Why Email Isn't Dead
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Why Email Isn't Dead
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Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#2Agreed--smart email users are getting increasingly targeted with pared down lists and more personal.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#3I've always thought these "email is dead or shortly will be" articles to be wildly presumptuous. The argument is generally that the tween/teen demographic hardly ever uses e-mail, and instead use facetwitsquarespace, hence as they grow up email will die out.
This argument is missing one huge point: what happens when these people go to work? How many businesses will want internal communications delivered over social networks?
Email, although far from perfect, is a wonderful work tool. It's private, it's asynchronous, it's distributed, it's cheap. I don't see this being replaced by social messaging.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#4I've always thought these "email is dead or shortly will be" articles to be wildly presumptuous. The argument is generally that the tween/teen demographic hardly ever uses e-mail, and instead use facetwitsquarespace, hence as they grow up email will die out. This argument is missing one huge point: what happens when these people go to work? How many businesses will want internal communications delivered over social n…
I agree, almost all B2B communication is still via email.
Also there is the argument of how do you get your facebook/twitter DM notifications? Mostly through email. Even all of these social services ask for an email when you sign up and send emails to drive you back to the site.
Facebook is now one of the largest senders of email in the world..
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#5This is tangential, but I drive two of my favourite web apps almost entirely through email (Tripit and Highrise) and a third (Instapaper) quite a bit. I basically live in Instapaper and Highrise, so that's saying something.
I have email literally everywhere and email reminders are still easily the most effective notification system for a bunch of things I've seen.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#6I've always thought these "email is dead or shortly will be" articles to be wildly presumptuous. The argument is generally that the tween/teen demographic hardly ever uses e-mail, and instead use facetwitsquarespace, hence as they grow up email will die out. This argument is missing one huge point: what happens when these people go to work? How many businesses will want internal communications delivered over social n…
I agree, almost all B2B communication is still via email. Also there is the argument of how do you get your facebook/twitter DM notifications? Mostly through email. Even all of these social services ask for an email when you sign up and send emails to drive you back to the site. Facebook is now one of the largest senders of email in the world..
Yes good point. I only ever log in to fb if I get an email alert. However, I imagine that a lot of (younger?) fb users are, like I am with email, permanently logged in, so they see stuff coming in.
Yeah - the B2B point also valid. "Uh, yeah, I'm just gonna message you this contract on facebook". I don't think so.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#7I'm still waiting for the foretold deaths of print, vinyl LPs, and CDs. Somehow, I believe print will manage to outlive all of these.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#8I'm not sure who the "many" people the author refers to who think Twitter will replace email, but they are certainly being hyperbolic.
I imagine what they really mean to say is that some sort of social identity will replace email as our manifestation of self online. That is to say, we used to default to email as the way we ran our Communications (big "C") as individuals.
"How can I find you online?" Oh, here's my email address.
But are people still identifying themselves that way?
8.3% of online time is spent with email (-28% shrink from last year). 22.7% of online time is spent social networking (+43% growth from last year). [Source: The Nielson Company, June 2010 data]
As we grow to use social accounts - Facebook, Google, Twitter - to sign up for stuff and spend most of our time there, the question is: will there be a psychological shift so that I am not uniquely identified by my email address, but rather by a richer and more controllable social profile?
"How can I find you online?" Oh, look me up on Facebook.
Already, I default to connecting with Not-Quite-Friends by telling them to find me online at my social profiles.
Once I give out my email address, I can never take it back, and everyone gets the same priority ("unread") whether you are my mother or a salesman.
I don't think anyone rationally disputes that email will always - or at least for a very long time - be something we use as a central way to communicate with people we have close relationships with; family, co-workers, anyone we have high frequency contact with.
But the author is - I assume because it's written on StartupDigest - trying to grasp the implications on how startups use these communication channels to reach & engage with customers.
In that respect: watch out, email may very well be dying.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#9I'm still waiting for the foretold deaths of print, vinyl LPs, and CDs. Somehow, I believe print will manage to outlive all of these.
its' tempting to think "wow, email is ancient, it's been around for 40-odd years surely web 2.0 etc will supercede it".
And then I remember the telephone, which 120 years later is still going strong.
Re: Why Email Isn't Dead
#10I'm not sure who the "many" people the author refers to who think Twitter will replace email, but they are certainly being hyperbolic. I imagine what they really mean to say is that some sort of social identity will replace email as our manifestation of self online. That is to say, we used to default to email as the way we ran our Communications (big "C") as individuals. "How can I find you online?" Oh, here's my ema…
"Once I give out my email address, I can never take it back, and everyone gets the same priority ("unread") whether you are my mother or a salesman."
This is true. But you don't have to give out your social network profile for anyone - requested or otherwise - to look you up, message you and potentially find out a whole bunch of stuff about you.
(E.g today I found out - accidently, I was browsing around - that an ex-gf stills live at the address she used to, who her boyfriend is and the fact that they are, I think, about to move house. I am not "friends" with either of them and their public profiles are private.)
Edit: this reminds me of an idea I had a while back: temporary email/contact addresses. Completely anonymous way of allowing people to contact you.