It is my dream to have only one email address for all my friends that is respected and safe from spam. My current email had been clean since 2006 and I would like it to stay that way.
I do not like nor have I had to use filters as I find that filters are not accurate – legit stuff is marked as spam and bad stuff isn’t. 80% accuracy is 20% too little for me. And the whitelist double verify creates 4x the work for us.
So in sharing my real email address I would love that everyone use the following respect and I promise that I will treat yours the same.
1) My email is private, for personal communication only.
2) My personal email is NOT at all for adding to any list, be it your own or otherwise. If you have a list you may invite me to your subscription page, and I can choose to enter my coded email myself. (I have a domain dedicated to subscriptions with which I use a system of a unique coded and dated email for each and every site. Yes it’s geeky and yes it works for me. If an address starts to get spam I know who got hacked and I can disable it.)
3) My personal email is not to be listed on any web site anywhere at any time, not even if it is HTML coded, imaged, hidden or in a private forum.
4) You will not ever find me at any social networking site using my personal email. It ticks me off that the sites encourage you to upload your entire database. I can be found usually by funDiva or name or email me yourself and ask me to friend you there. My current list is at the “Where’s funDiva” tab above
5) Personal communication does NOT include jokes, chain letters or biz opps. If you have monthly or weekly info that a group would be interested in, start a private blog and allow people to subscribe. Or learn the difference and utilize “BCC” BLIND Carbon Copy
6) I will never enter your email in a web form to invite you to something or qualify for a prize or bonus (me looking with raised eyebrow at Mark Joyner). If I feel something would be of interest, I will email you personally and tell you about it. If I have to enter 3 friends emails to get a prize, I make 3 up thru my system above. If there is no other option but their stupid web form for you to get credit, or they are doing one of those wanky 2.0 “exclusive invite” deals, I’ll make up an email and give it to you just for that.
7) Please use discretion in sharing my email with other people based on if you think they have the common sense to know everything listed above. I am happy to teach people how to BCC or if they are challenged or apathetic, I will make them a unique email so they don’t have to think about it.
I was new once too and it was only after years of trial and error that I live virtually spam free now.
FYI, while the title is a reference to Magnolia, for me it was more a second removed reference to Buffy “Respect the cruller. And tame the donut!” I rewatched Magnolia just for that line and had the same reaction as the first time – What the Barnacles?!?