I like the tool tips above most AI chat boxes…

ChatGPT can make mistakes. Check important info.

And…

Claude can make mistakes. Please double-check responses.

Yes, these are very small plasters on a much bigger issue, but I kind of think that humans should have them too, in email signatures and website footers. A more conscious version of defaults like ‘Sent From My iPhone’.

I’m a big fan of little touches like this in footers and signatures. A fondness shared with finding Easter Eggs in games and movies, and just generally giving little details some love and attention.

(Worryingly, for my memory…) Only now as I write this did I remember the little ‘footer’ that I recently added to mathewwilson.me.

And the slightly less playful but still fully considered footer on printedmatters.club.

I’ve been lazy with my email signature for a long while now, so maybe this is the prompt to sort it out. My unconscious, or was it even Claude, poking at me to put some polish where it’s lacking.

(It’s happening again, an oddly slow and patchy memory…) I can faintly remember playing with the email signatures at With Associates. I think we tried adding a note in our auto out-of-office replies, about where we were going on our holidays, alongside who to contact while we’re away.

The holiday destination was optional (at least I’m sure we wouldn’t have forced it) and I believe it was intended to encourage a little more understanding and empathy from people being annoyed when someone ‘they need’ is away. A subtle nudge to help them realise how the ‘someone they need’, has needs of their own.