Thursday, April 16, 2009

"Reply All": Not So Dope

So, here's something awesome I did today...

But first, a little bit of background:

A couple of weeks ago, four of my classmates and myself entered the Microsoft Advertising Digital Challenge (MADC). The MADC is a competition open to graduate and undergraduate level students. The premise of the challenge is to develop an advertising campaign aimed towards the college-aged audience for Office Live Workspace. If you have ever used GoogleDocs, Workspace is similar, but has the added benefit of sharing files using all Windows Office applications.

We had about a month to prepare for the competition, but with finals preparation and spring break right in the middle of it all, when it came down to it, we ended up putting our entire campaign together in 3-4 days. On the day it was due, we worked ten hours straight to tweek and finalize our written proposal and accompanying PowerPoint presentation to email to Microsoft. The deadline was midnight and exactly 11:58 pm, we sent it in. I seriously did not think we would get it in on time, but by some miracle, we just barely made the cut off. It was awesome!

Just last week, three days after we sent in our proposal, we found out that we had beat out 136 teams to make it into the top 10 of the competition! We were invited to New York to present our campaign to Microsoft Advertising Executives at the end of April to compete in the semi-final and possibly final rounds of the competition. I was in San Francisco with school when we found out and it was so exciting! Woohoo!

Crappy thing about it is that we have to fund our own trip out. Yeah. Poopy.

Thankfully, we have been able to receive assistance funding from our school to help us out. In all instances, we actively made requests to the Warsaw Center and the Graduate School administration. Both have very generously offered to essentially cover airfare and hotel to make our trip possible and so that we can represent our school.

So here's the kicker: We received an email today from the Director of the Business School informing us of the great news that we would be receiving financial assistance for our trip. In all of my uncontrollable excitement, I hastily hit "Reply All" and sent the following email:

"so dope. So i guess we just find a hotel and book then get reimbursed? so great!"

And right when I sent it, I knew I would regret it. Little did I know that the initial email that I had "Reply All"ed included not only the Director, but the Dean of the Lundquist School of Business, the Director of Fiscal Services and the Director of the Warsaw Center. Awesome.

"So dope." Who says "so dope"?! More like "so embarrassing." I felt "so lame" about it that I had to send apologetic emails to all unintended recipients. My Warsaw advisor replied with "word" which I thought was pretty funny, but I have not heard from the others. Man. So embarrassing...I feel shame.

A lesson to everyone, do not "Reply all". I could rather say be careful when you "Reply All" but I just say, do not do it. Too many predicaments have come of it. Just start a whole new email thread if the list of recipients isn't too long and move on with your happy life. It's just not worth the risk.

13 comments:

Bakabreath said...

Congrats...I think?

Laura said...

Reply all will get you ever time! I've learned to avoid it at all costs at BYU Broadcasting. Glad to see your doing well :)

Emily said...

i feel your pain... i will say no more...

Kim said...

congrats on the presentation bit. i can't stop laughing...i'm so mean!!

catharooni said...

you KNOW i understand the pain of mistaken replies to emails (dare i remind you?) ... my tummy hurt when i read this - bummer. but you are right. the funding really is DOPE!

the Rew Crew said...

That is great news-congrats! And as for the not-so-great news, well, let's just say I truly feel your pain.

Kaahl said...

yo yo yo, dat is so fly dat u be illin' in NYC. (i am so out of date)

The Law Spot said...

LOL! Congrats on the contest! I can't wait to hear what happens! If it makes you feel better at least you didn't accidentally send a spreadsheet out to everyone with everyone's salary info on it. Don't ask! :)

dana said...

haha. AWESOME. bummer for you.
at least people prob knew you didn't mean to "reply all". I hate it when people do "reply all" and they mean to do it...and there's no purpose for it.
That would be more embarrassing.

Miriam Oh Painter said...

People easily forget that email has its own set of rules of etiquette. If only we all knew them...

Miriam Oh Painter said...

I am loving hearing everyone's "Reply All" horror stories! I am definitely grateful mine wasn't as bad as many I've heard about. That is a dangerous button!

stanky said...

I think you may have taken the DA award away from kristen for her famous reply all to the bcc I sent her... Bcc is equally dangerous.

Unknown said...

Reminds me of when one of our vendors sent us an email informing us that they will "no longer be accepting payment in the rear" when I think she meant to say in arrears. I sent it to our entire office and we all had a good laugh. That's the thing about email, once it's out there, it's out there for good.