Posted by Shane Becker on
<p>Today I got an email from a recruiter who found my resume online. Typically, recruiters are pretty douchey, but this email was pretty good. Not too <em>used car salesman</em>. You know the type. But the part of the email that rubbed me wrong was the obligatory legalese non-sense footer. It goes like this:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This message contains information which may be confidential and privileged. Unless you are the addressee (or ized to receive for the addressee), you may not use, copy, re-transmit, or disclose to anyone the message or any information contained in the message. If you have received the message in error, please advise the sender by reply e-mail @[REDACTED].com, and delete the message. E-mail communication is highly susceptible to spoofing, spamming, and other tampering, some of which may be harmful to your computer. If you are concerned about the authenticity of the message or the source, please contact the sender directly.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Oh yeah, it was in 9pt Arial. Pretty tiny.</p>
<p>Here's the part that's bullshit, that a person / organization can try to presume that I have obligation to maintain some secrecy about the contents of a first email or any email without my express agreement. It's like a one way contract. It'd be like if I mailed you a lease saying that you owed me rent. And just because I said it was so, you would be obligated to mail me a check every month. Whatevers. Shenanigans.</p>
<p>On top of all that, there was absolutely no confidential or privileged information in this email. So many people are so uptight about their 'intellectual property' that no one else cares about.</p>
<p>(And, yes, I'm aware that it's probably enforced upon the employee from the employer to include this footer. I'm not blaming the dude. I'm just saying it's bullshit.)</p>