Dear Emily:

In my history of religion class in college, I learned that many religions and societies follow something very much like the "Golden Rule." So, why do we have so many rules and policies holding us back on the computer? Why isn't the Golden Rule all we need? What happened to trust?

Free Bird    

Dear Free Bird:

The Golden Rule is certainly a good starting place to govern your computing behavior. However, "compute unto others as you would have others compute unto you" is not sufficient. Many people would be fine if that were the only rule; however, because different people have different amounts of knowledge about computing, more specific policies are needed to prevent knowledgeable, albeit unscrupulous, computer users from taking advantage of naïve users.

Also, because the widespread use of computers is a relatively new phenomenon, universities and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) need to be explicit about what they will and will not allow on their servers to help people learn about using a computer.

Finally, given that universities, ISPs and users all live in a society of laws, it is important for all network providers to have specific policies in place and to enforce those policies as a means of protecting everyone's rights.

Dear Emily:

Why do I get so much e-mail from people I don't know? Sometimes, it's like the whole world thinks I'd be interested in dirty pictures of celebrity multi-level marketers who want me to refinance my mortgage and sell me millions of e-mail addresses. It can take me hours to wade through it all.

Overwhelmed

Dear Overwhelmed:

Sounds like you have a bad case of Spam, for sure. Whatever you do, NEVER reply to unsolicited e-mail. Even if you respond to remove yourself from a mailing list, what you are actually doing is confirming for the marketer that your e-mail address is a valid one--ready to be used again!

Spam is the computer term for junk e-mail you receive. You receive it because people find it cheaper to send out sales material via e-mail than they do via postal mail. A marketer can make money if even a handful of people buy what they are selling.

And, just as telemarketers and bulk mail marketers sell each other phone numbers and mailing lists, e-marketers often sell mailing lists to one another. So, the first thing you can do to reduce the amount of Spam e-mail you receive is to reduce the number of times you give out your e-mail address to strangers and marketers.

If you buy things online through any online merchant, set up a "free e-mail" account through a service like yahoo.com or hotmail.com and use that e-mail address for any situation in which you need to provide a marketer with an e-mail address. Similarly, use that e-mail address any time you enter a contest or fill in an online survey.

You can also use filters in whatever e-mail program you use (or Procmail if you are still a UNIX Pine Mail user) to reduce the amount

of Spam you see. But, since the e-marketers are so adept at changing subject lines and senders' addresses, you may find it's not worth the effort trying to filter out the Spam.

If you want to have your e-mail address appear on a web page, make it more difficult for e-marketers to harvest your e-mail address by putting a link to your e-mail address on the web page rather than listing your e-mail explicitly. For example, rather than list johndoe@udel.edu on the page, use your name or a phrase like "Contact Us" or "Comments or Questions."

Dear Emily:

My boss keeps telling me I need to be more careful about how I reply to e-mail. Why is he so insistent about this? A reply is a reply is a reply, right?

Gertrude in Paris

Dear Gertrude:

Sounds like you need to learn when to reply only to the sender of a message and when to reply to everyone on a distribution list for a message.

Every e-mail program on the planet lets you choose whether you are replying to the sender only or are replying to all the recipients of a message. Think before you just click or choose reply. Pay attention to the situation and reply accordingly. Does everyone who received the original message need to see your reply? Then, select "Reply All" or "Reply to all recipients" or whatever your favorite e-mail program calls it. If not--and this is the more usual case--then choose "Reply" or "Reply to sender."

Oh, and another tip: When you do reply, take an extra minute to edit the message so that you quote only the relevant part of the message to which you are replying.

Dear Emily:

I am so embarrassed! I like sent this note to this really cute T.A. I had last semester because I thought he liked me. But, he gave me a C-minus for my final grade! When I complained that it wasn't fair, he posted my e-mail on the bulletin board next to his office. He took my name off the note and everything, but like I am so mortified. How can I get back at him?

C-minus  

Dear C-minus:

First off, remember, harassment in any media is still harassment. Do not use e-mail to harass him. Ask him politely to remove the note. It was rude to post it without your permission; however, any kind of vigilante action on your part will put you in the wrong--big time.

Second, it sounds like you just learned one of the first principles of using e-mail: Never send anything in e-mail that you wouldn't want your mom, boss or the readers of the local newspaper to see. E-mail is so easy to forward, print or save that, in many ways, an individual e-mail message can be more permanent than a written letter. Messages can very easily end up in places you didn't mean for them to.

Therefore, always keep a cool head when you send e-mail. Because you are not face-to-face with someone, it is often tempting to give vent to the full range of your anger. And, research into people's behavior since the dawn of the e-mail era shows that people tend to use harsher language when they type "face- to-screen" than when they discuss things face-to-face. Fight off that urge. Use some restraint, if not for politeness' sake, then to save yourself possible trouble later on.