Activities and Exercises for Chapter 10: Smart e-mail

Activity 10:1

As in the case of letters (Chapter 9), ask your friends, colleagues, and relations for
e-mails – personal or work-related – that have struck them as very good or very
bad. Unless they are too personal (such as mail between lovers) or too
embarrassing, ask them if you could have a copy. Also ask them if you could share
them with your friends after masking the identities of both the writer and recipient.

Do not ask the suppliers of the sample mails why they consider those mails to be
either very good or very bad. Tell them you will get back to them with the mails.

Ask your friends also to collect some similar mails from their friends and colleagues.

Retype the mails after changing details that can identify the original writer or
recipient. Now make a few copies and distribute them among the members of your
group. What made the recipients look upon those mails as exceptionally good or
bad?

Take the mails back to your suppliers and ask them for their analysis of why those
mails were exceptional. Share with them your group’s views.

Activity 10:2

Having identified the features that made your sample mails exceptional, now try and
recast the bad ones. (You will find a couple of examples of such transformation in
Chapter 10 of BCS.) See if you can change the tone in such a way that even if the
message is negative, it will be read with an open mind. It would be good if each one
of you tries to recast the mail in their own ways.

Once all the alternative versions are ready, have a discussion within your group. See
which one is the most attractive. Analyse it and discover why most members find it
the most attractive to most of you. Then present all the versions to the supplier of
the sample. Ask them also to choose the one that they consider to be the most
attractive. Ask for their reasons as well.

Activity 10:3

Now most newspapers and newsmagazines accept letters to the editor sent via e-
mail. Write an occasional mail to your favourite newspaper or newsmagazine. Make it
crisp and easily readable. Let your mails be on issues you feel strongly about.

Activity 10:4

If you are a typical mail user you are likely to get a large number of mails in your
inbox. Some of them are from people you know nothing about. Some may be sales
mail. Unless you are pressed for time, don’t delete them without reading. If it looks
attractive or if it turns you off, save it and study it. Find out what about the mail
makes you behave in that fashion to that mail.
A sales mail from Bob Mankoff, Cartoon Editor of The New Yorker Magazine, is
reproduced below. What do you think about it? Do you feel like reading it through or
do you feel like deleting it when you see the first few lines? Why? Why not? Share
your views with the members of your informal group.

Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 12:37:46 -0500

From: "Bob Mankoff" <bob@cartoonbank.com>

To: "MM Monippally" <mpally@iimahd.ernet.in>

Subject: New Yorker 75th Anniversary Collection

Hi, MM

I'm Bob Mankoff, cartoon editor of The New Yorker Magazine. This message is going
out to everyone in our database that our computers have identified as discerning,
perspicacious and charming. If, due to some computer glitch, you are not discerning,
perspicacious and charming, please disregard this message.

THE NEW YORKER 75th ANNIVERSARY CARTOON COLLECTION, the biggest and
funniest collection of New Yorker cartoons ever assembled is out. I should know, I
assembled it myself. Gluing all the pages together was the really hard part.

I know these days a lot of you are thinking about purchasing books online. The
problem with purchasing books this way is that you are literally forced to judge a
book by its cover, because that's pretty much all that you can see online.

Not so with "The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection," however. You can
view 158 of the 707 cartoons in this volume just by clicking on the link below:

http://www.cartoonbank.com/search/search.asp?keyword=75th+anniversary

You can view the other 549 by actually buying the book.

If you're still not convinced, click on http://www.cartooncollections.com/index2.html

to view fourteen full size sample pages from the book. Click on the "Now Available"
red banner to buy from Amazon.

By the way, since you've been such a good sport in letting me ramble on, if you're
ever in New York, why don't you pop in and visit me at the Conde Nast building at 4
Times Square. When the scary looking guard asks "Who the heck are you!" simply
reply, why I'm MM Monippally, a certified registrant of http://www.cartoonbank.com and I'd
like to see Mr. Mankoff. He'll call

me up and I'll say "Did you say MM Monippally, is here. That's great, bring ol' MM
right on up".

One more thing MM, if you buy the book I'll send you a signed print of one of my
cartoons. What will I accept as proof that you bought it? Why, MM Monippally's word
is good enough for me.
Robert Mankoff, Cartoon Editor

The New Yorker Magazine

4 Times Square New York, New York 10036

Best,

Bob

Web Resources

Check these out.

http://www.webfoot.com/advice/email.top.html#intro

http://www.phoneskills.com/emailetiquette.cfm

http://www.emoderators.com/moderators/Emily.html (This is satirical; also meant

mainly for Usenet users. Worth reading.)

http://wise.fau.edu/netiquette/net/index.html

http://www.bspage.com/1netiq/Netiq.html

http://www.webnovice.com/email.html