On January 1, 2005, a certain web user sent a peice of electronic mail. It read: "So you left that hopeless company, you're no longer single and you got around to taking up all those new hobbies? Congratulations!
"But this is your work email address, and you're sitting on your own using a computer.
"Not only a loser, but a liar too. Shame."
Seems a bit harsh, doesn't it? But don't worry, there is little doubt that the message's recipient will understand. After all, he wrote it.
A novel website, FutureMe.org, allows anyone with an email account and an internet connection to send an email to the future?specifically, to their future selves.
The letter can be delivered on any date between 30 days and 30 years later. Each letter must be marked public or private. No one sees private letters until they are delivered. Public letters are posted, anonymously, on FutureMe. A mechanism exists whereby a person can change the email address to which their letter is sent.
Matt Sly, a Williams College graduate, thought up the idea of FutureMe on a jog a few years ago. Recalling school assignments in which he was asked to write to himself in the future, he came up with the idea of the web site. With his friend Jay Patrikios, he crafted FutureMe, which went online in 2002.
Although traffic was slow at first, it has picked up over the last few years. "We're about 25,000 hits a day right now," Sly said in an email. That adds up to "between 200 and 500 letters" sent every day.
The letters that are publicly accessible?and there are many of them?range from the amusing ("Dear Scott, That rooster you hated so much died just a couple nights ago. Remember? We got home, he was crowing, and all of us sudden, URK!!! just keeled over and died. You were practically gleeful.") to the questioning ("Dear FutureMe, i hope you have come out yet...how did that go? i am really worried on how dad will react, im hoping mom is going to be fine...its weird everyday it seems harder to be gay in this world...") to the utterly mundane ("Dear FutureMe, Time to renew your greencard. Good luck.")
Most of the emails are in English. Others are written in French, Spanish, German, Italian, and other foreign tongues.
Whle some letters are moving and profound, and while others are shallow and unremarkable, all reveal something about their authors. And, perhaps taken as a whole, the letters represent something greater.
Although FutureMe.org was intended for people to send letters to themselves, people use it to send small notes and lengthy diatribes to their family, friends, and ex-significant others. Perusing those letters sent to ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends, it seems the you-broke-my-heart-I-hope-you're-happy letters are particularly popular.
Recently the web site has received a spate of press coverage. Articles about FutureMe.org have appeared in the Washington Post, Wired, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Boston Globe, and other press outlets. According to Sly's personal website, the story has appeared in "hundreds of publications. And I mean hundreds." In January of this year, Sly was a guest on NPR's Weekend America show. He was also recently interviewed on CNN.
FutureMe's increased visibility prompted about a million hits a day for short time. The idea of being able to speak to one's future self appeared to intrigue a lot people.
The press coverage, however, has not really affected Sly or Patrikios.
"Ultimately, things haven't changed all that much," Sly said. "We're not making huge bucks?you won't see a BMW with a 'FutureMe' vanity plate any time soon. But the minor celebrity status that lasted for a few weeks was certainly fun, if a bit surreal."
Sly and Patrikios are closing a book deal soon in which the top letters appearing on the site will be published.
"We never, ever thought FM would garner this kind of popularity. It was really just a fun project we did in a spare time over a couple of weeks," Sly added.
The web site now is wholly automatic, according to Sly.
"The site runs itself right now. There is an automated script that runs every night that sends out the letters from the database," he explained. "We're kind of irrelevant at this point."
They expect FutureMe.org to continue sending out letters for the foreseeable future. In ensuring the web site's continued existence, Sly and Patrikios ensure that some unknown man or woman can receive a pleasant, hopeful, uplifting birthday message from his or her past self: "Dear FutureMe, I hope all is well, and you're not on crack. Happy Birthday!"