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by John Rzasa   

   The Internet has become a large part of everyday life over the last decade. People like my roommate go in chat rooms and meet hook-ups, others buy pizza and groceries, and some, like my mom, just do e-mail. E-mail forwards have become the most humorous, yet at the same time, the most impersonal and annoying thing about having an Internet account.

   I recently conducted a survey on the subject of e-mail forwards. Although the survey was completely unscientific, I have found from the 87 people who responded to the 225 emails I sent that there are two types of personalities when it comes to forwards: the readers/senders and the delete- this- crap- I- don’t have- time- to- be- bothered- with- you people. From the responses to my survey, I found that everyone with e-mail has received and read an e-mail forward at some point. There are individuals though, that have become frustrated with overwhelmingly full inboxes and have taken to deleting half of their new mail before even opening it. They may never read another e-mail forward again.

   Some interesting proof that forwards are frequently deleted before being opened came about inadvertently when I first sent out my e-mail survey. I cut and pasted names from forwards I have received in the past into the ‘To:’ field  and put  “This is not a forward” on the subject line.  I didn’t get a single response. When I re-sent the survey under the subject line of “CCSU Internet research,” I received many responses – even from people to whom I had not originally sent the message. The respondents were not just from a little circle of friends and college students, but from people in insurance companies and law firms  from Hartford to Georgia, and  people in Italy. Apparently, any e-mail even containing the word ‘forward’ or ‘fwd’ will have a slim chance of being opened. At the same time, something that might be interesting or fun (like taking part in an easy-to-do research survey) sails across the Internet.

   I  can’t speak for the entire e-mail-reading population when I say that most people don’t like to be bothered with chain-mail type forwards, but I know that I get annoyed when the message asks that I pass it on. I don’t like to be bothered, so why should I bother other people? When I have sent messages like this, it’s usually to people who I don’t think will read it, so hopefully the chain will stop. Eventually it does.

   Like most of the people who completed my questionnaire, I am not superstitious, but I do admit to having forwarded e-mails occasionally. I have found that most frequently, people send out humorous or comical pieces of mail. Just behind that would be news or information, and lastly, people still forward those annoying “You’re my friend” e-mails and chain letters.

   Why? I would guess it’s because some people are at a computer all day long. When they get an e-mail it is an excuse to take a break and forward the message on to people. Maybe they don’t even consider that it might be annoying to the person who is going to receive it. Maybe people are superstitious, bored, or think they are doing the world a favor by not breaking the chain.