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A $1 Billion Email Gaffe
Jake writes in with the story behind an explosive NYTimes scoop last week. It seems that the Times's pharmaceutical industry reporter, Alex Berenson, scored a page-one blockbuster when he revealed that Eli Lilly was looking to reach a settlement with federal prosecutors over the company's alleged inappropriate marketing of anti-psychotic drug Zyprexa. A settlement figure of $1 billion was mentioned. This scoop dropped into Berenson's inbox when a lawyer for one of Lilly's retained firms mis-addressed an email to a colleague with the same last name as that of the Times reporter. Some online observers are speculating that auto-complete is to blame, but this has not been confirmed.
Update: 02/08 17:19 GMT by KD : Jake writes in with an update: it seems that while Berenson did receive a misdirected e-mail from Pepper Hamilton, that e-mail did not contain a detailed description of the status of the Eli Lilly settlement talks. Berenson got his story from other sources.
Update: 02/08 17:19 GMT by KD : Jake writes in with an update: it seems that while Berenson did receive a misdirected e-mail from Pepper Hamilton, that e-mail did not contain a detailed description of the status of the Eli Lilly settlement talks. Berenson got his story from other sources.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PEBKAC
Hi, I Boris. Hear fix bear, yes?
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I am planning on robbing the bank on Fifth and Elm. Do not alert the police. Meet me at the warehouse after.
captcha:overlook
Tired of that pesky work getting in the way of having fun? No problems, with our new email auto-complete, work will never be a problem again. Tired of looking competent. Too few opportunties to end your career over a simple typo? Problem solved with auto-complete. People will blame you the dumb user for making the smallest mistake at any time of the day or night and regardless of your workload. With auto-complete your career is guaranteed to end in the jiffiest of jiffies.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
I telnet to port 25 and type my emails into the server by hand. If I screw up, I have to start over. You pine users have it easy.
How do you manage to notice emails from the Times and folks sifting through all the offers for a larger penis and requests to temporarily hold funds for nigerian family members
Dudes, you should see the crazy shit I get.
Signed,
Pritchard Cheney
Thank you Mr. Cruise...
It's interesting how some people are suggesting using encryption. I wouldn't be surprised to see an email like this; "Dear Eli, attached is the encrypted document. Regards, Your laywer PS: the password is zomg!1billion"
IANAL, but I'm pretty sure that putting a notice at the bottom of a message creates a legally binding contract.
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Judging from your four-digit ID number, I am going to assume that you wrote that software yourself, so you still owe me. Unless your software passes the Turing test, in which case you are safe but your computer is going to gitmo.
Mod parent +1 Glib.
The unheated cells are the nice ones. The heated ones are in the same wing as the ones with "running water".
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
[Me autodialling]
Callee: Hello?
Me: Hey baby, it's Thursday. I've got the Tantric oil, buttplug, and Fischer-Price chainsaw ready. When are you heading over?
Callee: Ummm... How's your week going?
Me: Mom?
Every Thursday, like clockwork...
[Me autodialling]
Callee: Hello?
Me: Hey baby, it's Thursday. I've got the Tantric oil, buttplug, and Fischer-Price chainsaw ready. When are you heading over?
Callee: Ummm... How's your week going?
Me: Mom?
Every Thursday, like clockwork... Let's just hope one of those times she doesn't say "Oh, what the hell, I'll try anything once."
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
"Ah ahm a lahyah"
and a southern gentleman too.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I was the campus token conservative columnist. He was very flamboyantly gay. Our university email addresses were generated off of initials plus, since we had a catastrophic hash collision, one distinguishing digit which people botched quite frequently. He got my death threats, I got his love letters, and neither of us was very happy with the matter.
... [Ed: I think it is for you]
... you [Ed: I think this one is for you] ... you [Ed: No, read it more carefully] ... you [Ed: Ah, whoops, my apologies] ... you [Ed: No problem. Hey, FWIW, I think he was out of line]
We both maintained a pretty good sense of humor about it, though. These were typical, with the vile language excised:
FWD: You fascist
FWD: I want to
RE: FWD: I want to
RE: RE: FWD: I want to
RE: RE: RE: FWD: I want to
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
And the culprit is (most likely).... timecop. Smart enough to post AC, dumb enough to leave his user name in the url :p
Actually, they are absolutely watertight. Nothing you can do if you get one of those.
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