1. Big companies dont do business via chain letter. Bill Gates is not giving you $1000, and Disney is not giving you a free vacation. There is no baby food company issuing class-action checks. You can relax; there is no need to pass it on just in case its true. Furthermore, just because someone said in the message, four generations back, that we checked it out and its legit, does not actually make it true.
2. There is no kidney theft ring in New Orleans. No one is waking up in a bathtub full of ice, even if a friend of a friend swears it happened to their cousin. If you are hellbent on believing the kidney-theft ring stories, please see:
http://urbanlegends.tqn.com/library/weekly/aa062997.htm
And I quote: The National Kidney Foundation has repeatedly issued requests for actual victims of organ thieves to come forward and tell their stories. None have. Thats none as in zero. Not even your friends cousin.
3. Neiman Marcus doesnt really sell a $200 cookie recipe. And even if they do, we all have it. And even if you dont, you can get a copy at:
http://www.bl.net/forwards/cookie.html
Then, if you make the recipe, decide the cookies are that awesome, feel free to pass the recipe on.
4. We all know all 500 ways to drive your roommates crazy, irritate co-workers, gross out bathroom stall neighbors and creep out people on an elevator. We also know exactly how many engineers, college students, Usenet posters and people from each and every world ethnicity it takes to change a lightbulb.
5. Even if the latest NASA rocket disaster(s) DID contain plutonium that went to particulate over the eastern seaboard, do you REALLY think this information would reach the public via an AOL chain-letter?
6. There is no Good Times virus. In fact, you should never, ever, ever forward any email containing any virus warning unless you first confirm it at an actual site of an actualcompany that actually deals with virii. Try:
http://www.norton.com/
And even then, dont forward it.
7. If your CC: list is regularly longer than the actual content of your message, youre probably going to Hell.
8. If youre using Outlook, IE, or Netscape to write email, turn off the HTML encoding. Those of us on Unix shells cant read it, and dont care enough to save the attachment and then view it with a web browser, since youre probably forwarding us a copy of the Neiman Marcus Cookie Recipe anyway.
9. If you still absolutely MUST forward that 10th-generation message from a friend, at least have the decency to trim the eight miles of headers showing everyone else whos received it over the last 6 months. It sure wouldnt hurt to get rid of all the > that begin each line. Besides, if it has gone around that many times – weve probably already seen it.
10.Craig Shergold in England is not dying of cancer or anything else at this time and would like everyone to stop sending him their business cards. He apparently is also no longer a little boy either.