3.493 nature of e-mail, cont. (74)
Willard McCarty (MCCARTY@vm.epas.utoronto.ca)
Mon, 25 Sep 89 22:08:11 EDT
Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 3, No. 493. Monday, 25 Sep 1989.
(1) Date: 24 Sep 89 16:58:49 EST (16 lines)
From: James O'Donnell <JODONNEL@PENNSAS>
Subject: nature of e-mail
(2) Date: 25 September 1989, 09:35:26 EDT (19 lines)
From: FLANNAGA at OUACCVMB
(3) Date: Mon, 25 Sep 89 11:38:20 EDT (14 lines)
From: Geoff Rockwell <rockwell@utorgpu>
Subject: Re: 3.490 nature of e-mail (62)
(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 24 Sep 89 16:58:49 EST
From: James O'Donnell <JODONNEL@PENNSAS>
Subject: nature of e-mail
1. E-mail also makes possible a new kind of community, the way writing made it
possible for Greeks, Romans, Hebrews, and Christians of antiquity for create
communities bound together over wide territorial areas of a kind that had been
impossible without writing.
2. The advance of technology is ever more angelic: the other participants on
HUMANIST appear to me as pure, disembodied intelligences.
3. True of e-mail generally and not just HUMANIST: this is not an activity
anybody would ever get involved in (to put this as crudely as possible) as a
way to meet girls. That is worrisome. (Unless there is a net called FEMINIST
whirring away somewhere I don't know about: I hope so.)
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------22----
Date: 25 September 1989, 09:35:26 EDT
From: FLANNAGA at OUACCVMB
What is different between e-mail and correspondence on paper
*and* oral communication is its intimacy and its anonymity. The writer
can be in pajamas or nightgown, up in the middle of the night or in the
early morning, at home or at the office, and the reader can't *see* him
or her. It is hard for the writer to be hypocritical (I think) because
there is no viewer to play off of or play up to. If I write for a large
e-mail audience like Humanist, I have to purge egocentrism and practice
self-effacement, and I have to watch what I say, but I still can say
something any time I feel like it and whenever I am within reach of a
modem. Anonymity can equal honesty, under some good conditions, and
being in one's home or even in a semi-private office tends to make one
relax and talk freely. If I write something for Humanist, yes, I am
conscious of being in something like an auditorium, but perhaps in an
auditorium where the lecturer and the auditors are both permitted to be
naked, but that is all right, because noone can see anyone else.
Cheers, Roy
(3) --------------------------------------------------------------19----
Date: Mon, 25 Sep 89 11:38:20 EDT
From: Geoff Rockwell <rockwell@utorgpu>
Subject: Re: 3.490 nature of e-mail (62)
The Next mail software offers the possibility to add voice tags to e-mail,
giving it the convenience of mail (the recipient does not have to be there
to recieve it) and the subtleties of voice. I say this not having used
the voice mail capabilities, has anyone used such a system? How does the
combination of text and voice change the character of the communication?
Is the extra hardware and storage needed worth it?
Yours
Geoffrey R.
rockwell@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca