About a year and a half ago I engaged in a discussion on this topic. Things have accelerated since then, but I thought I would post what I wrote. In recent months, my email box hasn’t been any emptier, it’s just become much less relevant to me. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this…
3/31/08
I don’t really believe we need to ask the question “is email dying?” I think it’s already dead as we knew it, and we just haven’t unplugged the life support yet.
Can email be a part of an integrated digital communication world? Perhaps. But the fact that many businesses seem to depend on it now really has no bearing on its future. As has been suggested, I remember hearing people tell me that email won’t have any impact on snail mail because people still like to put pen to paper. Yet here we are, and I doubt any of us has written a real letter of late. (I am guessing that older people were also inclined to dismiss the ball point pen, because people were familiar with hearing the scratch of the nib on paper…)
The clue in where this is going lies in the lives of today’s “digital natives”. Most of the faces I see fighting for email look like mine (though you all are much better looking!)…30’s, 40’s 50’s and up. This world is going to be ruled by our digitally native kids, and they are a generation that WILL NOT be told how to communicate….believe me. You try getting a hold of these students via email and Rip van Winkie will have slept twice before you get a response.
What do you think?
Comments
Powered by Facebook Comments
This may be a bit off the point, but I was raised to write “official” thank you letters. I just finished writing one, as a matter of fact. My handwriting has become so messy, I now type them on the computer, print and mail them. Wonder if Miss Manners would consider that “official?” On the other hand, my daughter apparently doesn’t like my mug popping up on her Facebook, so has asked me to e-mail her.
Email is just forwarding and storing a written note. As long as people have work to do and as long as their memories are limited, we will always have something to fill this function. If it’s not ’email’ it will be something that does the same thing. Facebook still has email.
I use cellphones, email, Facebook, my blog and snail mail. Mostly snail mail is for older relatives who are quickly departing and leaving me with no audience for the handwritten word. I tend to always include a personal handwritten note in cards and other things that I mail to friends as well. There is nothing like a note/letter. It’s fun to have them to look at years later when they turn up in a drawer, etc. That will not be the case with electronic forms. I do worry that those who are so used to texting will never learn how to spell or write a coherent paragraph, they are so accustomed to initializing everything and abbreviations that it is normal to them.
I ONLY use email to communicate with folks who I can’t communicate with in any OTHER net-based fashion. In other words, it’s my LAST CHOICE of net-based communications media.