MoodWatch

Overview of the Feature
Changing the Settings
Potential Problems

Overview

MoodWatch (or "Mood Watch" as it appears on a Macintosh) is an optional feature that looks for potentially offensive text in e-mail messages. E-mail is so easy to use that many people have had the experience of composing and immediately sending off a message, only to have second thoughts about the tone or wording a moment later. . . when it's too late.

MoodWatch graphically indicates the tone of a message on a graduated scale, using using an ice cube for an inoffensive message, and one to three red chili peppers (with three peppers being the "hottest") for potentially offensive messages. It looks at not just profanity, but tries to assess the overall tone of a message.

You can set MoodWatch to do any combination of the following things:

Check the text of your incoming messages.

Check the text of your outgoing messages.

Warn you if you try to send a message at or above a chosen level of "heat."

Delay sending your message automatically if it is at or above a chosen level of "heat."

As delivered through Bear Access, Eudora will rate both incoming and outgoing messages (you will see an ice cube or chili peppers next to the Send button as you compose messages, and there is a new column in your mailboxes) and will (usually) mark the questionable language, similar to the way the spell checker marks unrecognized words. As delivered, Eudora will warn you when you try to send a "hot" message, but it will not delay sending the message.

CIT's evaluation of MoodWatch indicates that it is of limited value, and may lead to confusion and other complications. See the section on potential problems below for more details.

Changing the Settings

To change any MoodWatch settings:

On a Macintosh, go to the Special menu and choose Settings. Scroll down in the left scroll area and select Mood Watch.
In Windows, go to the Tools menu and choose Options. Scroll down in the left scroll area and select MoodWatch.

With Enable MoodWatch you can turn MoodWatch off completely by clearing the checkbox.
Warn when queuing/sending simply shows you a message (the three varieties are shown below) when you try to send a message that has earned sufficient peppers. When you click Send Anyway the message is sent.

Delay when queuing/sending is a little trickier. It does NOT show you a message (unless you also have the "Warn" setting turned on), but when you try to send a message that meets or exceeds the pepper threshhold you've set, instead of sending your message it acts as if you had set Eudora to send your message ten minutes later. (See the page on Queuing Messages for more information on how this works.) See the section on potential problems below for details on what makes this risky to use..
Scanning Mail comes in two flavors. You can choose to have neither, either one, or both. The first box indicates whether incoming messages should be scanned as they arrive. The second box indicates whether mail already stored in Eudora should be scanned so that a rating may be assigned to it (although background scanning may slow your computer down, as described below).

Potential Problems

First, some users at Cornell have been confused by the use of chili peppers, since Project Salsa (which works through Bear Access to ensure you have the most recent files) also uses a chili pepper theme (including Agent Harry, a pepper wearing a sombrero and serape). These two kinds of peppers are completely unrelated.
Using the delay setting could have unexpected consequences. If you turn off Eudora (or disconnect from the network) before the message is sent, it will not be sent until the next time you have an active connection and start Eudora. This means it is possible for you to think you've sent a message, but you haven't (yet). If you choose to use a delay setting, be careful to check for any unsent messages before you quit Eudora or terminate your internet connection.
If you have background scanning of stored messages turned on, you may find that at some times your computer seems to be acting very slowly. This may be due to the background scanning, which can occur any time you have Eudora running, even if you are working in another program. We recommend that you turn this off.
Because Mood Watch tries to assess the overall tone of your message (rather than looking for specific profanity), it sometimes assigns chili peppers to words or phrases in odd ways. Fortunately, since the feature underlines the words it is reacting to, you can locate them and choose a different phrasing if you wish. Unfortunately, many users have found that the underlined words look very much like words flagged by the spell checker and then wonder why correctly spelled words are marked.

Unless you have a tendency to write and send e-mail messages without considering the tone of your message, CIT recommends that you turn MoodWatch off completely.

Last modified: May 24, 2007