I received an e-mail yesterday from Broc Copeland in which he told me that my readers may be interested in a MyBlogLog Giveaway. It is a contest where people who subscribe to Broc’s MyBlogLog community get added to a contest to win two nice printers. Browsing his site, I found out that he had also e-mailed a lot of other bloggers about the same contest. I thought of a question then: while mass e-mailing can be intruding or even a form of spam, when is mass e-mailing a good thing, and when is it a bad thing?

The e-mail that Broc sent me was short, up to the point and polite. That throws me into a dilemma: should I look at that e-mail as one of the many e-mails Broc has sent to dozens of bloggers, or do I look at the e-mail as something that only concerns me?

Things I see if I observe mass e-mails as being part of a group

If I look at the overall thing that Broc did and is doing, I can say that he is mass e-mailing his contest to everyone he knows in order to promote his site. That is clear mass spamming in the eyes of many people, it not most, as promoting any idea through mass e-mails is spam in the minds of many, whether or not the e-mails in question are relevant to a blog or an individual. Thus, I notice the following points about mass emailings:

• The e-mail offers some value to me when I am part of a group
• The announcement was mass e-mailed to many people, thus I do not feel extra special
• The e-mail can be considered spam or non-spam, depending on how my group [the blogosphere group] looks at mass e-emails, regardless of the email content
• The e-mail can also be considered either spam or non-spam depending on the type of activities the group is involved in. For example, a group based on human rights activities may view a mass e-mailing about credit card offers to be spam, but may view mass e-mailings about credit cards that donate money to victims of human rights abuse as being good.

Things I see if I observe mass e-mails as an individual

If I look at the e-mail as an individual, from my perspective and observe things based on how Broc approached me and what he offered to me and my readers, it seems like a good e-mail that may benefit people in the long run. This goes along with what I am saying in the new Reader Appreciation Project. Thus, the points for this perspective are:

• The e-mail offers some value to me as an individual and to my readers
• The announcement was e-mailed to me directly.
• The e-mail can be either spam or non-spam, depending on how I view such e-mails and their content
• The e-mail can also be judged based on what I think about different things and how I feel. I may be tired and may view such an e-mail as being spam, while I may be exhausted but if I get such an e-mail from a friend, I may view it as being non-spam.

The way you look at mass e-mail probably depends on what you think about mass e-mails in general and the way you think. You may also judge e-mails based on how you are approached by different people in different situations.

Broc’s e-mail is both spam and non-spam

I think some people may delete or even block Broc’s email, as mass e-mailing regardless of having good or bad intentions, is still mass e-mailing. I prefer the concept of giving back to the readers without making them do extra stuff, like making readers join communities, but giving back something is a good step in the right direction that Broc is taking, compared to the thousands of bloggers out there who are not giving readers anything back.

What is your view on this? Do you look at incoming e-mails from your own individual and personal perspective? Or do you look at e-mails from the perspective of a community and see if everyone is being mass e-mailed or not with the same message and then look at any possible benefits?

As for me, I joined Broc’s MyBlogLog community myself in order to keep my opinion in the matter lean less towards calling the e-mail a form of mass “spamming“, and to bring up an interesting point that we need to think about when looking at mass emails. I also want to see if I get a printer along the way or not. Even though my current printer is on the verge of death, the printer from Broc’s MyBlogLog contest will go back to the readers through the Reader Appreciation Project.