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Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

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Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#51

Post by overgard »

soyiuz wrote: post #46
overgard wrote: post #43

I'm one of those people with a bajillion unread emails -- 15,615 at the moment, but I feel like this is manufacturing a problem I don't have. Inbox zero or whatever does nothing for me. Here's like a sample of things I haven't bothered to click: "YMCA membership survey", "Recommended coursera courses", "grubhub order", "Mailing list update for a blog I read sometimes". These aren't really things I feel any sort of pr…

Hmm. The problem with that approach is that among many things that mean nothing in your inbox, there are some that are quite meaningful. And these have the potential to get lost among the noise.

They don't get lost -- I'm quite literally saying this is not a problem for me. I have no intention of prescribing how other people should organize their email, because I can't imagine any universe where I would actually care about that, but this extremely long winded essay about how the way I'm doing it is wrong strikes me as absurd. I also think it's pretty weird someone would take the time to diagnose my apparent character flaws based on my email habits, and then propose solutions. Uh, thanks? Of all the world's problems focusing on why some people leave email unread seems borderline OCD.

Not to mention that a lot of the author's inferences are pretty insulting. "This means that when someone asks you to do a thing, you probably aren’t going to do it. You’re going to pretend to commit to it, and then you’re going to flake out when push comes to shove. You’re going to keep context-switching until all the deadlines have passed." Wow, really, you got all of that because I didn't bother to hit "Mark Read" on my grubhub order confirmation?

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#52

Post by dack »

cortesoft wrote: post #6

I never mark email as read, nor do I move it out of my inbox. I have something like 800k unread emails in my inbox. However, I don't need to 'declare email bankruptcy' nor do I need to clear out my inbox.. I just don't pay any attention to the read or unread status. My inbox IS my archive. My system is this: When I check my email, I make sure I mark the most recent email as read. Then, I look back until I find the ne…

You're just talking semantics here - you have a different definition of "read email" and "archive" than the author. The article is just explaining how to process all of your email and take action on the relevant portion, which you seem to have under control just fine.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#53

Post by dack »

overgard wrote: post #51
soyiuz wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm. The problem with that approach is that among many things that mean nothing in your inbox, there are some that are quite meaningful. And these have the potential to get lost among the noise.

They don't get lost -- I'm quite literally saying this is not a problem for me. I have no intention of prescribing how other people should organize their email, because I can't imagine any universe where I would actually care about that, but this extremely long winded essay about how the way I'm doing it is wrong strikes me as absurd. I also think it's pretty weird someone would take the time to diagnose my apparent…

Many people have a legitimate problem handling their email and drop things on the floor they wish they didn't. It doesn't sound like you're one of those people, so the article wasn't for you, and that's fine.

For me _personally_, I archive the unimportant emails (like a grubhub order) so I don't waste time scanning over it next time i check my email. If I never archive it, I might end up scanning over it several times for no reason, and with keyboard shortcuts I can hit "x y j" once and not have deal with it again.

Your way is fine too. I just think some people really do need help being more organized and I thought the article did a pretty good job of talking about the non-technical problems many of them (but not you) have.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#54

Post by orblivion »

One thing I would say in disagreement is that you can use filters and labels to your advantage even with this mentality. I agree that keeping things labeled and archived hasn't done me much good. Lately what I do instead is use filters to label things by category, just so I can archive them faster. As I archive, I also remove the label. For instance, "Newsletter", "Transaction", etc. When I look at a bunch of things of one type, I don't have to make as big a context switch between them, and I can quickly determine which I care about. ("Recruiter" is a fun filter that is a perpetual work in progress.)

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#55

Post by gammaflow »

Sophistifunk wrote: post #45
stegosaurus wrote: post #15

I actually wish e-mail were used more. I want my relatives, my spouse, my friends to use e-mail. I'm not quite sure how to convince them, though. It generally feels like they'd rather use Facebook or WhatsApp or whatever's in fashion at the moment. Any tips? Do I just have to sign up to all of the different chat apps and write bots to forward them to me or something?

Delete your Facebook. There are a more benefits than being able to email; you'll stop pretending to be friends with those kids from high school, don't see your ex's new life, and you can get drunk with your friends without your aunt knowing.

I would do this but sadly I was dumb enough to use it with OAuth in numerous places

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#56

Post by overgard »

dack wrote: post #53
overgard wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't get lost -- I'm quite literally saying this is not a problem for me. I have no intention of prescribing how other people should organize their email, because I can't imagine any universe where I would actually care about that, but this extremely long winded essay about how the way I'm doing it is wrong strikes me as absurd. I also think it's pretty weird someone would take the time to diagnose my apparent…

Many people have a legitimate problem handling their email and drop things on the floor they wish they didn't. It doesn't sound like you're one of those people, so the article wasn't for you, and that's fine. For me _personally_, I archive the unimportant emails (like a grubhub order) so I don't waste time scanning over it next time i check my email. If I never archive it, I might end up scanning over it several time…

I would have zero issues if he was just proposing a solution to a problem that some people have, but he hasn't done that. He's suggested that using email in certain ways is incorrect and that it implies bad things about you.

"In other words: The thing you are bad at is saying ‘no’ to people. "

For fucks sake.

I'd also have no issues if this was on like the third page, but the fact it has this many upvotes suggests people agree with this, which makes me wonder: 1) WHY do you all care about other people's inbox habits? How does this impact you? Why do you even think it's your business in the least bit? 2) WHY do you presume you can actually infer anything important about a person based on that, to the point of saying some very insulting things about their character?

The author seems to believe we all inhabit the same bizarre world he does, where apparently most email is worthless, and yet your response to this apparently worthless stream of information implies many things about your character with a great deal of certainty. Like, what the fuck? Maybe there's a common sense middle ground where I get email notifications about things that don't require much action but are somewhat valuable to have, and I can read fast enough to parse the important things in a few seconds without having to spend significant time thinking about my email process.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#57

Post by jes5199 »

> but the defining characteristic of email is that it is the primary mode of communication that we use, both professionally and personally, when we are asking someone else to perform a task.

what the fuck. This is so specious. I don't use email this way at all.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#58

Post by Puts »

The reason nothing has replaced email yet, even tough it's an old and clonky protocol is because it's an open standard and people don't make standards any more. Today you make services (most often based on HTTP because it's a protocol any 20yr old junior programmer can handle) that are locked in, harvesting has much data about it's users as possible desperately hoping that it could monetize on this data one day.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#59

Post by rtpg »

cortesoft wrote: post #6

I never mark email as read, nor do I move it out of my inbox. I have something like 800k unread emails in my inbox. However, I don't need to 'declare email bankruptcy' nor do I need to clear out my inbox.. I just don't pay any attention to the read or unread status. My inbox IS my archive. My system is this: When I check my email, I make sure I mark the most recent email as read. Then, I look back until I find the ne…

So the Inbox Zero (and Getting Things Done, which is basically the overlying philosophy) is basically for people for which the status quo doesn't work. If you're able to manage your data without an empty inbox, that's great!

But if you're "suffering" from your e-mail, Inbox Zero is great for a couple reasons:

- The rules are simple. Read it, then archive, reply immediately, or archive it but put "reply to this email" in your todo list.

- The success state is simple. Is your inbox non-empty? Empty it. Is it empty? Go away.

- It's about aggressive honesty. You won't reply to your aunt's email from 2 weeks ago. Replying with a one-sentence thing in 30 seconds is OK.

- It fits with "email bankruptcy". Honesty and feeling of dread means you should really just empty your inbox.

the core thing is that it removes decision-making from the process of checking your email. For people who struggle with organisation, this is a bit of a godsend. Sure, you still have to reply, but for a lot of people following the Inbox Zero rules you'll end up feeling a lot less totally useless stress from staring at your inbox (even if it's just somewhere else).

It's sensible advice for people who don't have a working system. If you have a working system, you should totally use that though, it probably works better for you. Though maybe your system isn't working as well as you might hope, so it's always good to experiment.

Re: Email Isn’t the Thing We’re Bad At

#60

Post by rtpg »

overgard wrote: post #43

I'm one of those people with a bajillion unread emails -- 15,615 at the moment, but I feel like this is manufacturing a problem I don't have. Inbox zero or whatever does nothing for me. Here's like a sample of things I haven't bothered to click: "YMCA membership survey", "Recommended coursera courses", "grubhub order", "Mailing list update for a blog I read sometimes". These aren't really things I feel any sort of pr…

If that system works for you, great! For a lot of people it doesn't, hence all the praise for Inbox Zero.

You're allowed to have your own system for managing e-mail, just like you can put your pencils wherever you want on your desk. Or hey, let's be crazy! You can even have no pencils on your desk!

I think this piece is for people for whom e-mail is a chore and for whom it is common practice to stare blankly at their inbox thinking "Oh, I should just reply...." and then spend an hour to write "OK" in the reply. If you're good at e-mail already then awesome.

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