Comments on: I Can’t Believe I Sent it to the Whole Listserve

By: dave hoffman

dave hoffman — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 20:26:39 +0000

Hate to be a grump, but I think that because of the reply-all problem, the contracts listserve isn’t a fabulous resource at all but rather a spam source. I’d say no more than 1/3 of the messages we get are substantive, the other 2/3s are inappropriate advertisements for personal projects or piling on “me toos”.

By: Dissent

Dissent — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 19:28:09 +0000

One of my all-time favorites comes from our very own Dept. of Homeland Security. A mail list admin reportedly accidentally reconfigured the list and a newsletter sent out to over 7500 people revealed all their email addresses. Then people started replying to the whole list (sometimes on purpose). Bottom line: the DHS managed to create a 9-hour spam run that sent about 2 million messages and essentially ddos-ed all their subscribers until they got hold of their admin to stop the whole thing.

I still crack up laughing when I think about that one, even though revealing thousands of security professionals’ information is clearly no laughing matter.

By: arthur

arthur — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 18:52:00 +0000

This problem is not unique to email. Back in the age of faxes, an asbestos liability trial involving several thousand plaintiffs and over a hundred defendants was delayed by several weeks after one plaintiff’s counsel sent an “all counsel” fax, rather than an “all plaintiffs’ counsel” fax discussing plaintiffs’ strategy for voir dire, including discussion of particular potential jurors. The very large jury pool was dismissed and a new one assembled.

I once made a similar error once with snail mail. A defense firm was on the plaintiffs’ firm service list due to my carelessness, and received a draft that wasn’t ready for the other side to see.

I have seen numerous errors involving the distinction between “all counsel” and “all plaintiffs’ [or defendants'] counsel” emails, most but not all harmless.

By: Miriam Cherry

Miriam Cherry — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 07:10:17 +0000

Did you really have a crush on all the people in your email directory though?

I’d be very worried if all those people in my directory had even the potential for thinking I had a crush on them. Oh, the perils of being single…

By: AshamedAndGuilty

AshamedAndGuilty — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 05:34:48 +0000

This is not the same thing, but in the same spirit. There’s a website that sends you an email that says “Someone’s got a crush on you–click here to see who!”. When you get to the page, it says “They’re too embarrassed to tell you their name, but just put in their email address and if it matches, we’ll let you know.”

I dumped in my whole email address list…and they all got the message “Someone’s got a crush on you–click here to see who!” If any typed in my email address, it announced that I had a crush on them! I’d been one crucial step in a spam daisy chain that may well have chain letter spammed the world.

By: cantinflas

cantinflas — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 04:34:13 +0000

When an executive secretary requested a response email from anyone interested in putting their name on the queue for season tickets to the Phoenix Suns, one guy that was her friend replied to all with “Please put my name at the top of the list, maybe in the middle too, and it can be our little secret. ”

By: Trill

Trill — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 04:05:02 +0000

I sent a reply-all last week, on purpose… but only realized after I pressed the “send” button that someone had added a dean at my law school (I’m a student) to the thread. Without going into specifics, it involved crude jokes and references to alcohol consumption.

I’m still mortified.

By: such sweet thunder

such sweet thunder — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 00:40:47 +0000

I’ve heard a story about an Administrative Associate at Shearman who sent a vent email about people leaving unmarked containers in the fridge to all of the firms’ attorneys — foreign and domestic.