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I get annoyed by people that are so anal about email. I don't disagree that these rules help. It's just that It really seems like these kinds of rules miss the
by j_baker 15y ago
I get annoyed by people that are so anal about email. I don't disagree that these rules help. It's just that It really seems like these kinds of rules miss the forest for the trees.
The ultimate criteria of a good email should be if the recipient can easily read and understand the email, not whether you're quoting people properly or using bullet points rather than paragraphs. Sure those things help, but it's possible to write a good email that breaks all these rules or a bad email that follows these rules to the letter.
- hessenwolf 15y agoAnd if you can do that successfully without help, then more power to you, but lots of us need things to be given explicitly to wrap our weak minds around.
- j_baker 15y agoWhy? Don't you receive email? What kinds of emails do you like to receive?
- hessenwolf 15y agoI receive emails, and I know what kind of emails I like to receive. However, I am not particularly representative (find me a mathematician who is), so there is little value in extrapolate my desires to others.
- j_baker 15y agoWhy not? There's nothing wrong with having a different approach, nor does being a mathematician necessarily make you bad at email.
- hessenwolf 15y agoYou don't know anybody who gets offended by things that you don't get offended by?