It is almost end of the year. Emails are coming from a bunch of suppliers, all of them wishing Happy Holidays. Even the organization for which I work goes the extra mile to make a web page with a video for the holidays. A co-worker (different lab) asked if I’ve seen the video. He said that the focus is on sports, and new constructions that took place during the year. It is clear to me that for alumni, it would be a great video.

I’m not sure what companies expect us to do with a happy-holidays email. There is no action for me to take. There is no promotion listed. There is no announcement of new products.

These things caught my attention among the happy-holiday emails:

• The ones including a photo of employees are nice yet I happened to spot one company that seem to have zero minorities
• Listing a link to visit their happy-holidays web page is useless.
• Animations or use of flash is annoying.
• (update 12/30) Sending emails about ‘happy holidays’ on the 28th of December (or later) seems a bit silly