by: Rodrick Joseph

Jan Rodgers was a writer for an Atlanta news station. She spends most of her time on her computer, which can lead to the occasional online shopping frenzy. Jan also checks her email frequently and noticed that her inbox was being overloaded with spam and ad emails. So, she took time out of her day to unsubscribe from Wal-Mart, Bed Bath & Beyond, PetCo, L’oreal, American Eagle, Sears, and even Victoria’s Secret. Each time she’d unsubscribe, a message would tell her, “You have successfully unsubscribed from the Kohl’s Sale Alerts email list.” Jan then went about her day and did not check her email for the rest of the night.

The next day, Jan started her day off by drinking her usual cup of coffee with cream in her favorite Harry Potter Gryffindor coffee mug. She logs on to her computer to check her email, expecting that her email won’t be filled with advertisements and spam email. She has 15 unread emails waiting for her. Ten out of the fifteen emails were from the companies she just unsubscribed from. She quickly unsubscribed from the companies email list again and thought to herself, “Maybe it takes a couple of days to remove me from the list.”



The next few weeks seemed to be a nightmare Jan couldn’t wake up from. It was a constant process of unsubscribing from emails. It seemed as if the emails were coming in more often than when she started the process.



6 weeks after her initial unsubscribing process, Jan had 1,200 unread emails and the majority of them were ads. Jan was losing her hair, putting on weight, and altogether not taking care of herself. The emails devoured her and her complete attention.



Finally, after going and seeing her psychologist, Jan decided to delete her email and get a fresh one.



After one day of the new email, the ads were back. Jan couldn’t handle it as she threw all her electronics into the nearby river.



Weeks later, Jan began obtaining more and more paper ads in the mail. And she was receiving telemarketing calls. It was never going to end for Jan.



She eventually sold her house. And retreated to the countryside to live the remainder of her days in the woods. Years went by as Jan was enjoying her ad-free life. But one day, as she is gathering wood for a fire, she sees a man walking through the woods. The man is wearing a white shirt, black tie, black dress pants, and glasses. Jan tries to avoid the man but he spots her and comes up to talk to her. He begins by saying, “Miss, Miss, are you alone.” Jan mumbles and says, “yes, please leave me alone.” The man quickly replies with, “have you heard of the good word?”



Jan drops to her knees and dies. The man rushed her to the hospital and the doctors concluded she died of running from ads. A common death in 2050



Don’t unsubscribe from emails. It will kill you.

​Satire.



