Penny Brown Hoax

Subject: Penny Brown Hoax
From: raredance
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 10:47 PM

It looks as if a substantial portion of the Mudcat email list has been used to send out a version of the Penny Brown is missing internet hoax. Check out any "urban legend" or "hoax" site for more info. I wish people wouldn't clog email for these things. Check it out first. If the message has anything like "forward this to everyone you know" the probability is extremely high it is a hoax, or worse.

rich r?

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Penny Brown Hoax Google Search

Need I say more?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Sorcha
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 10:54 PM

OK, I understand now. Just checked my e mail. Recieved 2 notices that Penny has been missing "2 weeks and it's not too late". I gather this is a hoax?

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 10:56 PM

Amen. Do people actually think this stuff is legit?

On the other hand, I'm gonna be a multi-millionaire 'cause I'm helping some dead African Presidente's widow "collect" her fortune! Then I'll buy a D-45!

Rick

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 10:59 PM

If it's a hoax then I apologize for any of it. However for those of us not in the know - its always worth the effort to try.

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 11:14 PM

TRUTH OR FICTION story about "Penny Brown."

~Susan

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: khandu
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 11:18 PM

Hey Rick, I will soon be a millionaire myself, helping a deported Nigerian!!! Maybe then we can hob-nob with one another and snub all the Mudcat peons! We can buy twin Martins!

khandu

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Gary T
Date: 24 Feb 02 - 11:30 PM

Dear GUEST:

While I assume you have only the purest and sincerest of motives, I must disagree. The attitude you express is precisely what the hoaxsters are counting on in getting this junk spread around. It's bad enough when our mailboxes get crammed with spam from amoral hucksters with large amounts of greed and little or no consideration for others. It adds insult to injury to get further clogging of the e-mail system from well-meaning but, sorry to say, ignorant and unthinking would-be do-gooders.

First, take an opportunity to get in the know. Go to http://www.snopes2.com/ and learn about hoaxes. And be aware that any message instructing you to "forward to everyone you know" is a scam. That is exactly what turns these things into a sort of self-perpetuating "virus."

Secondly, use some common sense. The message in question says the girl has been missing for two weeks, but IT DOESN'T HAVE A DATE ON IT! Two weeks starting when? It could be a three year old item for all you know. And in this case, she was from South Carolina. This message is getting sent indiscriminately to people in every state in the union and God knows how many countries around the world. What are the odds that someone in Idaho or Germany or wherever would be within a hundred miles of the girl (if she ever existed)? One in a hundred million?

It is not worth the extra effort to try, but mainly it is not worth the KNOWN problems and inconvenience to COUNTLESS numbers of people for something that has essentially ZERO chance of doing ANY good.

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 06:45 AM

Gary T - Fortunately I have not become as cynical as yourself. So when the 'real" thing comes along I'm sure you'll be the same way? Like I said in an apology post that was deleted, I am sorry for not knowing of it being a hoax, but the fact that I tried to do something about it is something I won't apologize for. Maybe 5 seconds of your time was disturbed, that's hardly something I'm worried about.

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Hollowfox
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 07:04 AM

I take it that this is the "Mudcatters help needed" item that was so large that it took up two slots in my e-mail's "junk mail" section?

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From:
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 07:23 AM

Its good that you care Guest, but it really is worth doing a bit of a sanity check on these things before forwarding them, otherwise you risk the 'crying wolf' effect - ie you unwittingly contribute to the general cynicism, and a real request could then be ignored.

Kris

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Steve in Idaho
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 11:30 AM

There are a couple of things people can do if they really care. This is stated quite well in the above posts - if you really care - ensure its legitimacy before sending it on. Otherwise it's just a cheap way of getting out of being responsible for what one does - and then wrapping themselves in a cloak of "I really care."

Horse feathers.

Steve

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 12:29 PM

I received a desperate "please pray" e-mail last year from a member I was just getting to know. Something about it seemed familiar.... but I could not recall what it was that was tickling my memory. I asked the sender, is this someone you know personally? She replied it was a close family member of a close co-worker. But it still bothered me. I questioned it again. And I too got this very defensive "but I care so much" yada yada yada.

So I wrote to the person who I trust the most about the Net and asked, "Wasn't there something about this, didn't you fish up the true story on it back then?" He replied with the Truth or Fiction page for the story, and so I then wrote back to the sender, and advised them that they might want to check with their "very close friend" with a "very close family member" for an update-- because the story she'd sent me was already several years old!

I never heard from that "new friend" again, and I wonder how many other people she has involved in these things since then.

You just have to trust your gut on these. I think I probably watch every true crime show on TV there is. If you could really find missing people through internationally circulated e-mails that give no information about the authorities involved in the case, I think I'd probably have heard about that by now!

So I always check these at Truth or Fiction now before forwarding them on to our prayer chain, or anyone else. And when I get a stinker I just reply to the sender with the Truth or Fiction page, and let them know that if they have better information about the sitiuation, to contact me again. And guess what.... they have always been grateful to get the link to that site, not defensive about the message they've sent me.

One more thing. A Mudcat thread gets many more readers than an e-mail to members with posted addreses. Someone who really wanted to get the word out would have started with a thread, given their name, and mentioned they were also doing an e-mail about it, so that if anyone DID get any information they could forward it to that person.

I think these are a combination of spams for entertainment and spams to collect e-mail addresses. Someone in the chain eventually forwards the whole mess of repeated forwards (and all the addresses left showing), to an address buyer. So when you forward jokes, etc., please-- take off the addresses before you send it on.

~Susan

Subject: RE: Penny Brown Hoax
From: Gary T
Date: 25 Feb 02 - 01:53 PM

Ah, great. So now we not only have countless folks' time wasted (receiving, examining, reading, deleting, discussing, etc.), but our e-mail addresses have been outed from the Mudcat and we can expect more time-wasting and aggravating spam. "The road to hell..."