Lawannounce wars
Law students are nothing if not hilariously, bat-shit crazy. Can I say that here? I guess we'll see. Anyway, at my school there is a listserv called LawAnnounce through which anyone can send any e-mail to everyone. It's pretty cool. You can advertise that you are selling books (I have bought many this way, and it's the best deal and much quicker than getting them online) or that you are taking a cab to the airport and are willing to share, etc. You can ask for the syllabus that you lost for a class. Very helpful.
But of course certain students don't like getting certain types of e-mails through this listserv, the latest enemy being book sales e-mails. And being law students (the aforementioned variety of crazy) they not only complain, but they analyze, debate, and attack the problem at length. Thereby creating more e-mails than the original book sales e-mails. I love my school and the crazy students and their crazy arguments, so I save them in a mail folder I like to call LawAnnounce Wars. There are many, many gems in this folder, but in the interest of space I will only post here the highlights of the most recent engagement, with certain parts *deleted* for internet privacy:
E-mail 1:
Hi folks,
Begging people not to sell books over lawannounce will not work, so I'd like to introduce you to Holmes.
If you've used Facebook/Youtube, you'll notice a "flag" button. Holmes is a flag button for Lawannounce allowing all users to police the list. It also helps lawannounce book sellers internalize the cost of selling books on lawannounce.
Here's how it works: Say someone emails Lawannounce with a book spam email, you can forward the email to Holmes and flag it as book spam. Holmes's spam engine checks whether the message is spam, and monitors how many people flag the message. Once 15 people flag the message, the lawannounce spammer will receive 60 email replies to their advertisement. Now the book seller feels the collective pain of those on the list who don't care about the book sale.
Holmes currently accepts 4 commands:
1. Test
2. Spam
3. Keep Holmes
4. Kill Holmes
To issue a command, you must forward a lawannounce email using your uchicago account to *e-mail address deleted by me*, and put the command word in the email body above the forwarded message by itself. See example below.
"Test" shows you that Holmes is working (try it right now! Forward this email to *e-mail address deleted by me* with Test in the body of the email). "Spam" flags a message as spam. If you like the idea of Holmes, issue the "Keep Holmes" command. "Kill Holmes" lets you vote to kill this whole experiment. Holmes will die if 40 people issue the Kill Holmes command, unless 82 people vote to Keep Holmes, in which case Kill Holmes must be half of Keep Holmes.
System is accepting votes to kill or keep right now, and starts monitoring the flagging of spam starting on Friday at 9am CST.
*lengthy FAQ section omitted by me*
E-mail 2, response to Holmes:
I, too, was unhappy with the allocation of rights in the world around me, so I'd like to introduce a system I call "Bazelon!"
In "Bazelon!," if you do anything that annoys me, I will come to your house with a golf club and wreck up the place, thereby forcing you to internalize my annoyance.
"Bazelon!" promises to be another great leap forward for the rule of law. I guess the alternative would have been to petition some kind of central authority to change the formal allocation of rights according to a societal consensus, but who needs that kind of leviathan in our lives.
E-mail 3, objection:
I don't think this conversation includes enough voices of women or Persons of
Color.
E-mail 4, response to e-mail 3:
Nice joke. I, too, find it hilarious when women and "Persons of Color" want to be heard -- It's always SO RIDICULOUS, right????
E-mail 5, response to several suggestions of starting another listserv:
In the event that this new list serve doesn't take (for the same reason the google docs hasn't really caught on), how about a compromise solution: a tagging system? If you are buying or selling a book, put BUYSELLBOOKS in the subject line. Then anyone who wants to opt out can simply filter any lawannounce email with BUYSELLBOOKS in the subject line directly into the trash. We can use this Holmes spamming device to enforce the tagging rule without actually preventing anyone from using lawannounce to sell books.
Thoughts?
Email 6, self-explanatory:
Registering opposition to a solution worked out in private involving
administration and only those interested in a minority view. (that
selling is bad and should be regulated)
E-mail 7, response to e-mail 6:
No one’s accusing selling of being bad, they’re just saying it should
have its own listserv instead of competing for space and attention on a
bigger listserv.
(You know -- come to think of it, doesn’t this raise monopolization and
antitrust issues?)
E-mail 8:
You people have entirely too much time on your hands. Please solve actual problems with this time. Thank you in advance.
E-mail 9:
*Name of writer of e-mail 8*, starting a comment with "you people" almost never goes well. See: *writer of e-mail 4's* response to what was likely a nonmalicious comment about the lack of minority/female voices on lawannounce re: books.
E-mail 10:
By "you people," he means Asians in the library talking on their cell phones.
E-mail 11:
That was the clear intent, thank you for clearing that up *writer of e-mail 10*.
Seriously though, if this isn't the epitome of "first world problem" I don't know what is. I sincerely hope this entire exchange is an elaborate joke that I will eventually be let in on. Now, if you don't mind, I will return to perusing cute videos of kittehs. IT'S MY SPRING BREAK TOO, PEOPLE.
E-mail 12:
E-mail 13:
Mr. *someone's last name*'s idea regarding tags and gmail filters sounds like a reasonable compromise, but the problem with compromises is that they leave us without an actual winner. I'm about an hour into the Ken Burns Civil War documentary, which gives me an idea. Clearly, trying to resolve this non-violently has failed. I say we head out the midway, divide the camps, and charge. Last group standing wins.
The End (not really, people are still responding but not with anything funny yet. And this history is really only the highlights, I left out all the boring but better-reasoned e-mails)
But of course certain students don't like getting certain types of e-mails through this listserv, the latest enemy being book sales e-mails. And being law students (the aforementioned variety of crazy) they not only complain, but they analyze, debate, and attack the problem at length. Thereby creating more e-mails than the original book sales e-mails. I love my school and the crazy students and their crazy arguments, so I save them in a mail folder I like to call LawAnnounce Wars. There are many, many gems in this folder, but in the interest of space I will only post here the highlights of the most recent engagement, with certain parts *deleted* for internet privacy:
E-mail 1:
Hi folks,
Begging people not to sell books over lawannounce will not work, so I'd like to introduce you to Holmes.
If you've used Facebook/Youtube, you'll notice a "flag" button. Holmes is a flag button for Lawannounce allowing all users to police the list. It also helps lawannounce book sellers internalize the cost of selling books on lawannounce.
Here's how it works: Say someone emails Lawannounce with a book spam email, you can forward the email to Holmes and flag it as book spam. Holmes's spam engine checks whether the message is spam, and monitors how many people flag the message. Once 15 people flag the message, the lawannounce spammer will receive 60 email replies to their advertisement. Now the book seller feels the collective pain of those on the list who don't care about the book sale.
Holmes currently accepts 4 commands:
1. Test
2. Spam
3. Keep Holmes
4. Kill Holmes
To issue a command, you must forward a lawannounce email using your uchicago account to *e-mail address deleted by me*, and put the command word in the email body above the forwarded message by itself. See example below.
"Test" shows you that Holmes is working (try it right now! Forward this email to *e-mail address deleted by me* with Test in the body of the email). "Spam" flags a message as spam. If you like the idea of Holmes, issue the "Keep Holmes" command. "Kill Holmes" lets you vote to kill this whole experiment. Holmes will die if 40 people issue the Kill Holmes command, unless 82 people vote to Keep Holmes, in which case Kill Holmes must be half of Keep Holmes.
System is accepting votes to kill or keep right now, and starts monitoring the flagging of spam starting on Friday at 9am CST.
*lengthy FAQ section omitted by me*
E-mail 2, response to Holmes:
I, too, was unhappy with the allocation of rights in the world around me, so I'd like to introduce a system I call "Bazelon!"
In "Bazelon!," if you do anything that annoys me, I will come to your house with a golf club and wreck up the place, thereby forcing you to internalize my annoyance.
"Bazelon!" promises to be another great leap forward for the rule of law. I guess the alternative would have been to petition some kind of central authority to change the formal allocation of rights according to a societal consensus, but who needs that kind of leviathan in our lives.
E-mail 3, objection:
I don't think this conversation includes enough voices of women or Persons of
Color.
E-mail 4, response to e-mail 3:
Nice joke. I, too, find it hilarious when women and "Persons of Color" want to be heard -- It's always SO RIDICULOUS, right????
E-mail 5, response to several suggestions of starting another listserv:
In the event that this new list serve doesn't take (for the same reason the google docs hasn't really caught on), how about a compromise solution: a tagging system? If you are buying or selling a book, put BUYSELLBOOKS in the subject line. Then anyone who wants to opt out can simply filter any lawannounce email with BUYSELLBOOKS in the subject line directly into the trash. We can use this Holmes spamming device to enforce the tagging rule without actually preventing anyone from using lawannounce to sell books.
Thoughts?
Email 6, self-explanatory:
Registering opposition to a solution worked out in private involving
administration and only those interested in a minority view. (that
selling is bad and should be regulated)
E-mail 7, response to e-mail 6:
No one’s accusing selling of being bad, they’re just saying it should
have its own listserv instead of competing for space and attention on a
bigger listserv.
(You know -- come to think of it, doesn’t this raise monopolization and
antitrust issues?)
E-mail 8:
You people have entirely too much time on your hands. Please solve actual problems with this time. Thank you in advance.
E-mail 9:
*Name of writer of e-mail 8*, starting a comment with "you people" almost never goes well. See: *writer of e-mail 4's* response to what was likely a nonmalicious comment about the lack of minority/female voices on lawannounce re: books.
E-mail 10:
By "you people," he means Asians in the library talking on their cell phones.
E-mail 11:
That was the clear intent, thank you for clearing that up *writer of e-mail 10*.
Seriously though, if this isn't the epitome of "first world problem" I don't know what is. I sincerely hope this entire exchange is an elaborate joke that I will eventually be let in on. Now, if you don't mind, I will return to perusing cute videos of kittehs. IT'S MY SPRING BREAK TOO, PEOPLE.
E-mail 12:
E-mail 13:
Mr. *someone's last name*'s idea regarding tags and gmail filters sounds like a reasonable compromise, but the problem with compromises is that they leave us without an actual winner. I'm about an hour into the Ken Burns Civil War documentary, which gives me an idea. Clearly, trying to resolve this non-violently has failed. I say we head out the midway, divide the camps, and charge. Last group standing wins.
The End (not really, people are still responding but not with anything funny yet. And this history is really only the highlights, I left out all the boring but better-reasoned e-mails)