A mainstay of bad fiction and soap opera scripts is the "rich, unknown relative dies and leaves protagonist a fortune" scenario. I think I've discovered an updated parallel to that, and a more realistic one, as it's happening to me. This scenario could be deservingly called "rich, well-known corporation suddendly starts sending mailings to protagonist addressed 'dear stockholder'." It sounds like something out of a get rich scheme, something you'd find buried in the testimonials section of a piece of spam.

About a year ago, I got a big envelope full of information about the acquisition of a well-known homepage provider by a well-known search engine. And they wanted me to vote. It confused the hell out of me. I tried to call them, but the snooty woman in Investor Relations wouldn't return my calls and so I just forgot about it.. Then today I get a big purple package from the other company, the one who did the acquiring. They want me to vote on their next board of directors.

This strikes me as somewhat odd behavior for large, wealthy corporations to be engaging in. It had been my impression that stock was something that you needed an employment contract or cash to garner. I have my theories about where and how I got it, but I can't figure out why they gave it to me if they weren't going to tell me. Maybe they secretly dispersed the majority of the stock among volunteers, without telling them, in order to prevent some evil wealthy bastard from having a controlling share. That would be pretty much ideal. I certainly hope that's it.