[plug] HTML mail (partial flame and suggestions)

[Alex Nordstrom]

On Friday, 1 Oct 2004 18:39, Craig Ringer wrote:
> On Fri, 2004-10-01 at 17:59, Alex Nordstrom wrote:
> >  - Most people who do sent HTML e-mails are not even aware that
> > they are doing so; hence, any advantages it may be perceived to
> > have are not used.
>
> Others know just enough to set a horrifying background colour and an
> awful font, without any understanding of the implications of doing
> so.

This gets particularly important in mailing lists and other 
large-quantity applications, where even sensible presentations 
negatively impact readability simply by forcing the reader to adjust to 
a wide range of message-specific characteristics, assuming formatting 
is not automatically neutralised. Just as senders interested in 
effective communication do not send HTML e-mail, recipients with that 
same interest do not read e-mail in HTML mode.

> >  - HTML is a language to encode primarily structural information
> > about hyperlinked documents inline, yet in e-mails, it is often
> > used for formatting, which is not only incorrect application, but
> > poses a usability threat to the recipient. Furthermore, there is
> > rarely a need to encode structural information in something as
> > brief as e-mail communication.
>
> Sadly, if any lengthy content is involved the user will inevitably
> attach a Word document, often feeling that having done this they need
> not provide any body text at all.

Gah! I've had my very own blood do this unto me. The only thing between 
them and imminent strangulation by yours truly was 13,450 kilometers of 
land and ocean. Instead, I have to resort to sending them SXW files in 
return to mock them, which gets old quite quickly. ;)

> Ooh, that's a lovely thought. I wonder how long it'll be before
> spammers start sending Microsoft Word documents in emails with little
> or no body text (nothing useful or descriptive, of course - perhaps
> just most of a page of signature).

Well, few people actually read spam these days, but they seem as eager 
as ever to open attachments from random people, so why not?

(Apologies for the penultimate sentence of my previous post. You knew 
what I meant.)

-- 
Alex Nordstrom
http://lx.n3.net/
Please do not CC me in followups; I am subscribed to plug.