I read and surf widely and find lots of articles that intrigue me. Call me compulsive but I tend to send out lots of link to friends, often 3-4 a week, sometimes more. The subjects can range from thought-provoking economic pieces to politics to bizarre news and more. Lots more.
Would you consider this thoughtful or a royal pain in the ass? I’ve got good intentions but wonder if people appreciate. Usually I get very little acknowledgment. 
How many such emails do you send out?
I never send them out now but I have in the past. If you are just blasting them out to everyone in your address book, then I would imagine that people give the old “here we go again” when they get them. However, if you target people that are truly interested in that subject or as a followup to a discussion that you had, then that might be seen as thoughtful.
I don’t tend to send stuff once a week (or more often) to everybody I know. If I were the recipient of such a thing, I think I’d prefer it be a once-a-week thing.
yes, PITA. I get way too much of this stuff for work, as well as well meaning friends.
If you feel you must share, at least paste a paragraph or write a simple few sentences on why I even want to click the link as I reach for the delete key of your message.
Why not start a blog, and then those of your friends that are interested can go look there, and you won’t inflict it on those that aren’t?
Complete, royal PITA. This is not the purpose of email. As mentioned, make a web site or blog or whatever, let those who care read it there, those that don’t aren’t bothered.
I think there should be some specific reason to believe that a particular recipient wants to receive what is being sent. Absent this, there is PITA potential.
Isn’t this how fark.com started?
I send out some…mostly for business related articles, or if a friend has a certain condition or interest or issue and I find something of interest. BUT I do have a rule about it.
I always send the link and a snip of what the article is. I hate seeing – go to kuagfu.avnuiawg@thisite.con and I have no idea if it relates to me whatsoeva.
I think it’s nice. It only takes a minute or 2 to clean out an inbox for me. My mom send me ALL the prayer, friendship glurge, etc. Which is I hate, but it’s fine. She’s me ma afterall. I love the dog pictures, comics and stuff. And if someone goes out of their way to send me an article of the remotest interest–hell, I’d be thrilled.
That said, if someone ASKS you not to send it, try not to be hurt. One of my girlfiends asked another not to send religious things anymore (which did NOT go well) and I had her ask me not to send sad animal stories that f’ me off because it made her sad. Fine by me…
I find that kind of stuff a bit annoying, but everyone’s different. Your friends might not mind. Ask them about it.
Royal PITA. I never do it. When we first got e-mail, we made the mistake of giving our address to one of my wife’s relatives, and we got deluged with crap in the inbox. We couldn’t even tell who it was from. I had to write a message to the sender, pleading with them to please stop sending this garbage to us. We didn’t want it, we didn’t read it and we had no idea who they were or why they were doing this to us. They stopped, but they haven’t spoken to us in 6 years.
Total pain in the ass. It used to be that I’d receive 3 or 4 emails a week from my dad telling me about interesting articles–usually ones that supported his political position, but that wasn’t why it bothered me. I never cared enough to read them, so it just meant more for me to delete. Eventually I asked him to stop, and he’s mostly complied. I much prefer the blogging route used by some of my news-obsessed friends.