5 Sentence Rule

Some folks sent me an e-mail recently with their signature linking to the following 5 sentence rule website.

I actually think this should count as e-mail spam in the corporate world. The problem today is sending e-mails has no cost associated with it. Your computer is always on and you most probably have at least one tab in your browser open with your e-mail client open, or you are running outlook/thunderbird. The fact that there is zero cost associated to sending e-mails means people fell the liberty to send mails about anything and I would guess most e-mails are probably less than 5 sentences. The problem is they cc 10 - 15 people which end up causing an e-mail thread with 20 - 30 conversations. I think the five sentence rule is a bad one. The rule should really be would you want to be on the receiving end of your own e-mail or would you send that e-mail to your boss' boss' boss. For folks that are honest, I am sure they will agree a lot of the e-mails they send are unnecessary. Unnecessary e-mails is worse than e-mail spam in the corporate environment. Maybe someone will create a useless e-mail filter based on your reading preferences in the future. I'll sign up for that feature the day it is available.