This amusing article recounts the efforts of a Cleary partner to ban those "out of office" email messages. According to that partner, the messages are acceptable only while the lawyer is on a long flight, and even then the lawyer must identify in the message when she will land what time zone she will be in. (What happens once voicemail and Skype are available during flights?)
It made me recall an incident many years ago when my practice group leader (formerly of Cleary, by coincidence), announced that when we circulated internal memos about our vacations we could not announce that "I will not be checking voicemail." Checking email was mandatory, we were told. One associate piped up to say that she was going to vacation in a part of Provence that still used rotary dial phones -- that she couldn't access voicemail because she couldn't push the buttons that generate the tones by which you navigate through voicemail. The practice group head announced that he would stop by Radio Shack and buy her a phone tone generator that she could take with her and then place over the mouthpiece. We all sat in stunned silence.