Practically every email I’ve received in maybe the past year has started with “I hope you are well”. I even had an LLM draft a placeholder email for me and it started with the same thing. This has not always been the case and it’s strange to me that everyone I interact with begins their emails with this line. Frankly, it’s annoying AF.

What gives? Who started this? Why has it become so prevalent? More importantly, how do we stop it?

While I’m at it, if you work in tech / customer support, I urge you to speak with your supervisors to minimize the boiler plate copy paste trash you insert into your emails. People dealing with shit that’s not working as intended or desired do not have the mental or emotional capacity to wade through your platitudinal nonsense. Get to the fucking point.

  • Boinkage@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    I use this when the tone of my email would otherwise be, where’s my spreadsheet motherfucker?? It’s nice to modify the overall tone of the email to something more friendly. I have a very curt writing style so I’m often concerned my emails will come off as blunt or demanding if I don’t include a pleasantry.

    I work in a very friendly, informal field so I find myself doing little pleasantries to fit in, email-wise.

    • oxjox@lemmy.mlOP
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      5 months ago

      I would love if my coworkers were more blunt and honest.

      “Where the fuck is my spreadsheet” is very concise. It tells me what you want, it tells me what my responsibility is, and it probably tells me the level of priority the issue is for you. “where’s my spreadsheet motherfucker” is similar but, depending on our relationship, I’d take that either far more seriously or more jokingly.

      I have one guy I work with who speaks like this. He had to explain himself at first then I was like, yes please continue talking to me like a human. I’m more likely to trust people who don’t hide behind pleasantries and are just themselves with me.

      • Boinkage@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        I think you’re answering your own question here.

        Your blunt coworker has to explain himself or risks being taken as rude by people who don’t know him. You yourself couldn’t determine if he was being rude to you without some additional context.

        Without further context, you don’t know how to interpret an email that says where is my spreadsheet motherfucker.

        In both cases, you’re saying further social cues are needed to determine if someone you don’t know very well is being rude or not. Hence, why people emailing people they don’t know very well in a professional capacity include niceties to convey context and tone.

  • hperrin@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    It’s just a salutation. A pleasantry. It’s a formal way of opening a correspondence. It’s considered polite. You don’t need to put one if you don’t want to, but if your message is terse, it can come across as rude.

  • lemmyreader@lemmy.ml
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    5 months ago

    Dear OP, I hope you and your family and friends and relatives and co-workers are well

    To nip it in the bud it’s entirely the influence of the overly polite English and since Brexit this has deteriorated (de-Tory-ated). Just saying 😀

  • lemmyreader@lemmy.ml
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    5 months ago

    After some trepidation I’ll confess that I find these “hope you are well” also annoying though it depends who the sender is. What I find more annoying are the “OK, boomer” comments on the Internet. I mean what can you say after such a reply ?

    • techt@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      That’s the intended effect – a condescending dismissal of being condescendingly dismissed. Not much you can say to a clear sign of disengagement.

  • Jimmycakes@lemmy.world
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    5 months ago

    Yeah bro bosses just love it when you go up to them and tell them all the shit you’re not gonna write in emails to customers because a guy on the internet said so. Hope this comment finds you because you are not doing well