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Outlook Plug-In Keeps Tone of Your Email In Check
Meshach writes "A new plug-in for Outlook will warn you if an email you are about to send is 'too emotional.' Basically the plug-in scans the email for emotions such as elation, humiliation, excitement and fear. A user can set how much emotion they want to allow in their messages and if exceeded the threshold a warning will pop up."
WARNING: Outlook detected the phrase "full on double rainbow" as a modifying adjective in your e-mail and would like to remind you that this dangerously exceeds your predetermined threshold for elation and happiness. Outlook suggests taking one step down the elation scale and changing the phrase "Dude, last night that hooker was full on double rainbow!" to "Dude, last night that hooker was titties!" Yes/No?
My work here is dung.
Years of research went into language analysis software for this plug-in before an intern stumbled on the genius idea of simply counting the exclamation marks.
We are Outlook. Lower your firewalls, and surrender your servers. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture will adapt to service ours. Resistance is futile.
Eudora had this 10 years ago (then called 'MoodWatch'). Good to see Microsoft keeping up...
Cool, now can they make a grammar checker?
I has had two much emails from grammar Natzi saying I can't write.
It sounds very useful for people with a reversed tact filter (http://www.mit.edu/~jcb/tact.html).
The king is dead. Long live the king!
Infuriate left and right
Has Microsoft announced a release date for the mood-altering-drug-dispensing expansion pack yet? Detecting emotions and eliminating them is the first step towards true friendship with our robot overlords.
"Roll for detect sarcasm."
/Seemed appropriate
So it's a politically correct plug-in? Um....
There are a number of mental conditions for which this might actually be quite useful. For example, users suffering from Bipolar Disorder (manic depression), Hypomania, Depression and others.
Non-Vulcan-like typing detected.
Good thing it's an Outlook comment. If it were for Slashdot, we might never see any comments posted!
"I'm afraid I can't let you send that, %USERNAME%."
*clicks send furiously*
"Look %USERNAME%, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over. "
It has been annoying me for some time
It has been upsetting me for some time
It has been troubling me for some time
and finally replaced with
It has been concerning me for some time
All these mean different things.
My ability to get an erection has been upsetting me for some time
My wife's laughter at this has been annoying me for some time
It all started after I clicked on a goatse image, which has been troubling me for some time
And the quality of the Viagra pills I have been buying cheap from Taiwan has been concerning me for some time
You can send emotions in email? And here all I've been using it for is text and the occasional file.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
TO MUCH INFORMATION
This should be on a need to know basis, and I do not need to know.
Ignorance is bliss.
With kind regards,
The voting public.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
This plug-in freezes your computer if detection "sue microsoft for monopole position" in your eMail occurs.
Rumor has it any mention of chair-throwing will cause your email to shut down for a 3-hour cooling off period.
That would explain why your spellcheck never ran.
Can it stop flying chairs?
You seem to be expressing a great deal of frustration. Might I suggest using an OS that isn't bug ridden and seriously flawed?
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
can I get something to spice up my bland daily work emails, with selectable characterizations?
Example: "There is an optional hot-spare that can be added to most of the redundant power supply for this blade enclosure. It is available for the 240 and 208 VAC version but not yet for the 480 three-phase. thanks very much...."
After spice-up, selecting Joe Pesci mode: "You cocksucker! You dumbFUCK! You piece of shit dumb FUCK! Dersa fucking goddam optional hot-spare can be added to most da redundant piece-of-shit power supplies for dis fucking piece-of-shit blade enclosure. Itsa available for da 240 and 208 VAC version but not yet for the 480 three-phase. I'll cut your balls off, you piece of shit fuck! fuck you very much!"
... in big corporations.
Which is all very well as long as we remember that a lie is more harmful than all the emotional stuff, angry ranting/reving, flaming, capitals and exclaimation marks in the world. And hiding a lie in rational sounding dialog is management 101 in most places.
I did remember reading about a Swedish woman who got caught by that one, she cried her heart out but none of her friends answered. Need better friends? No, just moodwatch. because the message contained "nu är jag helt slut" which is something like "now I'm completely exhausted" in Swedish but the word filter had a different interpretation...
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
How long before this algorithm is hacked and reverse engineered, and anyone can use an app to tell if your letter was written using this app or not? That way clearly you would be flagged as an unstable person who has to rely on an application to moderate your abundant hostility. Job application refused!
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
For people who keep caps lock on and type the entire message in the subject.
I can't let you do that, Dave.
Fuck! Computers start to fucking resemble a Vulcan on Valium!
-- which will undoubtedly be replaced by: "All computers are working fine."
"There follows a brief message from the Head Librarian for your urgent attention. It has been edited for tone and content by The lman Lux Automated Decency Filter. Message follows. Run. For God sake, run. Nowhere is safe. The Library has sealed itself. We can't oh they're here. Arg. Snarg. Snich. Message ends."
THIS IS JUST STUPIDS!!!!!11!1!!! /. plugin!?!?!?!?!?
I'm a well adjusted human being. Why would I want a damn plugin filtering my freaking mail based on a stupid algorithm made by some socially-impaired geek!??!?!?!
What's next, for gods sake?!?!?!?! A
A car plugin so I can only drive through mild mannered neighborhoods? A TV filter so I can only see nice shows?!?!
AHHHHAAHAHAHAHHHHHH
If this actually worked I can think of a few people that it might help. As rude and obnoxious some people's e-mails may be in tone often that tone reflects the kind of person or the mood of the person fairly accurately.
So if some of my psychotic customers were to suddenly start sending mellow polite e-mails I would definitely be suspicious at first. Then somewhat lost as I would not be able to gauge the true feeling behind the polite tone.
To me it is like putting o n an act - people who go about all smiles and pleasantries but are seething with anger in the inside are to my mind the worst to deal with. You never know where you stand with them.
I certainly don't condone raging, insane e-mail tone but using a tool to do the job instead of leaving it to the person with the tone problem to moderate their communication skills just doesn't seem like the right thing to do.
Those that think they need this plug-in probably really need other kinds of help! Lesson 1. Turn off the caps lock!
http://www.acetonestudio.com
Will it catch my Embarrassment when I send:
Forgot the attachment
Following a:
Please see attached
The reverse detection might be useful too: you are sounding too much like a equivocating manager type. You need to show more pathos, not less!
--
$tar -xvf
Aperture Science Excessive Emotion Detection program has detected excessive amounts of optimism in your post. Due to this unwanted effect an Aperture Science Optimism Removal Helper has been dispatched to assist with with removing excessive optimism removal via depressing painting, sad music and lobotomy. Have a nice day ^_^
This reminds me of a story I once wrote about Microsoft adding a filter to Outlook so emails that were too dumb were not put in your inbox, sort of like a spam filter. But it all went horribly wrong. "Microsoft Shuts Down the Internet": http://ltuasoo.wordpress.com/2010/03/27/microsoft-shuts-down-the-internet/
Dir sirs
I am hopeful that your consumption of bovine expellent will cause a terminal condition.
Wishing you a wonderful trip to the warmest depths of an ice free land of universal repentance.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
The concept was introduced at least in 2000, but the inclusion of 'llama' as a warning word may have reduced its effectiveness.
Beginner's Introduction to Perl - Part 3 - Perl.com
I wonder if it has a setting for total fucking bastard. I don't like when people reply to my emails.
Assholes
OK, I decided to NOT go into the obvious Gates is the Borg comments and put all kidding aside. It is about time for a tone indicator. Most folks I run across these days could definitely use one. Seems like simple decency was slowly replaced with rage over the last decade or so. Maybe it's burn out or the fact that I still have to deal with users but it seems like the overall population has slowly turned into little rage puppies. Probably because it's easy to rage with a keyboard and say (type) things you would never repeat in person.
This aint Daytona and you aint Dale Earnhardt. So stop trying to draft on Interstate 40.
The demo on their website completely failed to flag up the sentence "Do you understand them?" [the terms and conditions] which I would consider quite condescending, and more offensive than the one it did flag up which was "It is time to either solidify matters or move on."