When I got in to work this morning, the office was in a tizzy because an email had circulated about "Bill 602P" that would add a 5c tax to every email. I'd gotten it before a year or two ago from an intelligent friend that I would have liked to think would have been able to see through it. At the risk of being sued by a fraud for copyright infringement, I'll post it below in its entirety. In the interest of hanging on to my readers, I'll talk about it first and save them the trouble of skipping through it. Anyway, a brief synopsis:

In addition to raising the costs of stamps, congress is also considering in an unnoticed bill adding a 5-cent tax to every email sent to make up for lost revenue. It speaks of a lawyer that is fighting it without pay and a congressman that says the tax is just the begining and a newspaper that endorses the idea. The email suggests that the reader ask their representative to vote 'no' and, of course, forward the letter to everyone they know.

As hoaxes go, this one has an appeal because there has always been the fear that the government will find a way to take what used to cost us money (mail) and make it cost money again. Since it's going through email, it's send directly to people who would be affected by the changes and therefore would be more concerned (ie paranoid) about it. However, the idea itself is incredibly far-fetched when you think about it. Any vote that involved something that would tax people between $10-30 a month or more would not go unnoticed. You would not be hearing about it from an email. Generally, you can count on one party to be for something and the other against it. The only exceptions are when the government is giving money, not taking it, and even then one party of the other will line up against it. The hoaxers are obviously hoping that the readers wouldn't really think about it, and judging by their success, it paid off. It manages to do this, in part, by making the struggle a story.

The story of the hoax has a hero. His name is Richard Stepp and he is a DC lawyer who is fighting this on his own time. You respect him and admire him. You want to believe that there are people out there who would defend us like that, for not a penny. You ignore the fact that there would be a real movement against such a tax because it would hurt a lot of businesses and they have money and lobbyists. Stepp even has a law firm! It's got his name on it *(in some of the emails, it didn't make it through others)! If there was a Stepp who was a lawyer, he would have a firm and the firm would have his name on it. The other two names (Gorman and Berger) are Jewish, making it sound even more like a law firm.

The story of the hoax also has more villains than you can shake a stick at. Even better, they're targets that the people are already skeptical of! Complaints about the post office are endless, so it's not really difficult for people to believe that they would make up for lost revenue by charging for a service they don't provide. The second villain is Congressman Schnell, who not only supports the tax but wants another $20-40 surcharge on Internet access. Schnell has the advantage of even sounding like a creep (though this is both good and bad, more later). Congress in general are also culprits as they looked poised to pass the bill and may consider sinister Schnell's idea of yet another charge. The third villain is the media, which have largely ignored the story or, in the one case of The Washingtonian, endorsed the email tax. The poor Washingtonian, a real publication that focuses on human interest and not politics, has recieved so many inquiries they have this disclaimer permanently on their web site. The beauty of choosing the Washingtonian is that no one has ever heard of it, but it has a ring of "Washington insider" to it.

They also cleverly used a series of devices that buttressed its credibility. take this passage:

"The US Postal Service is claiming lost revenue, due to the poliferation of E-mail, is costing nearly $230,000,000 in revenue per year. You may have noticed their recent ad campaign: "There is nothing like a letter.""

The ad campaign's connection to lost revenue in this alternate universe is slight, but the mere mention of a familiar-sounding ad campaign ads to its credibility. People subconsciously think "And I thought it was just a commercial. They were really just trying to kill e-mail with it! Those sly SOBs..." Additionally, the letter slyly reminds the reader that those "SOBs" recently raised postage rates again -- and more than usual. Also, the assigning of a political party to Schnell in addition to a name make him seem more real. How can Schnell not exist, it says here he's a Republican. Cognitive dissonance supports the idea that the congressman, the letter, and the bill are real.

Unfortunately for the hoaxers, they made a series of mistakes in their work that rang several bells for me when I first got it. Their goal was ambitious (and their charge not-so-credible), so I won't fault them for that. Instead I will focus on the delivery. What first caught my attention is the name of the bill. Many people would notice that 602P isn't like most bill names that they might hear about, which begin in "HR" or "S" and are not followed by a letter. If they were to have simply made it HR2341 it most likely would not have stuck out in my mind. Another idea might have been to attach names to it. Make it the "Schnell-Harris Postal Compensatory Act" or "Schnell Amendment" to an HR or something. It's possible that the 602P was derived from the original Canadian and it wasn't changed when it was ported to the US. If true, it still probably should have been changed.

That brings me to the second flaw, the villainous Congressman Paul Schnell. While Schnell sounds kind of creepy and autocratic and that might help the reader get a vision of him, it also might raise some suspicion because it is an odd name and sounds like a villain. On the other hand, a county executive named Loy Sneary made a credible run for congress down here recently, and Loy Sneary screams "villain." So maybe not. It does seem to me that using a real congressman or one with a more generic name (Matthew Stevens, for instance, avoid Smiths or Joneses) One area that really did catch my attention was that they never attributed Schnell to a state. They simply said "Paul Schnell (R)." Leaving aside the partisan complaint that this bill would more likely come from a Democratic sponsor, putting Schnell in a big state where even its citizens don't know all the congressman would have been more prudent. As an added benefit, "Paul Schnell (R-NY)" or "Matthew Stevens (R-NY)" would leave Democrats saying "damn Republicans" and Republicans saying "damn New Yorkers" and he would keep his villain status. In any case, it's not all that common to see a party affiliation without a state. It's worth noting that the Canadian version of Paul Schnell is given both a party (Liberal) and province (New Brunswick).

It's worth noting that if they had gone with a real (but unrelated) bill and its real congressional sponsor, it could have taken much more time and effort to check its validity. The hoaxers weren't thinking that far ahead, though. Especially considering there are Schnells and bills in two countries. It's also possible that even if they had really tried, it wouldn't have lead to a substantial increase in people who fell for it. With a little tweaking, I would have been more worried as I was looking into it, but I still would have looked into it and discovered it as the hoax it was. It's still fun to think about, though. It had better be since I'm not exactly getting paid to.

Here is the email in its entirety (supplied by DataFellows.com and edited to the one my coworkers got):

Postage will go up the end of June 2002 from 34 cents to 37 cents.
It will be up from 9% to 12% rate increase.

But this isn't all. No more free E-mail! I guess the warnings were
true. Federal Bill 602P wants us to pay 5-cents per E-mail Sent.
It figures! No more free E-mail! We knew this was coming!! Bill
602P will permit the Federal Government to charge a 5-cent
charge on every delivered E-mail. Please read the following
carefully if you intend to stay online and continue using E-mail.

The last few months have revealed an alarming trend in the
Government of the United States attempting to quietly push
through legislation that will affect our use of the Internet.
Under proposed legislation, the US Postal Service will be
attempting to bill E-mail users out of "alternative postage
fees". Bill 602P will permit the Federal Government to charge a
5-cent surcharge on every E-Mail delivered, by billing Internet
Service Providers at source. The consumer would then be billed
in turn by the ISP.

Washington DC lawyer Richard Stepp is working without pay to
prevent this legislation from becoming law. The US Postal
Service is claiming lost revenue, due to the proliferation of
E-mail, is costing nearly $230,000,000 in revenue per year. You
may have noticed their recent ad campaign: "There is nothing
like a letter." Since the average person received about 10
pieces of E-mail per day in 1998, the cost of the typical
individual would be an additional 50 cents a day - or over $180
per year - above and beyond their regular Internet costs. Note
that this would be money paid directly to the US Postal Service
for a service "they do not even provide".

The whole point of the Internet is democracy and
non-interference. You are already paying an exorbitant price for
snail mail because of bureaucratic efficiency. It currently
takes up to 6 days for a letter to be delivered from coast to
coast. If the US Postal Service is allowed to tinker with
E-mail, it will mark the end of the "free" Internet in the
United States.

Our congressional representative, Tony Schnell (R) has even
suggested a "$20-$40 per month surcharge on all Internet
service" above and beyond the governments proposed E-mail
charges. Note that most of the major newspapers have ignored the
story - the only exception being the Washingtonian - which
called the idea of E-mail surcharge "a useful concept who's time
has come" (March 6th, 1999 Editorial).

Do not sit by and watch your freedom erode away! Send this to
E-mail to EVERYONE on your list, and tell all your friends and
relatives write their congressional representative and say "NO"
to Bill 602P. It will only take a few moments of your time and
could very well be instrumental in killing a bill we do not want
!!!!!"

"SAY NO!!!!!! to BILL 602P"