in the cloud

Identifying persuasive language, teaching pupils to identify spam scams

I gave a class of twelve year olds a selection of genuine spam emails and asked them to write down what their replies to these would be. It mostly purported to be from a distressed Nigerian monarch living in exile looking for a friendly Briton to share a fortune with. Some of the kids quickly twigged and wrote sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek responses. But a few of them seemed genuinely intrigued and happy to enter into correspondence; others tried to negotiate the terms to make more money. It was this naivety and innocence that I wanted to address in the pupils. They had to become aware of dastardly tricks.

photo via flickr:CC | Vince_Lamb

Follow an email gmail’s journey with Story of Send

We’re answering those questions with Story of Send, a new site that gives you a behind-the-scenes look into how all that virtual information makes its journey through the real world—from your Internet service provider to our data centers and beyond. Along the way, you’ll discover everything from where we filter for spam and scan for viruses to how we’re minimizing our impact on the environment through energy efficiency and renewable power.

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Should I send this email?

You’re tired of getting countless e-mails that are simply distractions from your life goals. Today’s infographic is going to hopefully prevent you from looking like a fool by determining which e-mails are appropriate to send.

Embiggen here

How to Respond to an Angry Student via Email

• Do not respond immediately. Wait two or three days and carefully consider your response.
• Use a professional tone.
• Address the student by name.
• Deal with only the issue brought up in the email.
• Do not address personal matters via email. (If you need to address such issues, use the telephone.)
• Limit your response to two or three lines. (“The more you write, the more ammunition you’re giving them to get angry all over again,” Brown said.)
• Close “Respectfully, [your name].”

Using Research to Predict Great Teachers

What if you could spot a top teacher candidate from an e-mail?

It may sound too good to be true, but statistically speaking, it can be surprisingly effective, according to one charter school organization requiring applicants to answer hypothetical e-mails as part of its interviewing process beginning this summer.

Tumblr Fanmail

It’s on!

Want to check and share your fanmail?

http://www.tumblr.com/send/tumblrname

Or just go to your inbox.

LinkedOut

A teacher 10 years ago would have a few things in her actual mailbox mailbox. You know, the thing where maybe a single flyer from the principal on a half sheet of paper would show up.

By contrast, in the little ecosystem which I study, No Excuses charter schools which tend to have wi-fi and laptops everywhere — a teacher might get 20, 30, 40 emails.

What would happen if each email writer were charged or “fined” 10 cents for every email they sent which the reader marked as “not particularly helpful/interesting/necessary/useful”?

I would guess:

a. Teachers would have less to read

b. The emails they read would be more valuable to them

c. The senders would find that people actually reacted more to the emails, and were more likely to do what was asked of them

Another email tip

lhuddles:

It is super unprofessional to send an email that ends with the tag “Sent from my iPhone.”

Gotta disagree here…I see the context of your situation. While it would be a perfect world that I could devote attention at my desk to carefully craft a response to every email I get I can’t. Here’s how I assess email I get on my phone:

1. Does this require my immediate attention?
2. If yes, does it require a phone call?

If it’s requiring an immediate response and doesn’t require a call I’ll answer that email from my phone. And to let that person know I’m not at my desk, along with my grammer/auto-spelling being less than stellar, I make sure that email has my patented “proudly thumb-typed from my mobile device” signature. It succinctly conveys important facts and a courtesy:

1. I am not at my desk.
2. I determined your email is important and I’m responding as best I can now.
3. Despite my best efforts there will be typos, please excuse my thumbs.
4. If I’m asking for a response back quickly, please don’t make it really long.

How is that unprofessional?

Hacknotifier Checks if Your Email Is Registered on Hacked Sites

Hacknotifier searches for your email address in publicly available hacked databases. All you need to do to check is type in your email address on the main page and it will cross-reference it and give you its results in seconds, no registration or payment required.

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PANIC! Google updated gmail login screen. Yes, for true, you haven’t been hacked - google just decided on a new design.

Court Says College Can Snoop On Students' Email

There have been plenty of cases where courts have said that it’s okay for an employer to snoop on (employer-provided) employee email accounts. And now there’s a case saying basically the same thing for colleges and universities. As long as they provided the email system, there’s apparently no violation of anti-snooping or data privacy laws.

via infoneer-pulse

(via michaelzimmer)

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Shame but true