Urban Legends

(Heard the one about the missing kidneys?)

"I will set down a tale . . . it may be history, it may be only a legend, a tradition. It may have happened, it may not have happened. But it could have happened." . . .

~Mark Twain~

Tales Too Tall to be True

If you are like me, you receive at least one piece of Urban Legend in your mail a week. Chain Letters, Get Rich Quick Schemes, and Urban Legends clog the Internet with misinformation and panic. Since I spend lots of time on the Internet, people are constantly asking me,

"Is it true? Can I really win a trip to Disney World? "
Generally, like in real life , if it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn't true. But this doesn't stop people from automatically hitting that FORWARD button and sending the junk on to all of their "closest friends", who then send it to all their friends at work and, well, you get the idea.
Like a snowball rolling downhill, it gains in speed and size until it is unstoppable. People who believe them are more likely to spread them, thinking they're doing friends a favor by alerting them to the dangerous virus, or the free offer, or the "true story" about the "Drug users who are now taking their used needles and putting them into the coin return slots in public telephones."
Knowledge is Power!

Spend 30 minutes on these sites and you'll save hours and hours of your time in the future and avoid forwarding junk around the Internet.

An Urban Legend:

appears mysteriously and spreads spontaneously in varying forms
contains elements of humor or horror (the horror often "punishes" someone who flouts society's conventions).
makes good storytelling.
does NOT have to be false, although most are. ULs often have a basis in fact, but it's their life after-the-fact (particularly in reference to the second and third points) that gives them particular interest.

Urban Legend Sites

Urban Legends & Folklore
Man attempts to electrocute moles in his yard, dies in shocking fashion; 3 practical jokers in airplane "moon" another pilot, lose control of plane, die with their pants down....

Urban Legends Reference Pages
The following urban legends and bits of netlore are currently making the cyberspace rounds. If you're looking for a quick yes/no about one of them or are wondering if we've yet seen it, you've come to the right place.

Virus Hoaxes
During the course of any given day, a myriad of e-mailed warnings about dire computer virus pop up in thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of inboxes. Most are nothing more than inventively-named hoaxes designed to provoke a frantic "forward to all" response in the recipient.

Lies, Damn Lies, and ICQ Messages
The purpose of this site is to combat disinformation with the most powerful weapon of all:
the truth.

CIAC Internet Hoaxes
You can help eliminate "junk mail" by educating the public on how to identify a new hoax warning, how to identify a valid warning and what to do if you think a message is a hoax.

" Well there's egg and bacon; egg, sausage and bacon; egg and spam; bacon and spam; egg, bacon, sausage and spam; spam, bacon, sausage and spam; spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon and spam; spam, spam, spam, egg and spam; spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked beans, spam, spam, spam and spam; or lobster thermidor aux crevettes with a mornay sauce garnished with truffle pate', brandy and a fried egg on top of spam."

-- Monty Python's Flying Circus --

Spam

An e-mail with one or more of these properties:

Mailed to more than one person.
Mailed against the wishes of the recipient.
Anonymous.
Commercial.
Offensive.
Unsolicited.

Anti-Spam Sites

Internet Chain Letters
Chain Letter: "A letter directing the recipient to send out multiple copies so that its circulation increases in a geometric progression as long as the instructions are carried out." Webster's II, New Riverside University Dictionary, 1984

You're My Best Friend in the Whole World!
Tired of receiving those "friendship" page URLs that have been popping-up everywhere? Personally, I would rather just receive a brief note saying "Hello, my friend!" than a hundred of those impersonal URLs.

The Anti-Spam Home Page
Tired of wading through all that junk mail? Learn how to stop the spammers -- here are instructions to automatically filter your e-mail, defend your site from exploitation by the spammers, and get involved!

Fight Spam by Recycling it!

Take Back Your Mailbox!
This site is designed to provide information about the problems of junk email, some proposed solutions, and to provide resources for the Net Community to make informed choices about the issues surrounding junk e-mail.

F.R.E.E.
Forum for Responsible & Ethical E-mail
(Information for Spam Victims)

THE EMAIL FOLKLORE HOMEPAGE
A collection of frequently forwarded mail.

To My Best Friend in the Whole World...
If you suffer from CFD (Compulsive Forwarding Disorder), this page is for you. Before you hit that FORWARD button to send that URL to your Special Friend™ , read this for a laugh.

*** This page has heavy satire. ***

Bottom Line... composing e-mail or posting something on the Net is as easy as writing on the walls of a public restroom. Don't automatically believe it until it's proven. ASSUME it's false, unless there is proof that it's true.

Now, forward this message to ten friends, and you will win the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes.

More Anti-Spam Links

Telemarketing Scams

Related Links

(Heard the one about the missing kidneys?)

Tales Too Tall to be True

An Urban Legend:

Spam