Is it Goodbye to Emails?

[Jonathan]

Certainly not in my work environment - if I am off for even one day, I end up with anywhere between 80 - 100 emails to go through. It's ridiculous! As for phone calls, I have several every day. I don't have a work mobile (and don't share my personal details with anyone) so I don't get texts or WhatsAps (although I use that for family and friends!)

[kernelbogey]

...WhatsApp, like texting, is fine for short snappy exchanges.

It's my impression that Millenials (and younger) write nothing other than the short & snappy.

[oddoneout]

I don't know where voicemail is on my phone :-). I have a new (non-optional) digital landline and often don't notice the green message light when a message has been left for me. I'm telephobic and don't phone unless there is no other way to contact someone.WhatsApp is very useful (street and family groups), and texting quite convenient but I don't like using the keypad (jab, jab, jab, oops no, bother, delete, delete ). Emails are better on the computer for longer messages.

So it's email for me too. Spam has increased over the past few weeks. I usually just delete them, but the ICO has instructions on how to report them so I shall start doing that. I suspect many may be scams rather than spam but without clicking on links I don't know which they are.

I know where it is on my phone, but it's permanently disabled! As it was never used Tesco kept withdrawing it and requiring me to set a new password or something to get it live again. Having discovered just how much it cost to retrieve such messages I decided it wasn't worth the hassle, since virtually all use of the phone was text anyway.
Which has reminded me I need to make a call or send a text soon to keep the thing live, or I'll lose more than just the voicemail service. Now that I have retired and don't need to get 2fa codes by text to log my pay claims, the poor phone is dumb in more than just the common meaning of dumbphone - almost no activity at all!
So, obviously email is still very much a thing with me.

[LMcD]

The predictions relating to the disappearance of CDs, cash and cheques have yet to be proved correct, and I would imagine that emails will continue to be important to, and used by, plenty of people. A combination of dumbphone (useful for verification among other things) and email meets my modest needs.

[french frank]

I would imagine that emails will continue to be important to, and used by, plenty of people.

True, I shall use them. The inconvenience arises when those whom you email never check their Inbox. However, on a brighter note, I have now located my Voicemail: I have no new messages - which means no one has ever left me a voicemail in a good 10 or 15 years (unless they're automatically deleted after a certain time).

[LMcD]

True, I shall use them. The inconvenience arises when those whom you email never check their Inbox. However, on a brighter note, I have now located my Voicemail: I have no new messages - which means no one has ever left me a voicemail in a good 10 or 15 years (unless they're automatically deleted after a certain time).

I trust it's the emails, and not those who sent them, that have been deleted.

[Old Grumpy]

I trust it's the emails, and not those who sent them, that have been deleted.

[french frank]

I trust it's the emails, and not those who sent them, that have been deleted.

Well, in most cases I do eventually hear from people one way or another, even by email sometimes, so they must have escaped automatic deletion to see another day .

Second thought: It does make me wonder about those I don't hear from though ...

[richardfinegold]

There is so much crap e-mail that for every meaningful message I get 50 unwanted ones, and I use every filter available. I frequently will miss the wanted nuggets amongst the dross and be days late in responding.

[Dave2002]

There is so much crap e-mail that for every meaningful message I get 50 unwanted ones, and I use every filter available. I frequently will miss the wanted nuggets amongst the dross and be days late in responding.

It's not helpful when someone sends you an email telling you about their change in email id - possibly because of poor service - and then the email system keeps remembering the old one, so any messages sent out don't get delivered. This has happened to me, and the person in question said "but I sent you an email about this months ago ...". Indeed he did - and it was completely buried in the hundreds of mails received each day since the day - months before - when he sent out the reminder of his new email id.

[Pulcinella]

It's not helpful when someone sends you an email telling you about their change in email id - possibly because of poor service - and then the email system keeps remembering the old one, so any messages sent out don't get delivered. This has happened to me, and the person in question said "but I sent you an email about this months ago ...". Indeed he did - and it was completely buried in the hundreds of mails received each day since the day - months before - when he sent out the reminder of his new email id.

You probably need to remove the old address from your previous recipients list as well as updating the contact information.

[Dave2002]

You probably need to remove the old address from your previous recipients list as well as updating the contact information.

Sure - but one never discovers the gory technical issues until later, and sometimes some software seems to have a habit of resetting itself also!

[richardfinegold]

Sure - but one never discovers the gory technical issues until later, and sometimes some software seems to have a habit of resetting itself also!

I’ve definitely experienced that

[Roslynmuse]

I definitely prefer email, but also use Messenger and WhatsApp, sometimes for quite lengthy exchanges (and generally prefer typing on my laptop to using my phone). Emails are, though, to my mind, closer to letters, while Messenger and WhatsApp are closer to texts (which seem to have reduced in number over the last couple of years) ie I tend to think it more appropriate to use them for short messages (a memory of the days when texts were limited to 160 characters, I suppose). The other difference is that if I want to read an old email I just put in a search request, whereas accessing an old WhatsApp message (as, no doubt, some politicians have been discovering) involves scrolling back through one continuous chain - annoying when you are just looking for a reference to a book or a film that was discussed 18 months ago. (Please don't say I'm the only person who has these discussions online...) I do wonder why phone calls have fallen into such decline. I sometimes hesitate to ring someone because they may be busy, whilst they can access an email etc at any time that is convenient for them. One other quirk of mine is that I do like to know when someone has read/received a message, which is possible on Messenger (for the moment - I think I read that this might be phased out) and WhatsApp but only on certain email systems. My newish (2021) phone does not give me a read receipt for a text message which my old phone (2015) did.

[Serial_Apologist]

I definitely prefer email, but also use Messenger and WhatsApp, sometimes for quite lengthy exchanges (and generally prefer typing on my laptop to using my phone). Emails are, though, to my mind, closer to letters, while Messenger and WhatsApp are closer to texts (which seem to have reduced in number over the last couple of years) ie I tend to think it more appropriate to use them for short messages (a memory of the days when texts were limited to 160 characters, I suppose). The other difference is that if I want to read an old email I just put in a search request, whereas accessing an old WhatsApp message (as, no doubt, some politicians have been discovering) involves scrolling back through one continuous chain - annoying when you are just looking for a reference to a book or a film that was discussed 18 months ago. (Please don't say I'm the only person who has these discussions online...) I do wonder why phone calls have fallen into such decline. I sometimes hesitate to ring someone because they may be busy, whilst they can access an email etc at any time that is convenient for them. One other quirk of mine is that I do like to know when someone has read/received a message, which is possible on Messenger (for the moment - I think I read that this might be phased out) and WhatsApp but only on certain email systems. My newish (2021) phone does not give me a read receipt for a text message which my old phone (2015) did.

Many TV phone-in programmes warn would-be callers that mobile calls could be much more expensive than landline.