My PhD thesis : Anatomy of a mailstorm
After spending several Fridays in my clever undercover role as an Indian techie in a ever shrinking large multinational corporation & playing several successful rounds of "delete the email as soon as it appears", I have come to successfully analyse the beast that is the corporate mailstorm.
A Mailstorm is always triggered when some misguided Johnny decides to do one of the following :
a) Helpfully inform a large group of people that a particular piece of equipment that they didn't know existed is now out of commission.
b) Subscribes to Borg thinking - in that the collective brains of many people will help him/her solve an intractable problem, by sending out an SOS.
What results, generally follows the pattern outlined below:
1) The genuinely outraged workaholics
These are the people who, in their effort to continue working productively & stop mailstorms, send mails asking why they are being bombarded with these pointless emails.
"Stop Replying All" & "Why am I subscribed to this group?" are their catchphrases
2) The mail etiquette nannies
As their name suggests, they are the self appointed guardians of mail etiquette. They're generally the next to reply, with the line "I've put the mailer list in Bcc, please reply to this & stop spamming everyone else".
3) The not so genuinely outraged workaholics
These are people who give us proof of existence of Newton's Third Law of Motion. Sensing the danger posed by the nannies to the future of the mailstorm, they immediately reply to the entire group asking the same set of questions as the first group - working hard to make the mailstorm reach its tipping point.
4) The wannabe pro-active
Living proof that "a little learning is a dangerous thing". These folks attempt to circumvent the lunacy filling up their inboxes, by "taking initiative" and unsubscribing from the group. Unfortunately, having only heard about this amazing concept, they attempt to do so by replying to the thread with only the word "unsubscribe" in the body. (And these are the people designing the cutting edge technology of the day)
5) The helpful flamers
These folks are the ones who feel it is their duty to help the poor, misguided souls in (4). They helpfully attempt to point out the proper procedure for unsubscribing from a mailer list (or, alternatively, how it is not possible to do so). Unfortunately for them, for every email they send with this information, you see the next 10 emails with "unsubscribe" in them.
6) The performers
These are the people who know how to take advantage of a good time! While the rest of them try to fight the tide - these folks swim with it, revel in it, and, for a brief period, make themselves stars in the eyes of all those watching.
Nothing is out of bounds for them for this brief attempt at glory & they email with gay abandon, sharing, among other things :
a) Recipes for their favorite foods (I've got a great chocolate cake recipe from a storm 2 years ago)
b) Relevant youtube clips (Monty Python's spam sketch is a popular one)
c) Full page rants against an explicitly named competitor
d) Pieces of wisdom - "Replying All to stop replying all is like having sex to achieve virginity" (gathered from the last mailstorm)
7) The parents
"Fear is the best way to deal with irrationality" is their maxim. In the misguided belief that everyone else is a child of two, they attempt to do with threats what the
mail etiquette nannies could not achieve with kindness. "They're tracking everyone who replies to this thread & those are the folks going in the next layoff" they say, betraying their sharp wit. This would be a credible threat, except when you check your company directory & see that some of the performers listed above are Senior Vice-Presidents.
8) The apologetic/defensive originators
At some point, after about an hour of agonizing over what they've done, you'll sometimes find the person who sent the original email either apologizing for the spam, or defending to the death the need for the mailer thread in the first place.
After this point, the storm goes one of the following ways
a) If the storm originated on a Friday (which, statistically speaking is the day 81% of all mailstorms occur), they die a natural death after lunchtime
b) Some spoilsport admins will take the entire mailer-group offline, stopping the free exchange of knowledge that has been going on.
Numerous studies have shown that a mailstorm is the best way to start unplanned 3 day weekends. In fact, the problems posed by overzealous admins cannot be understated here. It is a little known fact that the reason the unrest in the Middle-East tend to gather steam on Fridays, is due to the interruption of regular afternoon mailstorms.
A Mailstorm is always triggered when some misguided Johnny decides to do one of the following :
a) Helpfully inform a large group of people that a particular piece of equipment that they didn't know existed is now out of commission.
b) Subscribes to Borg thinking - in that the collective brains of many people will help him/her solve an intractable problem, by sending out an SOS.
What results, generally follows the pattern outlined below:
1) The genuinely outraged workaholics
These are the people who, in their effort to continue working productively & stop mailstorms, send mails asking why they are being bombarded with these pointless emails.
"Stop Replying All" & "Why am I subscribed to this group?" are their catchphrases
2) The mail etiquette nannies
As their name suggests, they are the self appointed guardians of mail etiquette. They're generally the next to reply, with the line "I've put the mailer list in Bcc, please reply to this & stop spamming everyone else".
3) The not so genuinely outraged workaholics
These are people who give us proof of existence of Newton's Third Law of Motion. Sensing the danger posed by the nannies to the future of the mailstorm, they immediately reply to the entire group asking the same set of questions as the first group - working hard to make the mailstorm reach its tipping point.
4) The wannabe pro-active
Living proof that "a little learning is a dangerous thing". These folks attempt to circumvent the lunacy filling up their inboxes, by "taking initiative" and unsubscribing from the group. Unfortunately, having only heard about this amazing concept, they attempt to do so by replying to the thread with only the word "unsubscribe" in the body. (And these are the people designing the cutting edge technology of the day)
5) The helpful flamers
These folks are the ones who feel it is their duty to help the poor, misguided souls in (4). They helpfully attempt to point out the proper procedure for unsubscribing from a mailer list (or, alternatively, how it is not possible to do so). Unfortunately for them, for every email they send with this information, you see the next 10 emails with "unsubscribe" in them.
6) The performers
These are the people who know how to take advantage of a good time! While the rest of them try to fight the tide - these folks swim with it, revel in it, and, for a brief period, make themselves stars in the eyes of all those watching.
Nothing is out of bounds for them for this brief attempt at glory & they email with gay abandon, sharing, among other things :
a) Recipes for their favorite foods (I've got a great chocolate cake recipe from a storm 2 years ago)
b) Relevant youtube clips (Monty Python's spam sketch is a popular one)
c) Full page rants against an explicitly named competitor
d) Pieces of wisdom - "Replying All to stop replying all is like having sex to achieve virginity" (gathered from the last mailstorm)
7) The parents
"Fear is the best way to deal with irrationality" is their maxim. In the misguided belief that everyone else is a child of two, they attempt to do with threats what the
mail etiquette nannies could not achieve with kindness. "They're tracking everyone who replies to this thread & those are the folks going in the next layoff" they say, betraying their sharp wit. This would be a credible threat, except when you check your company directory & see that some of the performers listed above are Senior Vice-Presidents.
8) The apologetic/defensive originators
At some point, after about an hour of agonizing over what they've done, you'll sometimes find the person who sent the original email either apologizing for the spam, or defending to the death the need for the mailer thread in the first place.
After this point, the storm goes one of the following ways
a) If the storm originated on a Friday (which, statistically speaking is the day 81% of all mailstorms occur), they die a natural death after lunchtime
b) Some spoilsport admins will take the entire mailer-group offline, stopping the free exchange of knowledge that has been going on.
Numerous studies have shown that a mailstorm is the best way to start unplanned 3 day weekends. In fact, the problems posed by overzealous admins cannot be understated here. It is a little known fact that the reason the unrest in the Middle-East tend to gather steam on Fridays, is due to the interruption of regular afternoon mailstorms.
posted by Firebringer at 9:19 PM
5 Comments:
9) Misguided Johnny is pink with embarrassment and decides to recall his mail. Only poor Johnny having not thought it through adds one more mail to the pile.
I think you should send this mail to the mailer list. that will take them by a storm.
lol good one :) i like the unsubscribe idiots the best!
interesting blog. It would be great if you can provide more details about it. Thanks you
PhD Thesis
There are always a lot of problems to arise when writing thesis or dissertation, especially if it is for graduate school. So, it is good that even with a lot of problem early in your graduate thesis, you still found a lot of information for it and still finish the paper. Anyway, I hope everything went according to what you expect it to be, and finish all your requirements.
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