Peter,

This is both, I think, an "explosive" topic and philosophically problematic; yet, it's a very fascinating question too and truly deserves to be raised.   All technologies, as far as I can know, have been and will be misused, misdirected, abused, or otherwise made subject to circumstances, passions, needs, etc. not necessarily intended by their inventors.  Technologies, even as to communicational arts, do seem subject to the basic rule of utility.  Email is, thus, probably not an exception to this rule.

If it serves utilitarian/practical purposes, mostly likely it will remain as long as the vast majority of users do continue to want, for whatever reasons, to keep using it.  Telephonic communication, e. g., has certainly remained, though it has/will be used by, e. g, criminals for purposes of conducting crime, terrorists for planning acts of terrorism, malicious people using it for not wanting to insult others in person, etc.

In any event, an equal factor is the important need to find a genuine replacement technology; telegraphy, as a fairly "recent" historical example, was made obsolete by better technologies.  This might also happen, someday, to email too, though modern business has become subject to its use, of course.  And, business records are being created as a result.

Abuse or misapplication alone of any technology has not, in and of itself, tended to eliminate a particular technology.  One can easily cite a worst case scenario for illustrative purposes and, moreover, to readily prove the substantive validity of the main point.  For better or worse, censors, whether dealing with porn on paper or otherwise, have been hammering away, at various media types forever, with limited success.   Porn, inclusive of email, is now a fully multimedia affair literally spanning all continents of this planet 24/7.  Q. E. D.

I guess I'd have to just paraphrase the redoubtable Mark Twain, so that it could be fairly said: The reports of email's death have been somewhat exaggerated.

Thank you for your time and kind attention!

Joseph A. Settanni, MA, CRM, CPC, RMO
Director of Records Services
Smith County
County Records Center
Records Services Department
Room 150
1517 West Front Street/Cotton Belt Building
Tyler, Texas 75702-7897
Phone: (903) 590 2961
Fax: 903 590 2965

Smith County -" Striving for Excellence"


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