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Email petitions do more harm than
good. Please don't forward them, and for
heaven's sake don't start them. Let me explain:
- You can't return email
petitions even if you wanted to. Once someone
starts an email petition their mailbox gets filled up
with returned petitions immediately so anyone else trying
to return another one gets a bounce message. Then the
author's mail provider notices the ton of email hitting
their server and they turn off the author's email address
for breaking their rules about sending out chain letters.
Internet providers have these rules because chain letters
force them to deal with a swarm of incoming email which
slows down their email service for all their other
customers, and because of all the other reasons
below.
Since it's impossible to return signed email
petitions, none of the reasons below are even necessary
to make the point that you shouldn't forward them.
There's certainly lots more wrong with email petitions,
but given that a signed petition can't be returned, what
more reason do you need?
- The author can't process the
signatures. Even if you could get the signed
petitions back to the author, the author won't have the
skills to process the thousands of messages, clean up the
data, and remove all the duplicates. I know this because
doing so requires a fair bit of programming prowess and a
good chunk of time, and anyone who has the necessary
programming skills knows better than to send out
petitions via email.
- Email petitions can't be
recalled. Once an email petition starts,
there's no way to stop it, and it keeps getting forwarded
all over the planet for years after the issue it
addresses has expired. In fact, most of the email
petitions I receive are for issues that were dead years
ago. 99% of petition authors don't bother to put any
expiration date in their petitions, but even when a
petition comes with an expiration date some genius will
take it upon themselves to remove the date and then
forward the petition again. Obviously, circulating a dead
petition is just a waste of time. Read the Cautionary
Tale article below for more on this.
- Email petitions don't
work. Nobody in any position of authority is
impressed by a 100% unverifiable list of names. To my
knowledge, the number of victories that have been won by
virtue of an email petition is zero.
- Real petitions have
websites. A real petition has a website with
current news about the issue in question, and a
place to sign the petition on the web.
Web petitions overcome all the problems of email
petitions: Nobody's email server gets overloaded, the
website doesn't die because of a dead email address,
signers can get an assurance that the issue is still
current or proof that it's expired, the signers' email
addresses can be verified which increases credibility,
and signers can optionally get a newsletter to keep
apprised of the status of the issue.
Here's my summarized advice for
dealing with email petitions.
- Don't forward them.
- Ignore all email petitions & chain letters
about the following. These are all outdated, or
contain bad return addresses, or were just
unsubstantiated rumors to begin with:
- NPR/PBS funding
- Brazilian Rainforest
- French Nuclear Testing
- Congress supposedly wants to tax email or Internet
access
- Microsoft email test will bring you money
- Some charitable organization somehow gets money
donated when you forward the email (people actually
believe this stuff?)
- If you're certain that the petition is valid, then
absolutely verify its
validity yourself by writing to the author
first. (That's the person who started the
petition, not the person who forwarded it to you. This
person's email address will be listed as the address to
send petitions back to. Probably, that address will be
dead by the time you see the petition. In the rare event
that the email address is still good, and the rarer event
that you receive a response, you may learn that the issue
that petition addresses expired years ago, or was just an
unsubstantiated rumor in the first place.) If the
author's address isn't listed or you don't hear back,
then absolutely don't forward it. Even if everything
checks out, consider not forwarding it anyway -- because
even if it works today, it may not work tomorrow -- or
two, three, seven years from now, when the petition is
still bouncing around the net.
- Don't forward a petition which is supposed to be
returned directly to the target of the petition
(e.g., a petition that wants you to mail it back to, say,
the White House). Clogging the recipient's email with
thousands of messages is not likely to endear them to
your cause. It also makes their incoming email-box
useless, because they have to wade through gazillions of
worthless petitions (most of which will contain the same
names), preventing them from getting to the LEGITIMATE
mail that people are trying to send them. Won't they just
love you for that?
- Be extra skeptical of petitions which have no
expiration date.
- Instead of starting an email petition, let people
sign it on the web. (You can do this free at
ThePetitionSite.com.)
This way you retain control of the petition, since
everyone will be going to the one, same place for
petition info -- there won't be millions of copies of it
flying around the net for years to come. You'll also be
able to put up a notice when the issue you're addressing
becomes obsolete. Your email plea will simply direct
people to go to the website to sign. Make sure you
include an expiration date in that email you send
out.
Check out the article below for more. Happy webbing.
:)
-- Michael Bluejay
P.S. Check out this humorous
anti-chain letter.
P.P.S. Heidi Allen explains why
email petitions mushroom out of control, and the authors
are unable to process the signatures.
-
The Case of the
Pointless Petition
- from about.com
| Dateline: 05/27/98
-
- I have a cautionary tale to share with you
today.
-
- Once upon a time -- back in 1995, to be exact -- two
well-meaning but naive young students at the University
of Northern Colorado decided to express their concern
over cuts in federal funding for the arts by starting an
email petition.
-
- In their earnest Internet opus, they cited facts and
figures concerning the costs of keeping the Public
Broadcasting System and National Public Radio in
business, raised the specter of Republican threats to cut
funding for these programs, and asked recipients to
"sign" by appending their names before forwarding the
document off to everyone they know.
-
- To make sure the petition got the attention it was
due, they devised a very clever hook: it was launched
with the provocative title, "SAVE SESAME STREET!"
-
- The authors were savvy enough to know that no
right-minded American citizen would stand idly by as Bert
and Ernie were condemned to sleep with the fishes.
-
- Unfortunately, several things were wrong with the
whole idea:
-
- First, no one in any position of authority takes
email petitions seriously. Electronic signatures are
meaningless, no matter how many hundreds of thousands are
collected.
-
- Second, Sesame Street was never in danger of
cancellation, not even if PBS had been on its last legs.
The petition was sent out under false pretenses.
-
- Third, the University of Northern Colorado was not
pleased to find its email system deluged with responses
to the students' unauthorized mailing.
-
- And finally, there was one little technical problem
the students hadn't foreseen: there was no way to recall
the petition once its purpose had been served.
-
- Fast-forward to 1998, three years later. The students
have long since been reprimanded for their ill-conceived
actions (one even left the University, allegedly as a
result of the fiasco). They and officials of the
University have issued repeated pleas for mailings of the
petition to halt. And, lo and behold, their misbegotten
brainchild remains in wide, constant circulation to this
very day, all across the Internet and around the
world.
-
- Chastened, humbled, repentant, one of the petition's
authors issued this plea less than a year after its
launch:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
****UPDATE FOR PBS/NEA/NPR PETITION****
To all receivers of this petition,
It has come to our attention, due to the overwhelming support
of these programs, the movement to cut the funding for the
NEA, NPR, and PBS has been dropped. To repeat, thanks to your
support of these programs, the danger of losing these programs
has passed!!
Unfortunately, the due date for this petition was deleted on
most or all of these copies and the petition is still
circulating. ***** PLEASE DELETE ALL COPIES OF THE CIRCULATING
PETITION!!!***** We greatly apologize for any inconvienence
concerning this effort but MUST ASK FOR THE PETITIONS TO BE
DELETED!!! The overwhelming support we have received has kept
us going, but the fight has been won and we thank you all!
-Sincerely,
The authors of the petition
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
- Woe unto the authors of the petition; they had set a
juggernaut into motion.
-
- Various versions of the text remain enshrined on
Websites everywhere. It is reposted frequently to Usenet
forums and continues to be replicated daily by hundreds,
perhaps thousands of well-meaning email recipients.
-
- And every copy with its long list of names that finds
its way home to the University of Northern Colorado's
mail server is immediately and unceremoniously
deleted.
-
- So much for everyone's good deed of the day.
-
- From the Information Services office of the
University of Northern Colorado:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 1998 15:16:01 -0700 (MST)
Subject: Re: Petition from univnorthco
The petition you received from wein2688 concerning funding for
PBS was initiated over 2 years ago by 2 freshman here who had
good intentions but poor methodology. Electronic signatures
are virtually useless.
One of the students, wein2688, left the school after 1
semester because the reaction to this "junk mail" was so
adverse. And for more than 2 years we have been trying to slay
this beast. It just refuses to die. Please help use to kill
this thing by NOT sending it to anyone anywhere Just delete
it. If you do want to help PBS, contact the local PBS station
or write to your congressman to voice your concerns.
Dutch Mulhern
Information Services
University of Northern Colorado
End of cautionary tale.
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