Perfect email footer



  • An email that came in earlier today had the following footer:

    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments. Thank you.

    I'm trying to figure out the do not read part. Of course, the FUNNY part of the whole thing is that I actually wasn't the intended recipient for the email. Not sure who it was for, but it wasn't supposed to go to me or anyone else in my company. I went ahead and notified the sender, but still...



  • @clively said:

    An email that came in earlier today had the following footer:

    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments. Thank you.

    I'm trying to figure out the do not read part. Of course, the FUNNY part of the whole thing is that I actually wasn't the intended recipient for the email. Not sure who it was for, but it wasn't supposed to go to me or anyone else in my company. I went ahead and notified the sender, but still...

    I was getting voicemails for a while from some legal firm that were intended for someone else. They all started: "This message is for Miss Bladiblah and contains Confidential Legal Information. If you are not Miss Bladiblah, please stop listening to this message immediately." After the third or fourth voicemail, eventually I called them back so I could tell them I've never heard of Miss Bladiblah and they should stop filling up my mailbox with someone else's Confidential Legal Information. And no, I didn't listen to the message.

  • Considered Harmful

    By reading this email, you consent to XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP (henceforth, XYZA) withdrawing a sum not exceed $1,000,000.00 from your personal and/or checking accounts. You furthermore agree to indemnify and hold harmless XYZA and its subsidiaries, affiliates, licensees, et al.



  • @clively said:

    I'm trying to figure out the do not read part.

    It doesn't need to make sense as those little disclaimer notes are completely useless legally, but as most people are dumb they do accomplish some things (like getting you to mail back the sender).



  • @clively said:

    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments. Thank you.
    It gets worse.  My former employer attached a disclaimer like that to each and every e-mail which also claimed copyright on the contents of the email, any attachments, and the disclaimer itself.

    Then repeated the whole mishigoss in French.



  • @da Doctah said:

    which also claimed copyright on the contents of the email

    I don't know if that is actually worse, it probably depends on your industry.  I mean claiming copyright is silly but compared with "confidential or privileged" information in an email?  I suppose if you are doing creative work then maybe, but if you are doing something like medical records?



  • @clively said:

    An email that came in earlier today had the following footer:

    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments. Thank you.

    I see that a lot when people send me email from their work email account. It seems to be standard boilerplate that everyone is inserting into emails these days. Sort of funny when the email is jokes and/or other NSFW content. @da Doctah said:
    It gets worse.  My former employer attached a disclaimer like that to each and every e-mail which also claimed copyright on the contents of the email, any attachments, and the disclaimer itself.

    Then repeated the whole mishigoss in French.

    French is TRWTF, of course.


     

    ** mishigoss appears to be a commonly used phonetic spelling of meshugas


     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    @da Doctah said:

    It gets worse.  My former employer attached a disclaimer like that to each and every e-mail which also claimed copyright on the contents of the email, any attachments, and the disclaimer itself.

    Then repeated the whole mishigoss in French.

    French is TRWTF, of course.
    In this context, yes. Hindi might have been more helpful.


     



  • @mikeTheLiar said:

    was getting voicemails for a while from some legal firm that were intended for someone else. They all started: "This message is for Miss Bladiblah and contains Confidential Legal Information. If you are not Miss Bladiblah, please stop listening to this message immediately."
    At least you had a message to listen to.  Someone at a local county government office apparently programmed the wrong number into their fax machine.  Every day at exactly 1:00pm I got a phone call from them.  It took almost 2 weeks for them to figure out what they were doing wrong.  Fortunately, most of the time I wasn't in and  just had some fax screeching on my voice mail.



  • @El_Heffe said:

    @mikeTheLiar said:

    was getting voicemails for a while from some legal firm that were intended for someone else. They all started: "This message is for Miss Bladiblah and contains Confidential Legal Information. If you are not Miss Bladiblah, please stop listening to this message immediately."
    At least you had a message to listen to.  Someone at a local county government office apparently programmed the wrong number into their fax machine.  Every day at exactly 1:00pm I got a phone call from them.  It took almost 2 weeks for them to figure out what they were doing wrong.  Fortunately, most of the time I wasn't in and  just had some fax screeching on my voice mail.

    I need to learn dialup and fax so I can listen in on pictures.



  • I hear that junk faxes can be quite profitable if you bother taking it to court. Like tens of bucks per page. With an optional multiplier if it is intentional.



  • @Ben L. said:

    I need to learn dialup and fax so I can listen in on pictures.
    I don't think anyone is faxing porn.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @joe.edwards said:

    By reading this email, you consent to XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP (henceforth, XYZA) withdrawing a sum not exceed $1,000,000.00 from your personal and/or checking accounts. You furthermore agree to indemnify and hold harmless XYZA and its subsidiaries, affiliates, licensees, et al.
    Somewhat akin to the stunt that Network Solutions (hereinafter referred to as Notwork Problems) pulled the other day, and had to backtrack to make it opt-in due to adverse publicity?



  • @mikeTheLiar said:

    Voicemail

    TRWTF.

    Actually, that's not fair. TRWTF is leaving contact details (specifically phone numbers) by voicemail, since what you actually end up listening to is a garbled signal such as "Please call us back on 07derpderpderp7, so that I can do such and such." No. Email me the phone number or resign yourself to a life of never hearing from me again. The same pretty much applies to phone calls, with the added bonus of not being able to listen to the voice again.

    This tangent was brought to you by dividing a sinusoid by a cosine.

    To improve security in the post, do not read the above unless you're supposed to.



  • Here's an email footer that I've used in the past:

    -------------------

    NOTICE: Don't even think about looking at this mail if after you've started reading it you figure that:

    A. It wasn't for you
    B. You're not supposed to be reading it
    C. You don't even know what it says but think it might be something you're not supposed to see
    D. You're planning on running for office someday and are afraid this e-mail trail might come back to haunt you

    If you've already looked at it and one of the previous conditions apply then just LOOK AWAY and close it. FORGET WHAT IT SAID. JUST FORGET IT. Pretend you didn't even see it and in fact, by now you should be asking "Saw what? I don't even know what you're talking about!"

    In the event that you did read it and can't forget it, call your mother immediately and tell her what you've done. BUT DON'T TELL HER WHAT YOU'VE READ! Now you've really gone and done it. OK, now you've got to send her an e-mail with these instructions.

    BUT NOT THE E-MAIL YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE READ! Holy cow are you stupid. Look, maybe it's just better if you didn't have access to e-mail.

    OK, so now just forget what you saw, turn off the computer and leave it off for a few months. Unless you obsess over this really insignificant confidential disclosure you just read (really, it was nothing, that whole thing about the money and the smuggling and the botched coup was nothing) and are racked by guilt so that you can't quit replaying it over and over and over in your mind, then you should have totally forgotten it by the time you turn your computer back on. Just don't start trying to catch up with your e-mails when you turn it back on and read this really meaningless message AGAIN.


  • Trolleybus Mechanic

    @da Doctah said:

    It gets worse.  My former employer attached a disclaimer like that to each and every e-mail which also claimed copyright on the contents of the email, any attachments, and the disclaimer itself.
     

    1) Send them a paragraph of text that you own a copyright to.

    2) When they reply, they will quote your text and claim copyright over it.

    3) Sue them. This is Copyright, serious business that should invovle the FBI, guns, company-ruining fines and jail time longer than the projected age of the Universe!



  • @Shoreline said:

    @mikeTheLiar said:
    Voicemail

    TRWTF.

    Actually, that's not fair. TRWTF is leaving contact details (specifically phone numbers) by voicemail, since what you actually end up listening to is a garbled signal such as "Please call us back on 07derpderpderp7, so that I can do such and such."

    TRWTF is that in the year 2014 we still can't produce cellphones or vocie mail systems that don't sound like garbage.

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".

     

    OK. I'm exaggerating.  Most of them aren't that clear.

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    @Shoreline said:

    @mikeTheLiar said:
    Voicemail

    TRWTF.

    Actually, that's not fair. TRWTF is leaving contact details (specifically phone numbers) by voicemail, since what you actually end up listening to is a garbled signal such as "Please call us back on 07derpderpderp7, so that I can do such and such."

    TRWTF is that in the year 2014 we still can't produce cellphones or vocie mail systems that don't sound like garbage.

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".

     

    OK. I'm exaggerating.  Most of them aren't that clear.

     

     

    legacy issues: the original phone line spec has a bandwith of 3.3kH which was considered good enough for speach, and they can't upgrade that to anyreasonable level now that all hardware cuts off at that

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".
     

    Cthulhu left you a voicemail.



  • @mikeTheLiar said:

    And no, I didn't listen to the message.

    Liar!



  •  Just reply with an invoice for your proofreading services, together with an email footer which states that sending messages to your address constitutes a contract for said services.

     



  • @dhromed said:

    @El_Heffe said:

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".
     

    Cthulhu left you a voicemail.

    Bravo!

     



  • @dhromed said:

    @El_Heffe said:

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".
     

    Cthulhu left you a voicemail.

    You just made my day!

    In complex analysis, a meromorphic function on an open subset D of the complex plane is a function that is holomorphic on all D except a set of isolated points

    Now you're bringing me back 25 years...



  • @El_Heffe said:

    Voice mail beings with "This is glurgglurgglurgglurggarble" continues on for 3 or 4 minutes with "glurgglurgglurgglurggarble garblegarblegarblegarblegar blegarblegarblegarblega rblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarblegarble" and finally ends with their phone number that sounds like "derpderpderpglurflart7".

    My favorites are the ones left by automated systems that start speaking as soon as the call is answered, with no provision for the possibility that the other end of the call may be a voicemail system that hasn't started recording yet:
    847 [or "glurflart7"]. It is extremely important that you call us immediately, or <personal, financial or world disaster> will happen. Thank you.
    Bonus points because the calling number was blocked. Something terrible will (allegedly) happen if I don't return the call, but I don't know who called, why, or what number I'm supposed to call.



  • @Planar said:

    In complex analysis, a meromorphic function on an open subset D of the complex plane is a function that is holomorphic on all D except a set of isolated points

    Now you're bringing me back 25 years...

     

    It was the opening phrase for meromorphic functions, and I had to open a new wiki tab for every word in that sentence, except words like "the" and "in" and "all".

    Lesson learned: Do not follow enthusiastic math majors on tumblr.

    Or maybe do.



  • The point of the email footer is not to actually prevent the reader from doing anything. Nobody gives a fuck and it's too late for that anyway.The point is to make sure that a year or two down the road, if there is litigation where the contents of the email are relevant, the person who got the email by mistake can't bring it into court over the objection of the person who sent it because that recipient has disregarded the explicit wishes of the person sending and does not have permission to read it.

    See the way it works is that if someone sends you an email, you "own" it and can do whatever you want with it. Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise. It's not a binding contract as to what you can DO with the email, it's statement of intent as to who the sender actually wanted to get the email and what permission they wanted them to have with it.



  • @clively said:


    I'm trying to figure out the do not read part. Of course, the FUNNY part of the whole thing is that I actually wasn't the intended recipient for the email. Not sure who it was for, but it wasn't supposed to go to me or anyone else in my company. I went ahead and notified the sender...

     

    ...who was a nigerian spam group that now know that you are actively using your mail-address. Have fun being spammed to death.s

     


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Snooder said:

    See the way it works is that if someone sends you an email, you "own" it and can do whatever you want with it. Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise.

    How'd that work out for the cue:cat people?



  • @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:
    See the way it works is that if someone sends you an email, you "own" it and can do whatever you want with it. Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise.

    How'd that work out for the cue:cat people?



    What does a failed QR code predecessor have to do with the use of email as evidence in litigation?


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Snooder said:

    @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:
    See the way it works is that if someone sends you an email, you "own" it and can do whatever you want with it. Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise.

    How'd that work out for the cue:cat people?



    What does a failed QR code predecessor have to do with the use of email as evidence in litigation?

    Stuff that's mailed to you unsolicited is yours. The sender has no control over what you do with it. Just as the Cuecat people couldn't legally stop anyone from disabling the tracking feature on the scanner, "Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise" carries no weight as a modifier to the previous sentence.



  • @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:

    @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:
    See the way it works is that if someone sends you an email, you "own" it and can do whatever you want with it. Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise.

    How'd that work out for the cue:cat people?



    What does a failed QR code predecessor have to do with the use of email as evidence in litigation?

    Stuff that's mailed to you unsolicited is yours. The sender has no control over what you do with it. Just as the Cuecat people couldn't legally stop anyone from disabling the tracking feature on the scanner, "Unless it's very explicitly stated otherwise" carries no weight as a modifier to the previous sentence.



    It does in the very specific context of admissible evidence at trial.

    See, here's how it would go.
    Lawyer A: "Your Honor, Plaintiff would like to enter into evidence as Exhibit A an email from Dastardly Corp CEO to the General Counsel detailing how they plan to screw my client out of millions."
    Lawyer B: "Objection, the email is privileged. Plaintiff is neither a party to the communication, nor had permission to access that email, as per the email footer."
    Judge: "Sustained. The email is struck from the record."

    Nobody cares if the Plaintiff used the email to wipe his ass, make a paper airplane or buy a hot stock tip. The point of asserting privilege is to prevent him from bringing it into court.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Snooder said:



    It does in the very specific context of admissible evidence at trial.

    See, here's how it would go.
    Lawyer A: "Your Honor, Plaintiff would like to enter into evidence as Exhibit A an email from Dastardly Corp CEO to the General Counsel detailing how they plan to screw my client out of millions."
    Lawyer B: "Objection, the email is privileged. Plaintiff is neither a party to the communication, nor had permission to access that email, as per the email footer."
    Judge: "Sustained. The email is struck from the record."

    Nobody cares if the Plaintiff used the email to wipe his ass, make a paper airplane or buy a hot stock tip. The point of asserting privilege is to prevent him from bringing it into court.

    News to me. Has this actually happened yet? "Judge, I've got the printout right in my hand. It's not my fault they didn't mean to send it to me.



  • @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:


    It does in the very specific context of admissible evidence at trial.

    See, here's how it would go.
    Lawyer A: "Your Honor, Plaintiff would like to enter into evidence as Exhibit A an email from Dastardly Corp CEO to the General Counsel detailing how they plan to screw my client out of millions."
    Lawyer B: "Objection, the email is privileged. Plaintiff is neither a party to the communication, nor had permission to access that email, as per the email footer."
    Judge: "Sustained. The email is struck from the record."

    Nobody cares if the Plaintiff used the email to wipe his ass, make a paper airplane or buy a hot stock tip. The point of asserting privilege is to prevent him from bringing it into court.

    News to me. Has this actually happened yet? "Judge, I've got the printout right in my hand. It's not my fault they didn't mean to send it to me.



    Yes, it has. I remember reading a case for Evidence where the plaintiff was a customer who got hit by a plastic deer at some wal-mart style grocery superstore. At some point in the case, the lawyer for the store sent an email to the manager detailing how they knew that the deer falling was probably their fault, but as long as everyone kept their mouths shut, they'd still end up winning the case. And it would be cheaper to fight this one case than pay out a bunch of lawsuits. Since this was in the middle of trial, there had been some communication with the other side and the email got cc'd by mistake directly to the plaintiff's lawyers. I can't remember who won that evidence fight, I think the plaintiff did. But yeah, it's a real thing.

    Of course, due to the way discovery works you usually don't have that sort of dramatic showing right in court. More likely the objection would come in the form of a motion to exclude evidence filed by the defendant months before the trial. Which would mean that even though everybody knows that the email exists, nobody would be allowed to so much as allude to it near a jury. Frankly, if it got all the way to trial and the plaintiff whipped out a smoking gun email like that without telling anyone first, the judge would probably rule the trial as a mistrial and may even (if he's REALLY pissed) assess costs against the plaintiff for wasting everyone's time.

     



  • Interestingly, one of the cases on this issue: Monotype v International Typeface, http://openjurist.org/43/f3d/443/monotype-corporation-plc-v-international-typeface-corporation-international-typeface-corporation sheds light on something I've always wondered about the fonts included in Microsoft Office. Apparently, the reason that Office has the font packs that it does is because Microsoft were too cheap to pay royalties for the standard fonts, so they had to pay for some knock-offs.



  • @FrostCat said:

    @Snooder said:


    It does in the very specific context of admissible evidence at trial.

    See, here's how it would go.
    Lawyer A: "Your Honor, Plaintiff would like to enter into evidence as Exhibit A an email from Dastardly Corp CEO to the General Counsel detailing how they plan to screw my client out of millions."
    Lawyer B: "Objection, the email is privileged. Plaintiff is neither a party to the communication, nor had permission to access that email, as per the email footer."
    Judge: "Sustained. The email is struck from the record."

    Nobody cares if the Plaintiff used the email to wipe his ass, make a paper airplane or buy a hot stock tip. The point of asserting privilege is to prevent him from bringing it into court.

    News to me. Has this actually happened yet? "Judge, I've got the printout right in my hand. It's not my fault they didn't mean to send it to me.


    Hopefully not after he's wiped his ass with it. "Judge, I've got the printout right in my hand, and it stinks."



  • Just to throw another one in, my father is in a managerial position at $corporation, and all the email correspondence from him ends with the following:

    CONFIDENTIALITY This e-mail message and any attachments thereto, is intended only for use by the addressee(s) named herein and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail message, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail message, and any attachments thereto, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this e-mail message in error, please immediately notify the sender and permanently delete the original and any copies of this email and any prints thereof. ABSENT AN EXPRESS STATEMENT TO THE CONTRARY HEREINABOVE, THIS E-MAIL IS NOT INTENDED AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR A WRITING. Notwithstanding the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act or the applicability of any other law of similar substance and effect, absent an express statement to the contrary hereinabove, this e-mail message its contents, and any attachments hereto are not intended to represent an offer or acceptance to enter into a contract and are not otherwise intended to bind the sender, $corporation (or any of its subsidiaries), or any other person or entity.

    I didn't even know "hereinabove" is a word.


  • BINNED

    @Snooder said:

    The point of asserting privilege is to prevent him from bringing it into court.

    @Snooder said:

    I remember reading a case for Evidence where the plaintiff was a customer who got hit by a plastic deer at some wal-mart style grocery superstore. At some point in the case, the lawyer for the store sent an email to the manager detailing how they knew that the deer falling was probably their fault, but as long as everyone kept their mouths shut, they'd still end up winning the case. And it would be cheaper to fight this one case than pay out a bunch of lawsuits. Since this was in the middle of trial, there had been some communication with the other side and the email got cc'd by mistake directly to the plaintiff's lawyers. I can't remember who won that evidence fight, I think the plaintiff did. But yeah, it's a real thing.

    So the disclaimer doesn't actually work, which isn't surprising. If you could put language in emails that somehow is magically binding on people you don't know and have never met, why stop at permission to read the email?


    @better email footer said:
    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments send $100 to my PayPal account. Thank you.



  • @PedanticCurmudgeon said:

    @Snooder said:

    I remember reading a case for Evidence where the plaintiff was a customer who got hit by a plastic deer at some wal-mart style grocery superstore. At some point in the case, the lawyer for the store sent an email to the manager detailing how they knew that the deer falling was probably their fault, but as long as everyone kept their mouths shut, they'd still end up winning the case. And it would be cheaper to fight this one case than pay out a bunch of lawsuits. Since this was in the middle of trial, there had been some communication with the other side and the email got cc'd by mistake directly to the plaintiff's lawyers. I can't remember who won that evidence fight, I think the plaintiff did. But yeah, it's a real thing.

    So the disclaimer doesn't actually work, which isn't surprising.



    If I recall correctly, the plaintiff won precisely BECAUSE they didn't include a footer on the email. That's why I can't remember if the plaintiff won or not in that case, because there was a similar case where the person sending the email put in the footer and that saved their bacon. Can't remember if the plastic deer case was the winner or the loser. Hence why every law firm now splashes the things around on every single thing they send. Nobody wants to be that lawyer who got reamed in court because they forgot to add a footer to an email.

    @PedanticCurmudgeon said:

    If you could put language in emails that somehow is magically binding on people you don't know and have never met, why stop at permission to read the email?@better email footer said:
    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments send $100 to my PayPal account. Thank you.

    Because some statements are binding for some purposes and not for others. For example let's say you walk into a lawyer's office and say "Now, this conversation is privileged right? So you won't mention it to anyone else?" And he goes, "Sure no, problem." If he decides to blab about it to someone else, he'll get disbarred and nobody will be allowed to talk about conversation in court. But if you walk into the same lawyer's office and say "Hey, you're gonna pay me $1million dollars right?" and he goes, "Sure, no problem." you won't collect a goddamn dime.

     



  • A couple of years ago I recieved an e-mail without such a disclaimer and attatched was some one elses Tax Return from their accountant.  Just because we had the dame first/last name and simmilar email addresses (different domain names)

     In retrospect, does that mean I now "own" their tax return?  Can I claim their refund? 

     Worse, am I now liable for their penalites?  Suddenly feeling panicked.  Does this mean I can no longer run for office?


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @The Bytemaster said:

    Does this mean I can no longer run for office?
    Use an exercise bicycle instead.



  • @The Bytemaster said:

    A couple of years ago I recieved an e-mail without such a disclaimer and attatched was some one elses Tax Return from their accountant.  Just because we had the dame first/last name and simmilar email addresses (different domain names)

     In retrospect, does that mean I now "own" their tax return?  Can I claim their refund? 



    No, since ownership of a piece of paper is meaningless for whether you can claim a refund. What you can do is something like send it in to the paper and put out a full page ad showing just how much income the guy's getting. Or send it to his wife or something. Or if he's famous, sell it to TMZ. And the disclaimer probably wouldn't help prevent that.

    What it would help prevent is something like the following. Let's say you think that the guy was using your name in some identity theft scheme and you wanted to sue him for damages. The disclaimer would mean that you wouldn't be able to bring in the tax refund to show that he was collecting income from a business based on your name. Which you could do now that there's no disclaimer.

     


  • BINNED

    @Snooder said:

    @PedanticCurmudgeon said:

    If you could put language in emails that somehow is magically binding on
    people you don't know and have never met, why stop at permission to
    read the email?@better email footer said:
    This e-mail is from XXX YYY ZZZ & AAA LLP, a law firm, and may contain information that is confidential or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, copy or distribute the e-mail or any attachments. Instead, please notify the sender and delete the e-mail and any attachments send $100 to my PayPal account. Thank you.

    Because some statements are binding for some purposes and not for others. For example let's say you walk into a lawyer's office and say "Now, this conversation is privileged right? So you won't mention it to anyone else?" And he goes, "Sure no, problem." If he decides to blab about it to someone else, he'll get disbarred and nobody will be allowed to talk about conversation in court. But if you walk into the same lawyer's office and say "Hey, you're gonna pay me $1million dollars right?" and he goes, "Sure, no problem." you won't collect a goddamn dime.

    But we're not talking about a conversation where there's agreement between the two parties. We're talking about a paragraph at the bottom of an email message that is somehow magically binding on anyone who happens to see it, not just lawyers. You seem to be caught up in the specifics of the case you mention. I'm questioning the validity of the disclaimer in general.



  • @PedanticCurmudgeon said:

    But we're not talking about a conversation where there's agreement between the two parties. We're talking about a paragraph at the bottom of an email message that is somehow magically binding on anyone who happens to see it, not just lawyers. You seem to be caught up in the specifics of the case you mention. I'm questioning the validity of the disclaimer in general.


    And I'm telling you that the entire purpose of the disclaimer is the specific situation I'm referring to. It's not meant to be binding in general. It's just boilerplate that most lawyers slap on every email when there's a possibility that the email could wind up being relevant to a lawsuit sometime. Every single time you see one of these things, no matter what's actually in it, all it ever means is "hey, future judge, please don't let this shit get admitted as evidence." The lawyer who put it on there doesn't intend to force the person recieving it to do anything. He just wants to make it clear that the letter is either privileged or confidential, so it won't be useful as evidence.

    The reason there's all that "silly" language about "don't read or copy this" isn't to try to actually get the reader to go back and unread the damn thing. It's to signify a specific intent on the part of the sender and show that the person reading it didn't have permission to read it. Maybe there's a better way of wording it, but this has pretty much become the standard, and every lawyer and judge knows that it means. A lawyer who strays too far away from the customary language risks having a judge screw him on the evidentiary ruling at trial.

    I've been simplifying a lot of this stuff, but there's actually a really complex and somewhat arcane body of law concerning the admissibility of evidence. Part of that includes rules about when email can be brought in. The rules are similar to the rules for private conversations, or for printed letters/faxes, but for a variety of reasons (partly because email is just newer and partly because of technical reasons) there are small but significant differences. One of those differences is that it's much easier to accidentally waive privilege and confidentiality. That means that a conversation that would be kept out of court pretty much automatically if it was made in person or in hardcopy might get admitted into court if it's an email and someone made a slight mistake. So lawyers put that boilerplate on all their letters to keep from making a mistake that could be costly later on.


     


  • BINNED

    OK, that makes a lot more sense.


  • Considered Harmful

    @Snooder said:

    I've been simplifying a lot of this stuff, but there's actually a really complex and somewhat arcane body of law concerning the admissibility of evidence. Part of that includes rules about when email can be brought in. The rules are similar to the rules for private conversations, or for printed letters/faxes, but for a variety of reasons (partly because email is just newer and partly because of technical reasons) there are small but significant differences. One of those differences is that it's much easier to accidentally waive privilege and confidentiality. That means that a conversation that would be kept out of court pretty much automatically if it was made in person or in hardcopy might get admitted into court if it's an email and someone made a slight mistake.

    Now there's only for naïve individuals like myself to ponder why the laws are arranged in such a way to actively impede justice.

    If you admit guilt (other than directly to your lawyer, mental health professional, priest, etc) in a private conversation, and assuming no laws were broken in obtaining the record of that admission, why should that not be admissible evidence against you?



  • @joe.edwards said:

    @Snooder said:
    I've been simplifying a lot of this stuff, but there's actually a really complex and somewhat arcane body of law concerning the admissibility of evidence. Part of that includes rules about when email can be brought in. The rules are similar to the rules for private conversations, or for printed letters/faxes, but for a variety of reasons (partly because email is just newer and partly because of technical reasons) there are small but significant differences. One of those differences is that it's much easier to accidentally waive privilege and confidentiality. That means that a conversation that would be kept out of court pretty much automatically if it was made in person or in hardcopy might get admitted into court if it's an email and someone made a slight mistake.

    Now there's only for naïve individuals like myself to ponder why the laws are arranged in such a way to actively impede justice.

    If you admit guilt (other than directly to your lawyer, mental health professional, priest, etc) in a private conversation, and assuming no laws were broken in obtaining the record of that admission, why should that not be admissible evidence against you?

    Imagine the terrifying world where email admissions were considered sufficient evidence...



  • @joe.edwards said:

    Now there's only for naïve individuals like myself to ponder why the laws are arranged in such a way to actively impede justice.

    If you admit guilt (other than directly to your lawyer, mental health professional, priest, etc) in a private conversation, and assuming no laws were broken in obtaining the record of that admission, why should that not be admissible evidence against you?



    A) There are slightly different rules for civil suits and for criminal cases.
    B) When talking about privilege/confidentiality, those are exactly the types of conversations we are talking about.

    Really it boils down to trying to strike a balance between keeping people from being so paranoid that nobody can ever commit confidential information to email and preventing anyone from ever bringing useful evidence to trial. If it's too easy to assert privilege or confidentiality, then no plaintiff will ever win because all the evidence will always end up being excluded. But if it's too hard, then no lawyer would ever use email for anything.

     


  • Considered Harmful

    @Buttembly Coder said:

    @joe.edwards said:
    @Snooder said:
    I've been simplifying a lot of this stuff, but there's actually a really complex and somewhat arcane body of law concerning the admissibility of evidence. Part of that includes rules about when email can be brought in. The rules are similar to the rules for private conversations, or for printed letters/faxes, but for a variety of reasons (partly because email is just newer and partly because of technical reasons) there are small but significant differences. One of those differences is that it's much easier to accidentally waive privilege and confidentiality. That means that a conversation that would be kept out of court pretty much automatically if it was made in person or in hardcopy might get admitted into court if it's an email and someone made a slight mistake.

    Now there's only for naïve individuals like myself to ponder why the laws are arranged in such a way to actively impede justice.

    If you admit guilt (other than directly to your lawyer, mental health professional, priest, etc) in a private conversation, and assuming no laws were broken in obtaining the record of that admission, why should that not be admissible evidence against you?

    Imagine the terrifying world where email admissions were considered sufficient evidence...


    I didn't say sufficient evidence, I said admissible as evidence. It's then for the defendant's representation to argue the fallibility of and the lack of authentication inherent in the medium, and for the jury to weigh the plausibility of such an argument.



  • @joe.edwards said:

    I didn't say sufficient evidence, I said admissible as evidence. It's then for the defendant's representation to argue the fallibility of and the lack of authentication inherent in the medium, and for the jury to weigh the plausibility of such an argument.

    Fair enough about the wording. But that still provides a way that is far too easy to entrap or falsely accuse someone, and in this scenario, it also moves the burden of proof to the defendant, which is nominally against the "Innocent Until Proven Guilty" concept.



  •  Man, reading up on this stuff reminds me just how funny and weird case law can get. Check this out:

    Courts will often deem the privilege waived even if the disclosure was inadvertent. One of the most well-known inadvertent waiver cases involved a party’s rummaging through its adversary’s garbage over a period of two years to uncover evidence favorable to its case. Ruling that the privilege was waived, the court noted both that the party asserting the privilege had failed to render the documents unreadable and that the use of paper shredders was common.


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