Email no longer rules?? I think not...

I recently read an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal entitled Why Email No Longer Rules... . The editor references email as being more suited to how people used to use the web when we actually logged on and off and were our own content pipeline managers and cites social networking experiences such as Facebook, Twitter, and Google Wave as more relevant for today's communication preferences. The article makes some excellent points that I would agree with, but I cannot say that I necessarily agree with the foundational argument that email no longer rules.

For one, people are switching to new ways to connect using much more interactive methods such as networking sites, SMS, and instant messaging. But this doesn't necessarily make email any less relevant. Email is used by many organizations both in the private and public sector as the communication method of choice to send messages both internally and externally. One reason for this is that it leaves a digital trail - a way to track who is saying what and an excellent way to pass on information that you simply can't do by way of a text or comment on a social networking site. Email growth last month was 21% while social networking site adoption was closer to 31%, so email is certainly seeing slower growth, but my thinking is that it is still highly relevant if you are talking numbers of users worldwide.

Secondly, email has already passed the spam test. It has been hammered on by spammers for nearly a decade until the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 came about. Social sites have yet to endure the test as spammers are only now finding ways to infiltrate those spaces using fake accounts and bots that ask to add friends automatically. What will happen when people start to get barranged with spam in their social networking sites the way we once will in our inbox? My thinking is that usage will not wane but the adoption rate will be affected.

Finally, there is a benefit to turning off and tuning out. Just because a communication channel encompasses a quicker turnaround time does not necessarily make it better or suited for all types of communication. I know many people who are fine with sending a message and then waiting for a turnaround response. Imagine the thoughtless society we would wither away to if EVERY communication warranted a response within 5 minutes? We certainly wouldn't have time to ask the right people the right questions or put in the amount of thought necessary for an enlightened response.

I am not saying that email is king by a long shot, but that it is still highly relevant in both private and public communications and will continue to be throughout the next decade.