I don’t know what’s worse, those inane e-mail footers that go "Attention: This message is intended only for the individual to whom it is addressed, blah, blah, blah," or the fact that they come attached to everything from I’m-on-vacation auto responses to chain letter emails that promise years of bad luck if you don’t immediately forward it to 50 strangers. Not only are those footers pointless, they’re often incorrect. (For example, say that you accidentally send an e-mail to the wrong person because your mouse wiggles while you are trying to pick John Doe out of your address book and you get Jack Doe instead. Off it goes, to the "individual to whom it is addressed," but NOT to the person that was intended.)
If adding such verbiage to e-mails was ever effective, that effectiveness has got to be diluted 1,000 fold by now. Remember those 2 questions the airport attendants had to ask us about whether or not we packed our own luggage? After 7 years, the FAA finally quit making them ask us, because there wasn’t a single time when it did any good. I’ve never heard of those e-mail disclaimers doing anyone any good, either. Isn’t about time we stop cluttering up each other’s in-boxes with them?
