I just received yet another unasked for newsletter by e-mail. It was from a company that has a product I think is pretty good
and the newsletter started with the following spiel from the vice president of marketing:
"Welcome to our fall issue of [newsletter name]. We hope you enjoyed every moment of summer as it swept by. On my morning
run last week, I felt the crisp air and was reminded that fall is well on its way.
As always, with a change of seasons comes fresh beginnings. As the school year starts, some of the excitement of a new year
still rubs off on us as adults. So when the leaves turn and the temperatures fall, we sometimes feel that we have a fresh
start in our worlds e-amil
[Company name] is excited to present a fresh perspective on [product name]. In this issue of [newsletter name], we will talk
about the new option for purchasing [product name] - as a hosted solution."
I quote all of this because it illustrates the kind of newsletter that companies like subscribing me to without asking. I
am totally pissed off with these involuntary subscriptions! It's bad enough to get more gunge in my inbox, but when that gunge
is irritating . . . well, it makes you want to hurt someone.
These newsletters almost never contain anything of value. They are almost always smug, chatty, self-congratulatory, irrelevant
and boring, boring, boring.
Even more aggravating are the newsletters that include, as this one did, explanations such as, "When you subscribe to the
[newsletter name], you can be assured that your e-mail address will not be sold to third parties by [company name]." Isn't
that nice of them?
