It was the war to end all wars. A Blitzkrieg, one could call it. But yesterday Network Services Director Bill Brawley had the last word in the three-day "Blitzwar." When the smoke cleared, nearly 200 emails had been sent over the campus network to 1,336 recipients, according to Brawley.
In the cease-and-desist order issued from the Network Services Network Abuse account, students on the mailing list were informed: "We are tracking complaints regarding a BlitzMail 'war' affecting people on this list. Be forewarned that anyone who engages in BlitzMail 'war' will face disciplinary action and possible suspension of network access privileges."
Students were informed that participation in such a "war" violated school policy and were referred to the "Dartmouth College Information Technology Policy" and the "Principles of Community."
According to Brawley, students participating in the war violated school policies prohibiting the "sending of unsolicited email," and the "use of the network for purposes other than academic business." Brawley acknowledged that the latter leaves a "gray area with plenty of room for interpretation," but that an erroneous mass-email "war" obviously did not qualify as "academic business."
Such high numbers of email being sent over the network are of concern to Network Services because they place an unusually high stress on the intra-campus network, and impede other people from doing their business. The Deans were also concerned, according to Brawley, by the content of specific emails.
Though the "war" seems to have been quelled, with only one email having been sent to the list after the cease-and-desist order, Brawley said, "if that order is not respected, we are probably going to have to have a conversation with these students."
The "war" started when a routine sorority email was mistakenly sent by Cindy Garcia '05 to a nearly 1,400-person blitz list instead of just her house. Garcia promptly sent out a follow-up blitz apologizing for the mistake, and yet another explaining how she had sent her message about cleaning her house's T.V. room to the wrong blitz list.
"I sincerely apologize for the 'blitz war,'" her second explanation blitz said. "Thinking it was a blitz to my sisters I didn't suppress it...at the same time I had no idea it was such a huge list. Again my apologies."
Garcia was unavailable for comment.
The subsequent blitzes included requests to be removed from the list, commentaries on the war in Iraq, discussions of the Easter bunny, homophobic remarks, attached video files, jokes, requests for beer pong partners and one person who even asked if anyone wanted to have dinner.
However, of the total recipient list, only a small percentage actually actively participated in the "war." The rest of the people were merely recipients, and many got annoyed by the unending string of emails.
In fact, it wasn't until students began complaining to Network Services, sending emails to the abuse account, that Brawley and company were made aware of the three-day war.
"The messages alone probably wouldn't have tripped any alarms for us," Brawley said, "because there's no proactive searching for things like this. It was more because of the complaints we started receiving that we took action."
Lindsey Pryor '05, a recipient of the numerous blitzes, expressed a similar sentiment to many of the innocent legatees. By the end, she was "just deleting them" unread, she said.
"These people are sad for wasting so much time on it," she said.
And as the sun rises on the first peaceful day over the Blitzmail, battlefield, it appears as though most everyone else agrees.
