h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Something that irritates you that nobody else has noticed and when you point it out, it stops.

PP.

So annoying that.

So it seems.

PH - People who reply to an email with the entire conversation chain unnecessarily attached, or start a new conversation by 'replying' to an old convo email.

Or reply to an e-mail with a new mail and no hint as to what they are replying to.

PP>

I may be missing a point here, but if the entire conversation chain is attached to the email doesn't that mean you've also been keeping the conversation in your replies?

If the original conversation was with a different recipient, then perhaps the conversation is included for your reference...?

"People who reply to an email with the entire conversation chain unnecessarily attached, or start a new conversation by 'replying' to an old convo email."


A lot of times the program just does that by itself, without input from the human. Gmail seems especially prone, for some reason. So don't leap to any conclusions there.

often in a work situation, especially if you're in many locations, if you add someone to keep them in the loop, having the whole convo is useful.

What really gets my goat is "reply to all" - especially if it's just "thanks" or "I agree"

or when the subject moves on but the subject line isn't changed so you start discussing a meeting in January, and by the middle of may you're talking about a site visit Korea in June but the subject is
Re: re: re: re: re: Fw: re: re: 10th Jan - meeting in Istanbul

JUST STOP
(and since I moaned about this in a big meeting today I've suddenly been designated email communication specialist with a brief to make a presentation to the whole company about "effective email communication"

Surely you can configure your settings to include the original e-mail or not.

Whoops -

Go Sho!

You could write an entry on it while you're preparing the presentation.

Yes, it could be an automatic feature, as I often delete the superfluous bits, but they appear when someone replies.

On our old work e-mail system we had options to 'reply' 'reply with history' 'reply all' and 'reply all with history'. If you clicked 'reply' then all the previous correspondence was deleted.

At least they don't have the silly arrows, so you don't tend to get conversations like this anymore:

> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >The quick brown fox
> > > > > > jumped over the lazy
> > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >dog.

<BB<

I just got one of those yesterday with all the >>>>>> s

We have that option, too, Bluebottle "Reply", "Reply with history" and "Reply with history and attachments" - then the same for Reply All

I work for the NHS. Ours is cheap and basic. Reply or reply all. No choices about the history or attachments. The attachment will be there, but right the way down the bottom of the thread.

It gets proper difficult when someone replies to a complex e-mail several days later by sending a brand new virgin e-mail with no history.

PP.

Overuse of "Reply all" is frustrating, yes - but it's actually *not* using it, where appropriate, that annoys me more. It can end up with the same thing being explained to other people several times, unnecessarily - defeating the purpose of using email to communicate with a group of people in different places all at once.

The other problem is forwarding an email which is a whole string of conversations, expecting you to scroll down & pick out the small vital part you need to see (possibly including a lot you are meant to see!). Why can't they take time to copy & paste the info you need?

This is becoming a thread-within-a-thread. When Sho has written her entry , it will no doubt spark comments on a lot of other niggles people have.

don't hold your breath with that entry though - I have exams in June...

A few weeks ago I complained about having to phone the company that delivers my medication. Well, I had to phone them again today. I was told they'd tried to phone me on 1st May. As far as I can remember, I was in all day that day. The landline certainly didn't ring and there's nothing on voicemail on my mobile phone. (They usually leave a message if they can't get through to me that way.) Anyhow, I was told that the woman I spoke to couldn't arrange my delivery because I needed to speak to a neurology specialist. When I asked why, I was told that my medication had to be dispensed by one of the neurology team. There was nobody from that team available, so I have to wait around for them to call me back. It took all my self-control not to slam the phone down.

If there was any other way to get my medication, I'd go for it. As it is, I'm forced to wait for these people to do their job.

That hate is NOT petty.