June 2000
Listserv and E-mail Etiquette
The same code of courtesy and good manners applies to e-mail as to messages delivered by telephone, on your personal notepaper or face to face. Things we wouldn't normally do in regular correspondence — bad grammar and spelling, inappropriate content, not addressing the individual and other assorted faux pas — we regularly do in e-mail. It's one thing to be lax among ourselves, it's quite another to be lax when we send e-mail to the public or external colleagues.
E-mail also has its own rules of "netiquette:"
- Be brief but not terse. Short messages can be quickly read and responded to.
- Be polite. Include a salutation ("Dear Mary") and a closing ("Thanks, Jane").
- Don't copy messages to others unless they have a real need to know.
- When replying, don't resend the entire original message, just enough to put your reply in context. Most mail programs have an option to include the original text in your reply, which you can turn on or off, or you can highlight and delete portions of it as you compose your reply.
- Avoid uppercase letters. They are the cyber equivalent of shouting. If you use uppercase for emphasis, use it sparingly. If you're angry, wait before sending a response. Better yet, communicate with the individual on a more personal level.
- Don't bombard your correspondent with the latest jokes (especially ones with a space-consuming list of other addresses), and don't use e-mail for gossip or unkind comments. Remember, e-mail is not a secure mode of communication. If you wouldn't put it on a postcard, don't put it in e-mail. Assume the whole world can read what you write.
- Make judicious use of e-mail shortcuts and emoticons like smiley faces to save words and to express emotions, since your expressions can't be seen. Space-saving acronyms can also be used, but sparingly. Make sure your correspondent knows what the acronym represents. Emoticons can be found at: (www.windweaver.com/emoticon.htm). E-mail acronyms can be found at: (www.post1.com/acronyms.html).
- Always give the correspondent a polite reply, even if you just acknowledge that you received the message.
(Source: www.readersdigest.com/rdmagazine/specfeat/archives/emailjourneynet.asp)
~ Ruth Willson, Colorado State University
OCTnews, April 2000