, either. They always apologize, too.
>I often find that the people who scream about chain letters (because they
>have a line saying "copy me" somewhere in the text) are the same people
>who send me junk mail containing the latest net jokes and cute ascii
>pictures.
Don't point that finger at _me_! I don't forward that stuff to lists;
one or two people I know well with whom I regularly exchange such things,
maybe.
>I'm curious as to how this 'anti copy me' meme has arisen. Any ideas?
Call it a (possibly vain) attempt to exercise some control over my
informational (as opposed to physical) environment. And did it ever
occur to you that junk mail might just piss some people off?
There's an element of presumption in a chain letter; it says, in
effect, "I think you are a person who would be interested in this".
I for one dislike having incorrect labels pasted on me.
I guess I feel that there must be some other people out there who share
my view of chain mail to some extent, or I'd shut up and suffer and
let everybody else have their fun. But I feel I'm representing the
same sort of "party-poopers" who would rather you didn't hold a slam-dance
party in the apartment upstairs on a work night.
In the interests of having more people decide to break more chains,
Kennita
Kennita Watson | The bond that links your true family is not one of blood,
kwatson@netcom.com| but of respect and joy in each other's life. Rarely do
| members of the same family grow up under the same roof.
| -- Richard Bach, _Illusions_
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