Before email became synonymous with spam and junk, there was the original junk mail arriving in your mailbox – repetitive flyers; free offers for crap; packages of coupons you had no use for; people and businesses seeking to sell you services you didn’t know existed. Sounds kind of like email today, eh?
The reason I bring this up is that a friend mentioned how much he likes receiving snail mail today. He looks forward to opening his mailbox and is ever-hopeful he’ll find a letter inside, hand-addressed with something important inside. Of course, the snail mail junk-senders know this emotional tug and have learned to create a handwritten look-alike that makes you think you’re getting something personal, when it’s typically another insurance policy request or some other phony way attempting to suck money out of your bank account.
He reminisced about the old days. “Remember how when you first started receiving emails and it was exciting? You couldn’t wait to open them up. And, all you ever got in your mailbox was junk.”
Email was great. Instantaneous communication. Letter writing with an immediate response. You more quickly connected with friends and colleagues. You improved workflow, stayed in touch with relatives or friends who lived airplane flights away from you.
Then, of course, the spammers attacked. The same vile BS you received through your mailbox slowly wormed its way over to your electronic inbox. First it was to pick up your $2.1 million dollar extravaganza from the Nigerian prince who loved you so much he was willing to give his money away with no holds barred. Then it became everything from testosterone supplements, immune-boosting super vitamins, women from overseas who love you without even knowing who you are.
Email became overwhelming. The “delete” button was your most important decision of the day. Scan, delete, scan, delete. Then, as your junk email box filled (at least you could delete junk email all at once as opposed to having to check to see if the communication had any relevance to you), once again there was too much information to cope.
You shut down. You stop paying attention. You don’t read your emails. You don’t respond in a timely fashion, whether personally or professionally. Not good.
As my friend noted, this is when he started to become nostalgic about snail mail again, and enjoying going to the mailbox on a daily basis to see if there were any personal surprises for him in terms of a letter or birthday card.
Mostly, he is still disappointed. But, sometimes a nugget appears.
He recently received a lengthy letter. I forget who it was from or the subject, since it ultimately wasn’t relevant to me.
What was relevant was how it ignited his happiness. He was so pumped. “A LETTER! SOMEONE CARED ENOUGH TO WRITE ME A LETTER!”
We’ve come full circle. Now, with texting reaching the spamming stage, we turn off to that method of communication. We stop responding or we delay reading messages. Who knows where this will take us in terms of staying connected with others?
Maybe need to go back to sending smoke signals. Make the fire, figure out how to do morse code by sending up cloud smoke in different sizes and shapes. Nah, forget about it. The wind would blow it away, and the message would never get to the audience.
The reason I bring this up is that a friend mentioned how much he likes receiving snail mail today. He looks forward to opening his mailbox and is ever-hopeful he’ll find a letter inside, hand-addressed with something important inside. Of course, the snail mail junk-senders know this emotional tug and have learned to create a handwritten look-alike that makes you think you’re getting something personal, when it’s typically another insurance policy request or some other phony way attempting to suck money out of your bank account.
He reminisced about the old days. “Remember how when you first started receiving emails and it was exciting? You couldn’t wait to open them up. And, all you ever got in your mailbox was junk.”
Email was great. Instantaneous communication. Letter writing with an immediate response. You more quickly connected with friends and colleagues. You improved workflow, stayed in touch with relatives or friends who lived airplane flights away from you.
Then, of course, the spammers attacked. The same vile BS you received through your mailbox slowly wormed its way over to your electronic inbox. First it was to pick up your $2.1 million dollar extravaganza from the Nigerian prince who loved you so much he was willing to give his money away with no holds barred. Then it became everything from testosterone supplements, immune-boosting super vitamins, women from overseas who love you without even knowing who you are.
Email became overwhelming. The “delete” button was your most important decision of the day. Scan, delete, scan, delete. Then, as your junk email box filled (at least you could delete junk email all at once as opposed to having to check to see if the communication had any relevance to you), once again there was too much information to cope.
You shut down. You stop paying attention. You don’t read your emails. You don’t respond in a timely fashion, whether personally or professionally. Not good.
As my friend noted, this is when he started to become nostalgic about snail mail again, and enjoying going to the mailbox on a daily basis to see if there were any personal surprises for him in terms of a letter or birthday card.
Mostly, he is still disappointed. But, sometimes a nugget appears.
He recently received a lengthy letter. I forget who it was from or the subject, since it ultimately wasn’t relevant to me.
What was relevant was how it ignited his happiness. He was so pumped. “A LETTER! SOMEONE CARED ENOUGH TO WRITE ME A LETTER!”
We’ve come full circle. Now, with texting reaching the spamming stage, we turn off to that method of communication. We stop responding or we delay reading messages. Who knows where this will take us in terms of staying connected with others?
Maybe need to go back to sending smoke signals. Make the fire, figure out how to do morse code by sending up cloud smoke in different sizes and shapes. Nah, forget about it. The wind would blow it away, and the message would never get to the audience.