The Daily Jolt Sucks

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From: Jonathan Bardin
Subject: correction to the Crimson
Date: Tue, 8 Feb 2005 06:25:00 -0500
To: Jonathan Bardin
X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.618)

Today, in an article covering The Daily Jolt website, the site's url is
listed as crimson.thedailyjolt.com.

It is actually crimson.dailyjolt.com.

Thank you,
Daily Jolt


Last time I looked, I did not know Jonathan Bardin. In fact, I am fairly certain that I have never met him, that I have never expressed any interest in the Daily Jolt to him or any of his associates, and that I did not sign up for any "Crimson Corrections by Email" service that he was providing.

More importantly, this email makes certain assumptions. It assumes that I am actually interested in the Daily Jolt. It assumes that I am technologically ignorant, since I would not be able to find the website without an email telling it to me. It also assumes that around 6:30 this morning, I was reading The Crimson's article about the website, as opposed to more productive activity (like sleeping).

Even if the Daily Jolt were an interesting website (rather than my.harvard.edu without the integration with courses and email), such backhanded email tactics make it extremely unlikely that I will ever use their site. With such flippant use of my personal Harvard email address, how could I possibly trust their Privacy Policy, with its claims of "never disclosing my personal information?"

This was written by Martey Dodoo. Posted on Tuesday, February 08, 2005 at 10:54. Tagged Culture, Harvard, Technology

Comments

At 3:26 on February 11, 2005, Ryan Sanders wrote:

please. you are so self righteous...i've been to the site, it's useful, and this kid probably just wanted you to know it was there. did you even find out how he got your email? maybe he knows you from a group or an extracurricular? have you tried to contact him?

At 8:10 on February 12, 2005, Martey wrote:

Did you even read my post? I already explained that this is the first I have heard of Jonathan, and that I have never met him before. I also already stated that the usefulness of the Daily Jolt is not the issue here - it is the fact I do not like receiving unsolicited emails advertising services that I am not interested in.

Now, I receive several email messages each day, many of them announcing events, products, and services that somebody somewhere wants me to consume. Most of the time, I do not agree with them, but I almost never feel the need to post about them. Why? Because I have either joined a mailing list for an association, or have some sort of personal relationship with the sender. Either way, I have consented to receive such email messages. It was the absence of such a relationship, or any explanation in your email, that made it so heinous.

Note I said "your email." I fully realize that the fact that the IP address on your comment and that from the email above are the same is only circumstantial evidence for the assertion that Ryan Sanders and Jonathan Bardin are the same person, but it still seems suspicious. Assuming that Ryan Sanders does exist (which assumes that he is highly jealous of his privacy, since he has no account on theFacebook and has limited the information available through various College directories - an assumption which does not square with the comment), and was using your computer, it is unlikely that he would have referred to you as "this kid."

Despite knowing virtually nothing about you, when I read the email you sent yesterday apologizing for upsetting me, the last thing I would have imagined is that you would have attempted astroturfing. I hope that you are not also behind the posts on the Crimson Daily Jolt forum suggesting that I was abused as a child. I wasn't, but my parents did teach me the values of honesty and respect.

At 9:49 on February 13, 2005, jon bardin wrote:

an email i sent to martey, hopefully clearing this up: 

From:     bardin@fas.harvard.edu
Subject:    
Date:   February 13, 2005 9:47:25 PM EST
To:       dodoo@fas.harvard.edu

i did not post anything in the daily jolt forum, and my friend andrew made that comment when i showed him the blogging, in my room, even though i told him not to. we were literally wrestling over the mouse.

i stand by my apology; everything in that email was genuine. I guess at this point I also apologize for Andrew--I should have mentioned it in the first email, but was embarrassed. there's no reason for you to believe me, so make your own decision...

jcb