Be careful with your sticky fingers!

We all have done it, at least once. And we all felt ashamed after it. Most of the time, we can shoot a 'sorry, wasn't for you' and survive the embarassment.

I am talking about sending an email (or an IM) to the wrong person. But sometimes that simple mistake can be a big BIG BIG 'Ooooops'.

For work related reasons, I have been the the recipient of some of those 'oops' --so let me help you avoid them. The most common cases are:

1. The careless reply: If a friend sends you an article or an event that is a link to a website, when you hit 'reply' CHECK OUT what email appears in the 'to' field. It is very common that websites have a 'send to a friend' tool under their articles or events that your friend might have used to send that link to you. So, even if it is a message from a friend with a link, the sender may be an email address originated by the site she was visiting. And when you hit 'reply' to anser your friend, the email is going to that original site and NOT to your friend.

2. The rushed FWD: you've received an email and by some reason you want to send it to someone else, making fun of the original message. But in a rush or because you are more used to, you have in fact hit 'reply' instead of 'fwd' and you have sent to the wrong wrong wrong person your funny coments. Another variant of this same problem is that you have hit fwd but you start writing a name in the 'to' field and the program has filled it for you with the wrong address and you have not noticed.

3. The wide inclusive 'ALL': You meant to answer to just one of the persons that received the original email, but you hit 'reply all' and you just let everyone know that 'Bobby is really pissing me off, is he an idiot or what'. Worst part of it, Bobby was actually in the list... ooops!

4. 'Quick fingers IM': here there are 2 possibilities. You may have too many contacts starting with the same letter (or even name) and you meant a msg for Rod and it went to Rob. Or, you meant to send Vic a msg about George, but because George is in your mind, you actually send it to George and not to Vic.

Again, this is not a problem when the msg is inocous. BUT, if you are making fun of someone, being mean about someone, confessing your deep feelings to someone or bitching badly about something, believe me, you want to check twice before sending things like:

' I wish they all rot in hell, bunch of selfish and insensitives machos' or

' Yeah, she has a great ass, is a pity is her only ass-et' or

' They have no idea how bad I am planning to sue them...' or

' I don't care if he is married, gay or a monk, I will stalk him until I get him' or

' These idiots think I am interested in their product'

And if you think I am exaggerating, I am not. These examples are just free versions of actual cases I have received. So once more, be careful... or I will actually start publishing the oops I receive everyday!