In response to numerous email forwards/chain letters I have received recently, I present you with this...

THE WORLD'S MOST POINTLESS CHAIN LETTER

Here's the deal. I'm sending you this chain letter for no reason. It's noone's dying wish to have their name carried around the world several times via the internet; I won't donate money to any orginizations depending on how many people receive this email; you won't be cursed if you don't send this to 20 of your friends within the next 19 seconds. In fact, by receiving this chain letter, you are blessed with a most awesome power - you now will be able to ignore all chain mail sent to you. Now, what gives me the power to say this? Nothing! That's the beauty of the world's most pointless chain letter! If you believe everything that comes to you in a chain letter, then you should believe this! Every chain letter you receive from this moment on is no more than a normal email. Your sex life will not be affected if you don't forward it, you will not feel a pain of guilt at not sending the pointless drab to all your friends, thus making them detest you for passing the "curse" on to them. You don't have to do anything! And you'll have good luck for the rest of your life. Wish for anything you want! This letter gives it to you! The best part is that you don't have to forward this to anyone. Sure, you can if you want to, but even if you just delete this now, the power to ignore all chain email and interent myths is yours. In fact, this power will be transferred to anyone who sees this email, even if it is not sent to them. It will also transfer to anyone who is related to the person receiveing this email, anyone who knows someone who receives this email and anyone who has ever met someone who receives this email. Have fun and enjoy less-cluttered, more revelant email readings in the future!

NOTE:

If you didn't pick up on what I was saying, let me clue you in. I know this doesn't apply to everyone, but I'm sure you have all gotten at least ONE chain letter through email at one time. It might have been something like the Parachuting Cow that you had to send on to someone else so you wouldn't get bad luck, or something like a truly sad story about a cancer patient that promises a donation for every person who forwards the email.

Most chain letters are fine. Some are funny and interesting. Some even provide recepies! But there are a lot of ones that I know that I receive that are stupid and worthless, and people forward them to me for apparently no reason.

For example, take these "Virus Alert" forwards. They basically say...

"Beware of the ________ virus. It will delete everything from your computer if you read it. If you see an email with the subject _______ or an attached file called ______, DON'T OPEN THEM! DELETE THEM AS SOON AS POSSIBLE!!!"

First, if there was a chain letter for every virus on the internet, the servers across the country would be so clogged nothing would funciton. There are TONS of viruses out there. This is nothing new. Don't read this email and say, "Oh no! A virus? On the internet? But the Internet is supposed to be perfect and good for everyone!"

Second, if you ever DO get an email with a strange subject line, wierd file attachement, or just from someone you do not know, well, you should be suspicious. Sometimes an email from a strange email address will be nothing more than a generic form letter trying to get you to buy somethine (in my book, these kinds are almost as bad). Whether just by reading an email a virus can download itself on to your computer and delete files, I don't know.

The bottom line? If you get a virus alert, delete it. Don't forward it to anyone. Viruses are nothing special. By sending it to them, this implies that they don't realize the points I just detailed, so maybe you should send THIS to them, and not those virus alerts.

Another example: the Cancer fundraising email.

Bottom line - it's not true. I have never heard of a company or any organization donating money to a charity based on how many people read a particular email, and if I ever DO, I will certainly inform you. Think about it - you get this email and send it to all your friends. How does the company/organization know how many people got the email? Have you ever actually gone to the web site of whoever is sponsoring this? In the American Cancer Society's case, they provided an AOL email address in the email. If you had done a little background check, you would find that the email address was a false address - there was noone with that account name on AOL, nor had there ever been! And if you went to see the American Cancer Society's homepage, they had a very large and visible link to a page where they said how this and other similar emails are absolutely NOT TRUE!

What's my point? Well, we all get a lot of email. Some we forward to others, because we think they would enjoy it, find it informative or interesting. And then there's some that we forward without even thinking WHY we're sending it other than the fact that "the email says I have to send it to 10 people who need luck in love within the next 2 days or else I'll be the victim of a horrible Jello accident" (okay, that's a stretch, but you get the idea). I'm not telling you to send forwards or chain letters. You can do wahatever you want, it's your life, your email. But I ask you to think about WHY you're sending it and WHAT it is that you're really sending. And if you want to keep sending this stuff around, that's fine - just don't send it to me, okay?

I hope this was informative and useful. I don't mean to sound like I'm preaching or condescending; I'm trying to give everyone tips on how to better manage their lives, or at least their email life. If you want some more information, check out these web sites:

That's all! hope I helped a bit! Enjoy the weekend!