The result was a charred, soggy mass of mail.
Computer makers can better analyze the masses of e-mail messages that pour into technical support centers.
But whoever's behind it is working quickly to tweak its design, hoping to build a powerful army of machines that can be summoned to pump out masses of e-mail spam, incapacitate corporate websites, or even bring down large chunks of the internet itself.
During the 1998 Microsoft anti-trust trial, the prosecution pored over masses of e-mail, looking for a smoking gun.
"I can confirm that among the mass of e-mails there was an e-mail from Mr. Michael Cohen.
Hours after publication of this column, masses of denunciatory E-mail letters to the editor will arrive at The Times.
With its new mass of e-mail addresses, the A.F.L.-C.I.O. will repeatedly contact members of Working America to get them to send letters and e-mail and make phone calls about many issues.
The supremacist, Donald Bruce McAninch, 45, pleaded not guilty to "threatened use of certain weapons of mass destruction," mail theft and mail fraud.
Paul N. Carlin, a Postal Service veteran who unsuccessfully challenged his firing as postmaster general for what he said was retribution by a corrupt board member but rebounded by starting two lucrative businesses that focused on rapid sorting of mass mail, died April 25 at a hospital in Arlington.
And thus began our mass e-mailing of friends, of friends of friends, of college roommates we hadn't seen in years, of ex-colleagues now living everywhere from Washington to Paris, and of people we had met at dinner parties a few times and thought might be fun to hang out with again.
The cost of three waves of mass mailing was $16,700, not including personnel time in the preparation of address labels and related tasks.
