3 ms·

The main issue is whatever replaces email MUST be intentionally asynchronous. There are a 1000 email replacements. The problem is they try to be better. No o

The main issue is whatever replaces email MUST be intentionally asynchronous. There are a 1000 email replacements. The problem is they try to be better. No one wants email to work better than it does from a performance or function perspective. Email is literally the last tech bastion keeping us from 24x7x365 work days as matter of default procedure. Everyone knows this deep down and thats why they refuse to learn or adopt the better systems that already exist.

gjsman-1000 2y ago
I think it's important to recognize the article does not suggest any obvious user-facing changes to how email operates; only technical ones that would hopefully fix the many pain points there.
- citizenpaul 2y ago
  All the behind the scenes failures are also a feature. Diffusion of responsibility, plausibly deniability. No one needs "mgmt" to be able to nail their coffin easier than they already can. 99% of the world doesn't work in HN land of high pay for high expectations. Most places are trying to force people to work 100hrs a week for as close to min wage as possible. Unless countries start enacting actual labor laws with teeth I stand by my statement that no one really wants or needs email to work better, there already are alternatives.
TylerE 2y ago
> No one wants email to work better than it does from a performance or function perspective. Hard disagree. Email sucks in just about every way.
- citizenpaul 2y ago
  It sucks and that is a killer feature. Get a few years on you and the Grind-set will fade as you realize you don't want the only thing in life to be work. You will be glad email still exists.
- nradov 2y ago
  What about it sucks? Seems fine to me as long as it's used as intended and not for other purposes.
  - citizenpaul 2y ago
    I don't personally think it sucks. There are bike-shed levels of improvements that probably any person on HN could dream up to make it more effective and work more reliably.
  - TylerE 2y ago
    Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. Messages sometimes take minutes or even go up a to come through for no apparent reason what so ever. Massive spam issues. Headers are trivially forged People can sign up other peoples addresses to mailing lists, and if that 3rd party is a company, good luck not getting re-subscribed to random stuff for the rest of eternity.
    - EvanAnderson 2y ago
      > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. That's a feature. I don't want senders to know if their message was received without my explicit acknowledgement.
    - oneshtein 2y ago
      > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. There is, but nobody uses it. > Massive spam issues. Verify your recipients, then add them to a white list, then block everybody else, like a typical chat program does.
    - swiftcoder 2y ago
      > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. Every major email client has supported read receipts for a very long time now. It's just rarely enabled by default outside of corporate environments (I would guess in part because users find it invasive).
- nvy 2y ago
  Only for spammers trying to get their marketing into my inbox. For personal use cases email is great.
- lxgr 2y ago
  Email sucks, sure. But it sucks less than any of these alternatives: - Corporate support chats (no way to export/capture a papertrail as a customer, usually horribly brittle) - Proprietary/company-specific messaging solutions in my account on various sites (no notification channel for responses, often no papertrail for me either) - Contact forms (unidirectional, not standardized, no papertrail for me as a sender) - Push notifications (single-device only, no reasonable inbox management, headline-only) - SMS (just no on so many levels, most importantly that I don't want everything to be tied to my phone/phone plan and that I can't own my phone number in the same way that I can own a TLD) The EU (or Germany, I still haven't found out) mandates companies to have a support email address, and it's just so much more pleasant than the US pattern of providing only phone support, a horrible support chat experience, or a mailing address.
- karaterobot 2y ago
  The person you're responding to is saying that email sucking is a feature for the user, preventing them from being always at work. That making email like Slack would make it less appealing, and that's why nobody wants to replace it with something quote unquote better.
byteknight 2y ago
While I understand the unspoken rules and norms of text messages, and chat messages are significantly different from email there is nothing prohibiting one from treating chat messages as asynchronous. You can train recipients the same you train a dog.
- aksss 2y ago
  Yes, for me (as a recipient) it's about training the senders. Keep their expectations for fast replies low by developing a track record of not responding to texts for variable amounts of time, that sort of thing.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

gjsman-1000 2y ago

I think it's important to recognize the article does not suggest any obvious user-facing changes to how email operates; only technical ones that would hopefully fix the many pain points there.

citizenpaul 2y ago
All the behind the scenes failures are also a feature. Diffusion of responsibility, plausibly deniability. No one needs "mgmt" to be able to nail their coffin easier than they already can. 99% of the world doesn't work in HN land of high pay for high expectations. Most places are trying to force people to work 100hrs a week for as close to min wage as possible. Unless countries start enacting actual labor laws with teeth I stand by my statement that no one really wants or needs email to work better, there already are alternatives.

TylerE 2y ago

> No one wants email to work better than it does from a performance or function perspective. Hard disagree. Email sucks in just about every way.

citizenpaul 2y ago
It sucks and that is a killer feature. Get a few years on you and the Grind-set will fade as you realize you don't want the only thing in life to be work. You will be glad email still exists.
nradov 2y ago
What about it sucks? Seems fine to me as long as it's used as intended and not for other purposes.
- citizenpaul 2y ago
  I don't personally think it sucks. There are bike-shed levels of improvements that probably any person on HN could dream up to make it more effective and work more reliably.
- TylerE 2y ago
  Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. Messages sometimes take minutes or even go up a to come through for no apparent reason what so ever. Massive spam issues. Headers are trivially forged People can sign up other peoples addresses to mailing lists, and if that 3rd party is a company, good luck not getting re-subscribed to random stuff for the rest of eternity.
  - EvanAnderson 2y ago
    > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. That's a feature. I don't want senders to know if their message was received without my explicit acknowledgement.
  - oneshtein 2y ago
    > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. There is, but nobody uses it. > Massive spam issues. Verify your recipients, then add them to a white list, then block everybody else, like a typical chat program does.
  - swiftcoder 2y ago
    > Well, for a start, there is no way of knowing if a message I sent actually get delivered. Every major email client has supported read receipts for a very long time now. It's just rarely enabled by default outside of corporate environments (I would guess in part because users find it invasive).
nvy 2y ago
Only for spammers trying to get their marketing into my inbox. For personal use cases email is great.
lxgr 2y ago
Email sucks, sure. But it sucks less than any of these alternatives: - Corporate support chats (no way to export/capture a papertrail as a customer, usually horribly brittle) - Proprietary/company-specific messaging solutions in my account on various sites (no notification channel for responses, often no papertrail for me either) - Contact forms (unidirectional, not standardized, no papertrail for me as a sender) - Push notifications (single-device only, no reasonable inbox management, headline-only) - SMS (just no on so many levels, most importantly that I don't want everything to be tied to my phone/phone plan and that I can't own my phone number in the same way that I can own a TLD) The EU (or Germany, I still haven't found out) mandates companies to have a support email address, and it's just so much more pleasant than the US pattern of providing only phone support, a horrible support chat experience, or a mailing address.
karaterobot 2y ago
The person you're responding to is saying that email sucking is a feature for the user, preventing them from being always at work. That making email like Slack would make it less appealing, and that's why nobody wants to replace it with something quote unquote better.

byteknight 2y ago

While I understand the unspoken rules and norms of text messages, and chat messages are significantly different from email there is nothing prohibiting one from treating chat messages as asynchronous. You can train recipients the same you train a dog.

aksss 2y ago
Yes, for me (as a recipient) it's about training the senders. Keep their expectations for fast replies low by developing a track record of not responding to texts for variable amounts of time, that sort of thing.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]