Yahoo Sends Nonsensical Email To Disposable Email Users

[The Straight Story]

Yahoo Sends Nonsensical Email To Disposable Email Users


A reader forwarded the email below from Yahoo announcing changes to their disposable email address. The only problem is that he couldn’t figure out what it’s trying to say. And after reading it a handful of times, I can’t figure it out either.

Yahoo’s disposable email product lets users give out, well, disposable email addresses. If spam starts to hit that address, you just turn it off.

We asked Yahoo if they know what it means – they say they’ll get back to us. Meanwhile, if anyone else got this, please let us know. And a free TechCrunch tshirt to anyone who can explain what it means.

From:
Date: April 28, 2010 3:27:50 PM PDT
To: [email protected]
Subject: Fwd: Change notification for your Disposable Email address

Can you translate this into English? Or am I just being dense. And, of course, it’s a “drive by” message. That is “of you ask for clarification, we’re ignoring you”! Arghhhh! And I thought I was smart. Sigh.

Begin forwarded message:

From: “Yahoo! Mail”
Date: April 28, 2010 6:05:23 PM EDT
To:
Subject: Change notification for your Disposable Email address

You may have been receiving emails to your Disposable Email Address with other yahoo domains, even though your email address ends with @yahoo.com. In order to improve the accuracy of emails received by you in your right accounts, you will no longer be receiving emails to any other domain that you did not sign up with. You will only receive emails to your Disposable Email Address: [e-mail].

Please make sure you provide the right Disposable Email Addresses so you continue to receive the emails.

To confirm your existing Disposable Email Address:
1. In Yahoo! Mail, go to “Options,” then “More Options”
2. From the menu on the left, click “Disposable Email Address.” If you don’t see this option, “Spam” and “Set up a disposable address”

Thank you,
Yahoo! Mail Team


Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/28/yahoo-sends-nonsensical-email-to-disposable-email-users/#ixzz0mTdfatOH

[drm604]

1. I think I understand this.

I agree that it's garbled but I think I understand what it's saying.

Yahoo has a bunch of different email domains (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahoo!_Mail#Email_Domains ), for example, yahoo.com.ar, yahoo.com.au, yahoo.com.br, etc.

Apparently, in the past a disposable address such as [email protected] would receive emails sent to [email protected], [email protected], or whatever. The email seems to be seeing that this will no longer be the case.

[ima_sinnic]

2. I think they meant "TO other Yahoo domains" instead of "with"

might have been written by someone whose first language is not English--they seem to rarely get the prepositions correct. As a copy editor for a lot of ESL writers, I've learned to look to the prepositions first as the main problem areas. I see a bunch of other typical ESL--if it weren't a disposable address, I'd suspect phishing. What would the motive be to capture a disposable address, though?

[AsahinaKimi]

3. I got two of those messages in my email...

Right next to each other. I was like.. "What the heck does this mean??" I thought it was just me who was confused. Nice to know I am not alone.

Thanks for the confusion~~ Yahoo!