Salgaonkar Nicodemus

The CC field in an email stands for Carbon Copy, while the BCC field stands for Blind Carbon Copy. If these terms don’t make any sense with respect to an email, don’t worry. In this article, we’ll explain the context, why you need CC and BCC in email and when to use these fields.

You see, back in the old days when most communication was done on paper. If you had to create a physical copy of a letter, you had to insert something known as a carbon paper between two sheets of paper. Here’s what that would look like.

[Holger.Ellgaard / CC BY-SA]

With this arrangement, anything that you wrote or typed on the top sheet of paper would get imprinted through the carbon paper onto the button sheet of paper. The bottom sheet of the paper would then be known as the “Carbon Copy” of the original.

As the communication slowly changed from paper over to email over the years, there was a need to send a “carbon copy” of an email to someone. That’s how the CC field was born.

In effect, the CC field in an email allows the sender to send a “carbon copy” of the email to someone apart from the recipient in the To: field of the email. The CC field in email lets you keep recipients in the loop.

For example, let’s say you are sending an email to a prospective client with the project quote. You want to send a copy of your email to your manager, so that he is kept in the loop. In this case, you will enter the prospective client’s email address in the To: field and your manager’s email address in the CC: field.

BCC stands for Blind Carbon Copy. Just like how CC works in an email, BCC is used to send a carbon copy of the email to someone. However, unlike CC, there is a major difference in the way BCC works.

When you CC an email to someone, the recipients in both the To field and the CC field are able to see the email addresses of each other. In the above example, the prospective client can see that your manager has been CC’d in the email. To avoid this, i.e. if you want to keep the carbon copy recipients private, you need to use the BCC field.

All email addresses that are mentioned in the BCC field are kept hidden, so recipients in the TO and CC field are unable to see them.

From a technical point of view, the CC field works exactly like the TO field in email. That is, it makes no difference whether you include an email address in the TO field or in the CC field — the email is delivered to the recipients and each of them can view the other’s email address. So why do you need the CC field?

It really just boils down to email etiquette. When composing the email, the TO field is for those recipients who the email is directly intended for. On the other hand, the CC field is for those recipients who are receiving the email as a courtesy or so that they are kept in the loop.

Generally speaking, if you receive an email where you’re mentioned in the CC field, no action is expected from you.

The BCC field is very unlike the CC field, and actually has a bunch of use cases. As the email addresses mentioned in the BCC field stay private and hidden, here are some examples where you can use BCC to your own advantage.

The CC field allows you to send a copy of the email with any recipient of your choice. In most cases, the CC field is used to keep someone in the loop, or to share the same email with them. Unfortunately, this creates a literal copy of the same email in the recipient’s inbox. Imagine the state of your manager’s inbox if you were to CC him onto every outgoing email that you send. This is a quick-fire way to clutter your inbox.

Not just that, CC’d emails also take up unnecessary storage space in the email account. If the email has attachments, copies of those attachments are created and delivered to every recipient mentioned in the TO and CC fields. Imagine how much storage space is wasted this way.

Lastly, if you use an email service that charges per email sent (such as Amazon’s SES), you are wasting a credit for every recipient mentioned in the CC field. So what are the alternatives to CC in email?

An African secret society that originated in the eighteenth century in Calabar, a section of Nigeria around the Niger River delta. The name means "leopard" and referred to a mysterious forest being that could be seen only by the initiates. On those occasions when the "leopard" was brought to town for ceremonies, the people could not see the animal but could hear its tremendous roar. Whenever an Ekpe day was announced, slaves, women, and children would remove themselves from the area of the ceremony, as the messenger of Ekpe, armed with a heavy whip, went through the village and lashed everyone he encountered.

The society was divided into eleven grades, of which the first three were not open to slaves. Members, as a rule, bought themselves into the higher grades in their turn, and the money thus obtained was shared among the Nyampa, who formed the inner circle. The king was president of the society under the title of Cyamba. Each grade had its special festival day, on which their Idem or spirit-master exercised complete control.

The Idem was usually a hermit who lived in the distant bush, and when he appeared it was in a fantastic guise of mats and branches that covered him from head to foot, and with a black mask on his face. The principals of the order were linked together by a garb of leaves so gathered up that they seemed to move in a connected mass. Ethnologist L. Froebenius observes:

"The Order of Free Egbos, is said to have originated at the fairs which were held at a great palm-oil market in the interior, midway between Calabar and the Kamerun. As the place became the scene of much disorder, while the European trade made it necessary for the maintenance of public credit that all engagements should be strictly carried out, this institution was formed as a sort of Hanseatic Union under the most influential traders, for the mutual safe-guarding of their interests. Later it acquired the political character of a Vehmgericht or secret tribunal, by bringing within its sphere of action the whole police of the Calabars and the Kamerun. The kings always sought to secure for themselves the Grand-mastership of the Order, since otherwise their authority would sink to a mere shadow. European skippers have frequently found it to their advantage to be enrolled in the lower grades, in order thereby the more easily to recover their debts. A member of the Egbo has the right to claim as his own property the slave of his debtor, wherever he may find him, merely by fastening a yellow strip to his dress or loincloth. Even in the interior of the continent the standing of an Egbo is still respected and feared, and affords one a certain immunity from molestation, such as is absolutely needed for the extensive commercial speculations in Africa.

"In the Kamerun, as a preliminary to their acceptance into the Free Egbos, the young men are sent for a protracted period to the Mokokos, a bush tribe in the interior; with these they live naked in the fields, and only now and then dart out, clad in green leaves, to have a bath in the river. All women, and especially slaves, are prohibited, under heavy penalties, from approaching the forest where they reside. In the Kamerun, it is customary to pay particular honour to a visitor, above all if he be a European, by introducing the Egbo goat, which the people are otherwise seldom allowed to set eyes upon.

"Holman reports that the whole of the Old Calabar district is subject to the rule of the so-called Egbo laws. These are promulgated at a secret Council, the Egbo Assembly, which is held in the 'Palaver-house' erected for this special purpose. In virtue of his sovereign rights, the head-chief presides, under the title of Cyamab, over this assembly. Amongst the members of the Egbo there are different ranks, which must be acquired in their due order, one after the other. Holman quotes Englishmen who state that Europeans have bought themselves into the Egbo, and even into the Yampai, in order to be thus better able to get in their money. He gives the following as the names and prices of the different grades of Egbo:

1 Abungo 125 bars

2 Aboko 75 bars

3 Makairo 440 copper bars

4 Bakimboko 100 bars

5 Yampai 850 copper bars

"To these must be added rum, clothes, membo, etc. The Yampai is the only grade whose members are allowed to sit in Council. The sums paid for the various titles of the Egbo are distributed exclusively amongst the Yampai, who, however, are not limited to a single share, since every Yampai can multiply his title as often as he can purchase shares, and these give him a claim to the receipt of the corresponding quotas from the profits of the whole institution."

The society emerged as a powerful force in nineteenth-century Calabar society and is still quite strong, though it must now compete with Christianity and a host of new religions for the hearts of the people. Much of the ceremony and belief of the society remains a secret kept from outsiders.

In the UK, chilli is the preferred spelling, and chilli pepper is quite common. Bell peppers are called green/red/yellow peppers as well. In New Zealand and Australia, we tend to use chilli/chilli pepper, and green/red/yellow capsicum. Most people mean the green variety if capsicum is used on its own.

The average cost of product liability insurance for products in a low-risk category is about $025 per each $100 in revenue