I’m always annoyed when I get an e-mail invite to a party where all the recipients have been bcc’d so you can’t see who all is invited. My gut reaction is not to respond at all.
Is there a good reason for keeping the guest list a secret? Shouldn’t invitees be able to see who else might attend?
Some people might feel more comfortable with a private message for whatever reason. For example maybe the individual doesn’t want other people to be able to see their email address. I’ve sent party invitations through snail mail that didn’t include a list of guest so why would I need to send one with email?
Honestly, if someone asks “Who is going to be there” before they accept my invitation I might feel a little hurt.
Marc
One reason is if you want to get a crush alone by pretending you are inviting a group but they’re the only invitee.
I didn’t say it was a good reason!
I absolutely hate it when I get emails addressed to some huge group with all the recipients’ email addresses in plain sight. If I want someone to have my email address, I will give it to them. I always assumed that the type of people who do this are the ones who are too stupid to figure out how to bcc.
There are two good reasons to bcc everyone. The first is what FatBaldGuy pointed out – not everyone is comfortable with their email address being shared widely. Using bcc accomodates those folks’ wishes. (I’m one of those folks, btw.)
The second is that if there’s a large number of invitees, the invitation will start out with a big, ugly block of email addresses unless you put them in bcc. Using bcc puts the visual focus on the invitation itself instead of the address block.
I find bcc annoying to both employ and receive. And if you aren’t willing to give someone your email address, why would you want to spend three hours at a party with them? Also, by seeing the list of email address, you can avoid the embaressment of asking someone if they are coming when they weren’t even invited.
I agree with the bcc practice. As pointed out, it has been the case since the dawn of time when invitations were sent in writing that invitees did not know the guest list.
Often a party will include people who don’t know each other. There are very few people I don’t know who I’d like to have get my email. What if the host doesn’t know her friend’s brother is a creepy stalker or the king of V-gra spam?
The people make the party. I don’t see much of a party unless I see an invite list. And I don’t want to be at your party if you’ve only invited me, the doorman at your building, the crazy cat lady from down the street and Woody Allen.
Well ok, maybe the cat lady might be fun to talk to.
I don’t want to walk into a party blindfolded. I’d rather a bunch of strangers have my e-mail address so I can make an informed decision beforehand.
I’m not all that worried about who has my e-mail address. What is somebody going to do with it anyway? The party organizer and probably 99% of the invitees are people that are either in my immediate circle of friends or an adjacent circle.
I like the way e-vite does it, where you can see the invite list along with any comments they’ve made.
As others have said, not everyone wants their email addresses sent out.
Also, I think it’s a bit rude to accept or decline based on who else might be invited. What did you do before email, when invites were issued via the mail or by a phone call - ask who else was invited before accepting or not?
That was my thought.
And no, I don’t want everyone at a party to have my E-mail address. I do enough spam filtering without having to deal with more people’s “omg if you forward this you get $$$$!$!!!” and other bullshit.
Ok, I don’t have much of an opinion on this either way. I don’t care who has my email address, but I’ve always sent out stuff bcc’d though out of respect for others’ privacy.
That said, those of you who would prefer to know the invite list in advance, what did y’all do in the golden age of snail mail? To my knowledge, as has been pointed out, no one ever received an envelope for a Birthday Party! (or whatever) with that included. Did no one ever attend then since the revelers were a mystery? Or back in the day didja just throw caution to the wind and take yer chances?
The last time I got a snail mail invite (besides Weddings) was around 1987, I think! It’s just never been something I’ve had to negotiate as an adult.
But I agree that sending everyone’s email out is rude and dumb. I’m a bcc-er, mostly to cover my ass, since I don’t know who’ll be upset by it. I don’t care myself - gmail is great at making sure I get very little spam.
I do get why you might be curious as to who’s coming, but I don’t think your curiousity trumps everyone else’s right to privacy. Myself, I won’t go to a party thrown by someone I don’t know well enough to call up (or email) and say, “Great! What can I bring? Who’s coming?”
I’m not sure why you find it annoying! In all the e-mails I use, and I use - let’s see, at least 4 or 5 different ones, it has merely been a case of clicking the “Add bcc” button and then pasting all the e-mails into the bcc box instead of the regular To: box.
And I don’t want my e-mail seen by everybody either. If I am at the party I can avoid them - but I don’t like getting stupid glurgy stuff in my e-mail, and too many people send that stuff out.
On my old college account, you needed to have something in the to line and you could only do it for five or so addresses. Granted this was the worst account I ever used, got more spam than my parents’ 12 year old, used by everyone account did, and found attaching files to be too much to ask for.
Also, I want to know who’s going to be at a party, so I can avoid people’s allergies when cooking for it if not for avoiding people in general, but I would just call the host and ask if I got a snail mail invite. I just don’t see the point in bcc for parties.
A solution I’ve been using for a while – and that I learned about here on the Dope – is that I use BCC to protect everyone’s e-mail address but I start each e-mail with a “To:” line (and it gets sent to me). So no one sees addresses, but everyone sees something like
Hey everyone, just want to let you know my new address:
123 Main Street
Hoonows, AM 22222
Details about the housewarming to follow!
–Jenny
Solves both the privacy problem and the “who else got this?” problem. 
It just occurred to me, I’ve never sent an invitation to ANYTHING (well, except a work meeting) I’ve planned via email - ever. I’ve either mailed it or called the person. Perhaps I’m odd - but frankly, I wouldn’t want my email broadcast to a list of people either - I would do a bcc.
If a host invites you to a party, the assumptions are (a) you like the host well enough to want to go to a party they would throw and (b) you trust the host enough to believe they will be throwing a good party, meaning one at which you will have a good time.
To let the host know that your presence is contingent on who else might also be invited is rude, rude, rude. You are in effect saying “I wouldn’t have enough fun with just you;” “I also don’t trust you to invite fun people;” AND “if you don’t make it worth my while, I won’t show up.” And the “I need to know for food allergies” bit is bogus; at anything other than a potluck, you as a guest won’t be cooking, and at a potluck you can either make something without major known allergens (like nuts) or label the dish (“contains nuts”).
I also think it’s ridiculous for the hypothetical host to provide my e-mail address to 100 people who may be at this party (many of whom I don’t know), just because one of the them wants like to know the whole guest list – which is information they’re not entitled to anyway.
If you’re invited to a party, you decide whether or not to go based on what you know about the host, their prior get-togethers, and your own personal interest in the type of people who are likely to be there. Then, if the party ends up to be fruit juice and repeated playings of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” (to steal from another thread) – well, that’s the last party by that guy you go to. But you don’t ask in advance who else is coming because that makes it clear you don’t trust the host to throw a good party.
I can’t believe that nobody has mentioned the best reason to BCC everybody: To avoid the dreaded “reply to all” problem.
There will inevitably be one poor schlemiel who clicks “reply to all” when responding, or worse when mentioning some unrelated personal matter (“I’ll be coming, and by the way did the blood test results come back yet?”).
I’m the same way. And in snail mail, I’ve never provided a guest list. When people ask me “Who’s coming?” I get very annoyed. I would think that unless you have some sort of death vendetta against a mutual friend it shouldn’t make a difference who’s invited. It’s bad form to base your acceptance or rejection on who else will be attending.
It’s also for people like me who are vain/insecure enough to start counting down the list - “hmmm…I’m ahead of Phil, but I’m after Sally? Sally got invited before me? Why?”
And I know I’m not the only person who does that.
BTW, why do you need to know who else is going to be there? If they’d sent written invitations, you wouldn’t know who else was on the list. You just have to decide “Do I want to go to _______'s party and do I trust _____ enough to invite interesting people or not?” BCC’ing does the same thing.