Introduction

This document is intended to offer guidance to users of electronic mail (e-mail) systems, whether it's a twelve-year old computer nerd's BBS, one of the dinosaur services like AOL-ful or Prodigee-wiz or the vast world of the Internet. Although it's geared towards users of the afore-mentioned services, it has sections that apply to all e-mail systems.

This is not a how-to document, but rather a document that offers advice to make you more computer-worthy (probably more worthy than you desire) and to prevent you from embarrassing yourself at some point in the near future.

Don't Be A Novelist

Messages should be concise and to the point. Think of it as a telephone conversation, except you are typing instead of speaking. Nobody has ever won a Pulitzer Prize for a telephone conversation nor will they win one for an e-mail message.

Its also important to remember that some people receive hundreds of e-mail messages a day (yes, there are such people), so the last thing they want to see is a message from someone who thinks he/she is the next Dickens.

Too Much Punctuation!!!

Don't get caught up in grammar and punctuation, especially excessive punctuation. You'll see lots of e-mail messages where people put a dozen exclamation points at the end of a sentence for added emphasis. Big deal. Exclamation points (called bangs in computer circles) are just another form of ending a sentence.

If something is important it should be reflected in your verbage, not in your punctuation.

The Legacy Of Punch Cards

Although this is the 1990's, not everyone in the world has e-mail software that has the word wrap feature (word wrap keeps you from having to hit the Enter key at the end of line of text). There are still a large number of users with dumb (and not so dumb) terminals and teletype devices that do not gracefully handle text longer than the old punch card length of 80 characters. Therefore, keep the number of characters per line below the 80 character limit. Some recent e-mail packages have a built-in feature that automatically word wraps at a specified character limit so that the problem is essentially solved. However, if you're software does not support this feature, you'll just have to remember to use the big Enter key again.

Abbreviations

Abbreviation usage is quite rampant with e-mail. In the quest to save keystrokes, users have traded clarity for confusion (unless you understand the abbreviations). Some of the more common abbreviations are listed in the table below. I would recommend you use abbreviations that are already common to the English language, such as FYI and BTW. Beyond that, you run the risk of confusing your recipient.

Smilies

Part of the nature of a good one-on-one conversation is the use of visual cues. How important are facial expressions and body gestures to a conversation? A simple eye movement can mean the difference between yes and YES. What about auditory cues? The results is the same as with visual cues.

Since there are no visual or auditory cues with e-mail, users have come up with something called smilies. They are simple strings of characters that are interspersed in the e-mail text to convey the writer's emotions (cues). The most common example is :-). Turn your head to the left and you should see a happy face (the colon is the eyes, the dash is the nose and the parentheses is the mouth). Here are some more examples.

Please don't ask me to interpret, because I don't understand all of them.

They are typically found at the end of sentences and will usually refer back to the prior statement.

I would recommend you use these sparingly. There are hundreds of these things and their translations are by no means universal (a miss-interpreted smiley could lead to a flame).

Salutations

The question here is "How personal is too personal?" or to be more specific, how do you open your e-mail: 'Dear Sir', 'Dear Mr. Smith', 'Joe' or none of the afore-mentioned.

If you posed this question to Miss Manners, I expect she would come back with a quick answer - use the standard formalities -- but I don't know that I would agree.

In a non-business situation, I would recommend that you bypass the standard formailites. At most, I would only include something along the lines of 'Dear Virgil' or just 'Virgil'.

In the business situation, things are much more complicated. Each situation will need to be evaluated on it's on, but in general, I would use the following as a guide: If you normally address a person as Miss/Mr./Miss/Ms. Smith then that's the way I would initially address them in e-mail. If you normally call them by their first name then I would either omit the salutation or follow the guideline specified in the prior paragraph. If you are unsure, stick to the formal salutation. It's the safest bet.

Signatures

If you had to guess what a signature was (the e-mail version), you would probably be close.

On a paper document (save a tree, send e-mail) it's typical to close the document with the following:

Since it is not possible (yet) to sign your e-mail, users will sometimes include the same information (minus the signature) at the bottom of all e-mail messages.

I would highly recommend this practice because it's not always clear to a message recipient as to the originator of the message. Lots of companies use abbreviated names or numbers to identify employees and those abbreviations and /or numbers will mean little to someone not familiar with their significance.

I would also recommend that you included your e-mail address in this information. Sometimes it can be very difficult to locate your e-mail address in the information that's a part of transmission, especially if it's going across the Internet.

If your e-mail address is a business address, I would include your title and company name in the signiture. Normally, this might be part of a letterhead, but in the e-mail world letterheads are not used (wasted space).

You will sometimes run across a user's signature that contains a quote (as in "...the secret to life is that there is no secret.") after the person's name. This has become a fairly common practice. If you choose this option I would recommend that the quote be something that is a reflection of yourself. Keep it short. You don't want the quote to be longer than the message.

Also you will run across signatures that contain images built out of keyboard characters. These are kind of hard to describe unless you've seen one, but you will surely know one when you see it. As with the quote, the image should be a reflection of the person.

Whether you choose to add a quote, an image or both, I would recommend that you keep the total number of lines for the signature down to four or less. There is actually a technical reason for this, but I'm not going to provide it here.

Threads

Once you send that first e-mail, you will probably get a response. If you want to reply to that response what should you do? The wrong thing to do is to start a new e-mail message. This breaks the link (called a thread) between the original message, the response and your soon-to-be-created response. Without the link, it can get difficult for the user's on each end to follow the sequence of messages, especially after several exchanges. This becomes an even larger problem when you are dealing with news groups (more later) where several people may be replying to messages and trying to follow the thread of information being exchanged. The correct thing to do is to reply, which is essentially the same thing as creating a new message, but maintains the thread.

Quotes

Nothing is more wasteful than to reply to an e-mail by including a complete copy of the original with the words "I agree" , "Okay" or "Ditto" at the bottom.

The correct method is to use quoting. This is best explained by an example:

The '>' in front of the text indicates to the recipient that this is quoted material from his/her last e-mail message. The second sentence is your response to the quoted material. The key with quoting is to include enough material in the quote so that it will be relevant to the recipient. Imagine that the original message was a hundred lines long and the only question that required a response was located in the last sentence. Why send the whole message back in a reply? That would cause the recipient to scroll through the hundred line message again just to find your response at the bottom.

Quoting can occur again and again as in the example:

From this we see both two level quoting (>>) and one level quoting (>). The (>>) indicates that the sender is quoting your quote and the (>) is a quote of part of your message you sent in reply.

Don't get to hung up in quoting. After so many levels, all you end up with is a bunch of these '>' and very little else.

Save A Tree

Sometimes I think that the best thing that could happen would be for someone to take away the printer. Why? Every time I send an e-mail out to a large group, a third of the group will print the message even before reading it, a third will read it and then print it, and the last third will read it and delete it.

One of the goals for e-mail usage is to eliminate (or greatly reduce) the shuffling of paper, but what chance does that have if a significant number of people are going to print every message they receive. I'm not saying that all messages should not be printed. I'm saying that too many messages are printed for no reason (a lot are printed and never retrieved from the printer).

Unless you have a very primitive e-mail system, it probably has some system (usually called folders) that can be used to permanently store messages for recall at any time in the future. If the same people who print messages for paper file systems would create the same structure in the e- mail system with folders, it would accomplish the same goal, but would save an enormous amount of paper (and trees).

Privacy, Are You Kidding?

Stop right where you are and set aside a couple of brain cells for the following statement: there is no such thing as a private e-mail. I don't care what anybody says, states, swears or whatever, there is just no such thing as private e-mail. The reason? Keep reading.

With some e-mail systems, the e-mail administrator has the ability to read any and all e-mail messages. If this is the case where you are located you better hope that there is a honest and respectable person in that position.

Some companies monitor employee e-mail (I consider this one of the worst forms of censorship). The reasons for this obtrusive behavior range from company management wanting to make sure users are not wasting time on frivolous messages to making sure that company secrets are not being leaked to unauthorized sources.

E-mail software is like all software in that occasionally things go wrong. If this happens, you may end up receiving e-mail meant for another person or your e-mail may get sent to the wrong person. Either way, what you thought was private is not private anymore.

Somewhere in the world there is a person (usually a hacker) who is able to read your e-mail if he/she tries hard enough. 'Tries hard enough' is the key. It's not simple to read another person's e-mail (usually) . (Usually) there are security measures in place to prevent this from happening, but no security is one hundred percent hacker-proof. I have 'usually' in parenthesis in the prior two sentences because I'm making the assumption that the person/persons who install and operate your e-mail system have taken the necessary precautions. Of course, the same must also be true for the person/persons on the receiving end of your e-mail

So where does this leaves us. First, let me reiterate the initial statement: there is no such thing as a private e-mail. Got it? Second, don't send anything by e-mail that you would not want posted on the company bulletin board. If it's safe enough for the bulletin board, it's safe enough for e-mail. Finally, if your debating whether or not to send something personal by e- mail, either deliver it by hand or send it by snail mail.

Flames

What is a flame or specifically what does it mean to be flamed? To be flamed means that you've sent an e-mail to a person(s) that has caused that person(s) to respond in many, not-so-nice words. It's basically a verbal attack in electronic form. I would provide examples, but I'm not too sure of the age of my audience and I, in turn, do not want to end up getting flamed from the readers of this document.

Sometimes the reason for a flame is quite obvious (keep reading), but in other cases you just never know. You might send what you think is a harmless e-mail to ten people. Nine people respond in a rational tone while number ten sends you a flame. Just remember that everyone sees the world differently. You may be lucky and spend your whole life dealing only with the people in the nine group, but I'll bet that sooner or later you will run into person ten.

How do you respond to flame? Tough question. The best answer would be to ignore it and go about your life as logical and rational human being. If this is not your first reaction, it probably will be after you've been flamed a couple dozen times. You will find out that responses just aren't worth the effort. Remember that old saying about "You can please some of the people...".

If you do choose to respond you will probably end up in what is known as a flame war. This is where two or more people end up exchanging flames for an extended period of time, usually to the point that users start making references to one's mother, one's mental capability, etc... At some point, all those participating in the war will eventually forget what originally started the war and go back to being normal human beings.

Never been flamed? Well if your begging for it, I would suggest one of the following:

Send an e-mail in all UPPER-CASE. Use of upper-case words is the equivalent of shouting in some one's ear. ONLY use upper-case words when trying to make a point (such as I just did). Even at that, you should be careful with who you are exchanging messages.

Make a comment about grammar or punctuation. Nobody wants to feel like they are exchanging e-mail with their eighth-grade English teacher.

Send a mass-mailing advertisement. This is numero uno on the don'ts list and will generate more flames than the devil himself.

Think about the amount of junk mail you receive everyday by snail mail. Even though you don't want it, you find you must look through all of it because somewhere in that stack of unwanted advertisements and wasted paper could be your monthly water bill. The same principle applies to the e-mail. Would you want to search through a mailbox full of advertisements simply to find that all-important message from your boss?

Request computer help without providing system-specific information. For example, if I submitted an e-mail that stated "I've got this problem with Word...". Well is that MS Word for DOS, MS Word for Windows, MS Word for Macs? What version? Version 2.0? Version 6.0?

Remember, the world (and it's users) is made up of every kind of computer imaginable, from IBM PC's to Macs to UNIX workstations to the one your neighbor assembled in his garage.

The correct method would be to list all the system specifics first, then describe the problem or question. For example, if I were seeking answers to questions about Microsquish Word for my computer at home, I would list Gizmo Model SR-32 (Microchannel Clone, 486-66Mhz, 16MB RAM, 400MB SCSI hard disk), MS DOS 6.22, MS Windows 3.11, MS Word 6.0a and then state the problem in detail.

Send a e-mail asking for the meaning of BTW or :-). If you've not already found these in this document, keep reading. E-mail users use lots of abbreviations (not everyone can type 200 words a minute). and other funny characters (called smilies). These are two of the more common examples -- BTW is the equivalent of 'by the way' and :-) is a happy face or smile (turn your head to the left).

Better Than Snail Mail

You would think that since e-mail is electronic and electronic information is suppose to move at the speed of light, your e-mail message would arrive seconds after you send it. If you're sending e-mail to the person in the office next to yours it might happen that way. In most cases, however, the message will probably take anywhere from a couple of minutes (majority of the time) to a couple of days (in which case there is usually a problem).

Think of it this way. Sending e-mail locally is as easy as delivering it by hand. Following that premise, if you had to hand deliver mail to some one clear across the country, doesn't that take a little more effort?

The reason it takes longer is that in the transmission of a message from point A to point B, the message may pass across one, two, or up to who- knows-how-many different types of mail systems before it reaches it's destination. Remember my earlier statement? All computers (and e-mail systems) are not the same.

No matter how far away you are sending your e-mail message I'll guarantee that it will beat snail mail. On top of that you save the cost of a 32 cent stamp.

A Blessing And A Curse

E-mail is a conversation that does not require an immediate response (like a telephone). If someone calls you on the telephone, you pick it up (unless you have an answering machine, voice mail or you are just plain rude) and the conversation begins. This is an interactive conversation.

With e-mail you send a message and then wait for a response. The response may come in five minutes or the response may come in five days. Either way it's not an interactive conversation.

If a hundred people send you e-mail in one day, so what? You didn't have to talk with all one hundred. Just think of all the hellos, good-byes and other unnecessary chit-chat you avoided. With e-mail you only deal with their messages (which usually omit hellos, good-byes and such) and you deal with them on your own time. That's the blessing.

Now for the curse.

Too many users assume that the minute someone receives an e-mail it, the person will read it. Bad assumption.

If you schedule a meeting for an hour from now and send an e-mail to each attendee, the chance that all the attendee's will read that message within the hour will be pretty small. On the other hand, if you schedule the meeting for the next day, the chance that they will read the message will be pretty high. Remember, e-mail is not designed for immediacy (that's why you have a telephone), it's designed for convenience.

Some (not all) e-mail systems have features that try to combat this problem. These features (usually called notification) will notify you when a person has received your e-mail and may also notify you when the person has read it (really all it can do is assume you that the person has looked at the first screen of the message -- it has no way to know if the person has read the message word for word). Referring back to the example in the last paragraph, you could check to see who has checked their e-mail before the meeting and then telephone those who have not read it.

Talking To Dinosaurs

If your e-mail package has links to the Internet (which any worthwhile site should have) then you can send e-mail to the poor, unenlightened souls on Compu-Snore, AOL-Ful or Prodigee-wiz.

For Compu-Snore users, the address format is:

For AOL-ful users, the address format is:

For Prodigee-wiz users, the address format is:

Newsgroups

If you have access to the Internet, you may have access to news groups. At the simplest level, a news group is a collection of related e-mail messages tied to a specific topic. Some examples might be a news group for users of Microsquish Word, a news group for the fans of the works of Rita Mae Brown or a news group for owners of handmade bicycles manufactured in Wisconsin. If you seen a list of the available news groups, which is now well over the 20,000 range, the topics are quite diverse and amazing.

Anyway, on to more important items....

Don't call a news group a anything but a news group. They are not forums (that's on Compu-Snore). They definitely are not BBS's. They are newsgroups. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Before posting (think of it as sending an e-mail message) to a news group, I would highly recommend that 1) you monitor it for a few days (called lurking) to make sure the newsgroup's content is relevant to your interest, and 2) read the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section if there is one. FAQ usually will provide a statement of direction for the news group along with any other guidelines for it's usage. Following these two tenets will help you avoid that dreaded flame.

If you find that you want to post an entry to a newsgroup, make sure it's the right group. Posting a message for help for Microsquish Word in the WordImperfect newsgroup won't get you anywhere other than a possible flame (there's that word again).

One last no-no for news groups is called spamming. Spamming is repeated posting the same message to a particular news group(s) for no other reason than to be obnoxious. This is definite flame bait.