A random general notice item

(Inspired by yet one more email about "someone whose user name is completely unidentifiable has sent you an e-card at this html link which may or may not be the site we claim it is".)

If anyone is ever inspired to send me invitations to view electronic greeting cards, solicitations for school fundraisers, or pointers to similar third-party web sites at which I am promised access to something interesting, exciting, or useful, but where there is no direct personal contact with or content from the person alleged to be the generating party ... don't. Just, please don't. I won't click on them. They will get parsed as spam (at best) or phishing (at worst). If there's some particular site where you truly believe my life will be blighted if I don't view it ... if there's some particular sentiment that you believe can only be conveyed by a particular on-line greeting card ... if there's some particular favor you want from me ... contact me directly and with clearly interpretable sender information (not just a user name). I will be properly delighted and enriched. But if you can't be bothered to make the personal contact, please don't blame me if I can't be bothered to sort out your offering from among the spam.

(Note that the one exception to this is evite invitations, since they now count as a Known Source for me.)