# Can individual emails be created/coded to disable the "Reply All" function? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 13, 2019, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816 "2019-12-13T16:57:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/21 "2019-12-16T00:14:55Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Given the prevalence of this issue going back a long, long time, I’m surprised that every email program on the planet doesn’t make you click a couple extra times before the “reply all” goes out. > > “Hey, did you notice that this email is going to be sent to the following 183 people?” > click > “Please type in the number of people that was listed in the previous window before continuing.” > “183” > “Okay, I’m going to send it in one minute. This window will stay up until then and you can click “Cancel” to stop this from going out to all these people.” > > Ditto initial emails accidentally sent out to a large mailing list. Outlook/O365/Exchange has something a bit like the first part of that challenge sequence - mailtips, which can be configured on distribution lists to say things like “this message will be delivered to more than 100 people” (they can be set up on mailboxes too, so I have one on my IT team mailbox that says “Are you sure you didn’t mean to be raising a ticket instead of mailing the team?”) ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2019, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/22 "2019-12-16T22:25:26Z")
My example of stupid use of CC: I was on the email list of a major Internet security company. I got an email from them that had hundreds of email addresses given in the CC field. It was clear that this was an alphabetic subrange of their email list. Just a few people pooling their resources could have gotten quite a bit of the whole list. And done bad things with it. Nice security mentality there folks. ---
**Author:** ![dgrdfd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/eb8c5e/32.png) [@dgrdfd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dgrdfd)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/23 "2019-12-17T03:23:48Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > That’s what I prefer people do. I think you should have someone, even if it’s just the sender, in the To field. > > And I’m surprised the OP’s string of replies was only 34. I’ve had a lot more than that when this happened, and this was at a large information technology firm (where I would expect people to know better than to reply all). The downside to this is often times as a manger I need to know that certain people received the information and if the sender uses BCC I have to manually forward it on. ---
**Author:** ![dgrdfd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/eb8c5e/32.png) [@dgrdfd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dgrdfd)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/24 "2019-12-17T03:30:15Z")
Edit window missed but what I’m saying is that BCC is bad when it’s used for a general “dissemination of information” If you send an email to managers and then every manager at every level “forwards it on” to managers and others on their team the trickle down effect means some get more than a reply all. And the information may be slower to trickle down. ---
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/25 "2019-12-17T12:31:34Z")
Sorry for the late reply, but thank you for all of the responses! I work for a large firm in the foothills near Santa Fe, and yes, I’m surprised it was only 34 responses. After going through my inbox yesterday, I realized that some of them were kinda snarky to those who “Replied All.” Somehow, somewhere along the line, the problem got fixed. I expect that the admins of the mailing list restricted the ability to send/reply to the list mid-stream. Otherwise there could have potentially been _thousands_. But this is good to know–especially when I send out periodic updates to a handful of folks, and the discussion spreads like wildfire. Tripler Nuclear-rated Chairborne Ranger. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/26 "2019-12-17T19:02:10Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > But if it’s a distribution list, depending on how it’s set up, a simple “reply” might still go out to everyone. If the client is sending to a single address, and it still goes to 183 people, the problem isn’t that people are clicking “reply all”. I had this happen to me back in the early 2000s. I got a marketing email on a Friday evening. It wasn’t even really an ongoing subscription, just an email that went out to everyone who had entered an online sweepstakes announcing the winner. Except the distribution list had been misconfigured so every reply went to the entire list. So when a bunch of people inevitably replied “unsubscribe”, they all went to my inbox and everyone else’s on that list. So for that entire weekend my inbox was inundated with emails saying “unsubscribe”, and then “why am I getting this???”, “Stop emailing me!!!”, “Why won’t you unsubscribe me???!!!” Until Monday morning when presumably the IT person who caused the problem discovered what was going on and put a stop to it. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/27 "2019-12-17T23:28:24Z")
Most companies have corrected this problem using one of the solutions already described. When this became a problem at my previous employer about 15 years ago. I asked our head of HR if he had been collecting the names of the people that were “replying all” to the recent company wide emails. He asked me why. I told him that the next time we needed to have a reduction in force he already had a head start in the list. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2019, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816/28 "2019-12-19T16:38:21Z")
> [@AlsoNamedBort](#): > > On Outlook at least, if you get tried in a reply all chain you can click the “Ignore” button to automatically delete any future replies. God bless you. I never noticed that button before. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-individual-emails-be-created-coded-to-disable-the-reply-all-function/844816.md?page=1)