Email Disclaimers

[Tom Wilson]

On Fri, 2005-05-27 at 11:49, David Bandel wrote:
> Note:  IANAL!
> According to my understanding of the law, for one party (exception:
> the government of which you are a citizen or the country you are
> residing in) to impose a condition on another, there has to be some
> kind of relationship (normally contractual, and that contract is
> defined because there is "consideration").
> 
> In the case of you or anyone else receiving an e-mail not meant for
> them from a party you have no contractual relationship with, you are
> not enjoined from doing with the contents of the e-mail as you please.
>  That said, unless you're just mean, you probably wouldn't want to
> post embarrasing or otherwise sensitive information on a web page, but
> the author really could do nothing about it.
> 
> An e-mail should be thought of like a postcard.  anyone can read it. 
> You have no expectation of privacy whatsoever.   If you want a
> reasonable expectation of privacy, then you should encrypt the message
> using GPG, etc.
> 
> People that waste bandwidth with idiotic and useless disclaimers
> should be considered in the same category as spammers.
> 
> I welcome any thoughts/facts that would repute the above.
> 
> Ciao,
> 
> David A. Bandel

IANALE.  

That being said, I believe you are pretty right on about that David.  I
remember in my business law class I took someone asking a question about
those e-mail disclaimers.  The professor stated, though there was no
basis or precedent either way for the disclaimers that she knew of, in
her opinion she couldn't see them standing up in court. But then she
also said that advice was worth what we paid for it.  If we really
wanted to know, hire a lawyer.  I never did.  

Also, one thing I've noticed and I may be reading to much into this.  I
have a couple of friends who work for law firms.  The e-mails I get from
them that are sent from their work accounts never have a disclaimer on
them.  Most other e-mails I get from peoples work accounts all have
those silly disclaimers.  Maybe my friends at the law firms know
something the rest of don't.


Tom Wilson 
McSwain Carpets 
513.771.1400 x4433 
----- 
"In short, _N is Richardian if, and only if, _N is not Richardian."