I seriously think that what we have is great. Send this text from here to there. It's so simple that almost anything can be done with it. If only social network

I seriously think that what we have is great. Send this text from here to there. It's so simple that almost anything can be done with it. If only social networking had followed the model of a simple protocol with distributed servers, we would have a serious alternative to Twitter's API restrictions and Facebook's privacy invasions. That said, if we could redesign email, my quick wishlist would be: * Better encryption. No surprises that a HN comment thinks we should encrypt metadata as well as contents, and have something better than the way we have to exchange GPG keys at the moment. * Better security. Easier to guarantee that the ostensible sender of a message really did send it. Also, help prevent the viral problem of malware, which spreads through inboxes protected by rubbish passwords.