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I'm constantly amazed by professionals who complain about their email inbox. Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? Mailing l

I'm constantly amazed by professionals who complain about their email inbox. Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? Mailing lists are actually one of the best collaboration tools available because: (1) They can be, but don't have to be, nearly real-time; (2) The content comes to you, you don't have to check it; (3) They allow a full suite of content to be exchanged, if participants are willing to accept the overhead; and (4) They're straightforward to build tools atop, including archives, autoresponders, and various kinds of automation. Realtime tools like IRC & Zephyr and their awful browser-based clones like HipChat and Slack can be useful too, but should be treated as supplements, not primary. Web forums aren't quite as awful as browser-based chat, but they're generally better treated as a front-end to a mailing list for people who don't otherwise have access to a good mail client. (Really, all of this would be even better served by NNTP instead of mailing lists, but almost nobody runs organizational NNTP servers and mail clients long ago dropped support for it.)

VMG 10y ago
> Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? You know the answer. They don't, because they have actual work to do.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- amelius 10y ago
  Communication is part of their work.
  - tvanantwerp 10y ago
    Managing my office's IT, this is absolutely how I feel about it. If their job depends on technology X, they should master technology X! But through experience I know that this isn't what happens. The technical stuff is my job. I'm responsible for holding hands and getting everyone to the level they need to be at. If I don't go out of my way to bring people along, they won't even think about it.
- verletx64 10y ago
  Set it up once, get more value out of your email. It's a quick job, it's not going to come close to derailing their work.
  - empath75 10y ago
    You're leaving out the time it takes to learn enough about email to know what the correct configuration is. And you're assuming that you're going to get the configuration right the first time and not have to continually tinker with it.
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  I'm not allowed to say "I can't be bothered to deal with HR forms, I have actual work to do". Why do other people get that pass?
- engi_nerd 10y ago
  But, I have work to do, too, and I have many rules set up for my inbox. I receive about 300 emails a day from automated processes and another 50 or so from actual people I am collaborating with. Without filtering I would drown in email. So the filtering makes me more effective at getting work done.
marmaduke 10y ago
The groups I've worked with, you can't rely on people using filters, formatting or even search effectively because they use the outlook web app, or similar. Email as a collaboration tool is a strong as the dumbest email client in the group. With slack, there's on boarding and a consistent client so better chance of better use.
- walterstucco 10y ago
  and now you're tied to slack for your data and can't move it around.
  - EamonnMR 10y ago
    And you need the paid version to access all of the archives. In effect, they are selling you content that they know you want-because you created it.
  - marmaduke 10y ago
    right, but the same people I mentioned before wouldn't be able to move their email around either. I'm not for slack either, just meant to say that it currently offers more consistent short term upgrade over lowest-denominator email clients.
lmm 10y ago
> Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? Most people have similar needs, and most people's job is to actually do their job, not mess with their email config. Defaults are important. A group conversation should be represented in a first-class way as a group conversation - flattening it down into a bunch of fake person-to-person messages and then trying to guess the information that you threw away is dumb. NNTP is ok, but still built for a time when the network was much more expensive and less reliable than it is now. For a realtime-like conversation it adds a lot more overhead than a Slack-like system - you can't make a 1-line contribution because you have to formalize it as a post, and everyone has to read everything twice because the bottom-posting culture from the days when server interconnection was unreliable has been passed on five-monkeys style. In theory open standards should make it easier to build archives, autoresponders, integrations etc. In practice, the state of archives, autoresponders, integrations and so on for mailing lists is much worse than that for Slack et al. (I suspect because everyone knows there's no money in it). e.g. Mailman was written by a couple of students a decade ago and has barely been updated since, and it shows.
- rahrahrah 10y ago
  > Most people have similar needs, and most people's job is to actually do their job, not mess with their email config This is such an obvious excuse. You get the config right once and you've solved a problem forever. It is, how do you say, very "scalable" in time.
  - lmm 10y ago
    If it's really that simple then why isn't a good config just built in?
    - rahrahrah 10y ago
      Because it depends on how you want to use email. eg I have emails which are sent to my address+subs@gmail.com being put to a label "subscriptions", but obviously not everyone wants to use it like this, in which case why make it default?
Balgair 10y ago
So, in our lab we do bio-optics (fiber-optics to shine light into a mouse brain and drive it around a cage, that kinda stuff). We tried using Slack in the lab, a few grad-students were really pushing for it and using it. It failed miserably. Other users echo some of the reasons better but we could not pay for it (not in the budget)so our data got 'locked up' from us after ~6 months when it auto-deleted. That was not a good lab meeting to be in. We 'siloed' ourselves and it became just a crappy online lab-book that your boss could look at. So, then you have people just typing to seem like they were doing stuff and never talking to one-another. That is to say: useless. Again, not a good lab meeting to be in. Still, to the point I am replying to: We are scientists, not 'programmery' people, so that that into account when I ask these questions: What is a config? How do I set up a mailing list and then take people off it too? What is a mail filter and how do I use it? What are IRC and Zephyr? Ok, also, look, I am NOT going to make my PI or other lab mates into programmer people, most of them never took calculus nor know formal If-Then-Or-And logic trees. They do mice and cells and DNA and stuff, not electrons and motherboards and stuff. At last check, my PI has 120,000+ emails in her 'inbox' on Outlook and I don't know for certain if she actually knows what counts as spam or not or how to delete an email. If I can't explain, teach, and implement these tools in less than 45 minutes in a single lab meeting among all the Windows and Mac versions out there simultaneously with the other lab members, then forget it. It will not happen. Is there any hope? Because Slack seems so cool (and was for ~6 months before out data got deleted), and your ideas on how to implement it with email seem like they could really work well, but I mostly understand nada about it.
- daveFNbuck 10y ago
  Slack has an education discount of 85%. With that, it's only $12 per team member per year. If e-mail isn't worse than spending $12/year, then you don't really have a problem with e-mail.

VMG 10y ago

> Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? You know the answer. They don't, because they have actual work to do.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
amelius 10y ago
Communication is part of their work.
- tvanantwerp 10y ago
  Managing my office's IT, this is absolutely how I feel about it. If their job depends on technology X, they should master technology X! But through experience I know that this isn't what happens. The technical stuff is my job. I'm responsible for holding hands and getting everyone to the level they need to be at. If I don't go out of my way to bring people along, they won't even think about it.
verletx64 10y ago
Set it up once, get more value out of your email. It's a quick job, it's not going to come close to derailing their work.
- empath75 10y ago
  You're leaving out the time it takes to learn enough about email to know what the correct configuration is. And you're assuming that you're going to get the configuration right the first time and not have to continually tinker with it.
CaptSpify 10y ago
I'm not allowed to say "I can't be bothered to deal with HR forms, I have actual work to do". Why do other people get that pass?
engi_nerd 10y ago
But, I have work to do, too, and I have many rules set up for my inbox. I receive about 300 emails a day from automated processes and another 50 or so from actual people I am collaborating with. Without filtering I would drown in email. So the filtering makes me more effective at getting work done.

marmaduke 10y ago

The groups I've worked with, you can't rely on people using filters, formatting or even search effectively because they use the outlook web app, or similar. Email as a collaboration tool is a strong as the dumbest email client in the group. With slack, there's on boarding and a consistent client so better chance of better use.

walterstucco 10y ago
and now you're tied to slack for your data and can't move it around.
- EamonnMR 10y ago
  And you need the paid version to access all of the archives. In effect, they are selling you content that they know you want-because you created it.
- marmaduke 10y ago
  right, but the same people I mentioned before wouldn't be able to move their email around either. I'm not for slack either, just meant to say that it currently offers more consistent short term upgrade over lowest-denominator email clients.

lmm 10y ago

> Do they not bother to learn their tools, and set up simple mail filters? Most people have similar needs, and most people's job is to actually do their job, not mess with their email config. Defaults are important. A group conversation should be represented in a first-class way as a group conversation - flattening it down into a bunch of fake person-to-person messages and then trying to guess the information that you threw away is dumb. NNTP is ok, but still built for a time when the network was much more expensive and less reliable than it is now. For a realtime-like conversation it adds a lot more overhead than a Slack-like system - you can't make a 1-line contribution because you have to formalize it as a post, and everyone has to read everything twice because the bottom-posting culture from the days when server interconnection was unreliable has been passed on five-monkeys style. In theory open standards should make it easier to build archives, autoresponders, integrations etc. In practice, the state of archives, autoresponders, integrations and so on for mailing lists is much worse than that for Slack et al. (I suspect because everyone knows there's no money in it). e.g. Mailman was written by a couple of students a decade ago and has barely been updated since, and it shows.

rahrahrah 10y ago
> Most people have similar needs, and most people's job is to actually do their job, not mess with their email config This is such an obvious excuse. You get the config right once and you've solved a problem forever. It is, how do you say, very "scalable" in time.
- lmm 10y ago
  If it's really that simple then why isn't a good config just built in?
  - rahrahrah 10y ago
    Because it depends on how you want to use email. eg I have emails which are sent to my address+subs@gmail.com being put to a label "subscriptions", but obviously not everyone wants to use it like this, in which case why make it default?

Balgair 10y ago

So, in our lab we do bio-optics (fiber-optics to shine light into a mouse brain and drive it around a cage, that kinda stuff). We tried using Slack in the lab, a few grad-students were really pushing for it and using it. It failed miserably. Other users echo some of the reasons better but we could not pay for it (not in the budget)so our data got 'locked up' from us after ~6 months when it auto-deleted. That was not a good lab meeting to be in. We 'siloed' ourselves and it became just a crappy online lab-book that your boss could look at. So, then you have people just typing to seem like they were doing stuff and never talking to one-another. That is to say: useless. Again, not a good lab meeting to be in. Still, to the point I am replying to: We are scientists, not 'programmery' people, so that that into account when I ask these questions: What is a config? How do I set up a mailing list and then take people off it too? What is a mail filter and how do I use it? What are IRC and Zephyr? Ok, also, look, I am NOT going to make my PI or other lab mates into programmer people, most of them never took calculus nor know formal If-Then-Or-And logic trees. They do mice and cells and DNA and stuff, not electrons and motherboards and stuff. At last check, my PI has 120,000+ emails in her 'inbox' on Outlook and I don't know for certain if she actually knows what counts as spam or not or how to delete an email. If I can't explain, teach, and implement these tools in less than 45 minutes in a single lab meeting among all the Windows and Mac versions out there simultaneously with the other lab members, then forget it. It will not happen. Is there any hope? Because Slack seems so cool (and was for ~6 months before out data got deleted), and your ideas on how to implement it with email seem like they could really work well, but I mostly understand nada about it.

daveFNbuck 10y ago
Slack has an education discount of 85%. With that, it's only $12 per team member per year. If e-mail isn't worse than spending $12/year, then you don't really have a problem with e-mail.