Email from People I Love

I absolutely hate mail forwards being sent to me. I think forwarding emails is very rude. My email address is private. It's a means that I use to give and send information...just like in the old snail mail days. People wouldn't dream of just randomly handing out someone's home address or telephone number to a bunch of strangers on the street, yet some don't give that same care and consideration when it comes to someone's email address.

In fact I tell people who have my email address to leave me off of their email forward lists, and if I get a forward email I write them back telling them to please not send me more.

I have actually been known to ask people to delete me from their address book if they keep sending me "forwarded" emails. One guy kept saying he "forgot", but in the meantime I was getting all kinds of emails that contained viruses/worms in them because of his 'forgetfulness'. I actually had to change my email address thanks to him.

Some people think I'm rude, but I'm only looking out for myself and my computer. Sending email forwards is really a dangerous practice. Think about it....

If someone sent me an email forward that was also sent to 10 other people, 10 people now have my email address on their computer. If those 10 people send to 10 friends each, that's an additional 100 people that have my email address on their computer. If those 100 people each sent to 10 of their friends... well you do the math. The point is that it doesn't take long to have your email address sent around to thousands and thousands of strangers.

Some of those people have their email box set to add people automatically to their address book.

An email virus/worm will "spoof" an email address and send out mailings to not only those in the address book, but also any addresses sitting in the sent or deleted folders too. So if your address has been sent around to 1000 email boxes, any one of those 1000 people could be infected with a virus/worm and not know it (and many don't know it) and they will be bombarding people with the virus/worm.

So the more people who are sent your email address through email forwards, the larger your chances are of getting emails with viruses in them because anyone who received the email containing your email address could be infected and sending the virus to you.

If by chance I have to forward an email for whatever reason, I never just add everyone's address to the "To" line. I put my own address in the "To" line and then the other addresses in the "BCC" line. That way peoples' email address aren't spread around.

It sounds to me like the issue is you want more contact with your loved ones so you'd like for them to write more.

You could try replying with a personal message when they send you a mass mailing. Give them a brief update about you and then ask questions so they will write back. If that doesn't work, pick up the phone every time you get a mass email, tell them you saw the picture (or whatever) and it prompted you to find out how they are doing.

You can't make someone do something, but you can change your expectations.

I totally agree with you on this. I also think with today's technology at our finger tips, one-on-one personal contact is just a way of the past It does sound like you want more contact with your loved ones. So I would just reach out to them. For me, I will just pick up the phone and call someone I love to catch up that way.

Another thing, that bother's me, are those birthday e-cards. I still always send a regular birthday card to my loved ones..... I am still holding on to the "old fashioned" way of doing things.......