According to this article, “Kids say e-mail is sooooo dead“.
To sum up the article, the rise in spam and the growing popularity of social networks like MySpace and FaceBook means that the ‘net generation is largely forgoing e-mail in favor of text messaging and messages sent through social networks. It’s fascinating that even IM is falling by the wayside. Kids use their cell phones both to text message (I wonder why “TM” hasn’t become the word for “text messaging” the way IM did for “instant messaging”?) and to access their messages in Facebook and MySpace.
Kids today are connected in ways that those of us who are older can’t even begin to understand. We are inching steadily toward a cyberspace in which people are wirelessly connected with one another 24 hours a day via a worldwide network. Taken to its extremes, one could imagine communication through implants that would, for all practical purposes, be telepathy. Then there’s the spam…
What’s almost as interesting as the article itself are the comments from readers at the bottom. CNet’s navigation is kinda screwy, but they’re worth reading. Many of them seem to be railing against the future. What do you think? I agree with one poster who said that e-mail isn’t a binary system. It won’t have to die just because other people use other means of communicating. It still makes the most sense for business or long-form communication. It’s amazing to think that 15 years ago many people had only heard of this thing called e-mail, and today we’re looking at a future in which it will be supplanted.
Popularity: 3% [?]
You’re right to say that email is still and likely will remain the dominant form for long-form communications. Email will be around for a long time, much like the telephone, fax, and other communication systems that are more or less outdated. The concept of sending written information never changes, only the technology. As for the potential of cybertechnology, I can easily see an implanted cell phone today and wonder why no one has done it yet.