Ask HN: Is email a failed technology? What went wrong?
With letters, you will get confirmation that it was received (registered mail). With email, MS exchange server has an option but not dependable. Basically, there is no way for the sender to track the email with 100% accuracy. That is reminiscent of the carrier pigeons, no clue if the pigeon reached the destination or was a meal for some predator or decided to romance & settle down with a female that he found on the way (I am just naively assuming that the carrier pigeons were all male).
Sending an attachment is a hassle. When I was in client service, the emails were so unreliable that I would first send a text email informing that I am going to send an email with x number of attachments and the name of each files, hoping that the server has not blacklisted me and my email will land in the inbox. Then I would send the attachments and it was followed up by a call in 10-15 mins. It was part of my workflow to call and confirm if the email were received if I did not get a response in a couple of hours. Every important & time sensitive email was immediately followed by a call.
Recently, I was forced to send a registered post to a nationalised bank in India as my repeated attempts to send a 5 page (2.3 mb pdf file) failed. Technology has a share of the blame if not the whole.
Skype or any chat service are not a replacement to emails. They are branded private service like Fedex or DHL.
The whole internet got popular due to free email & porn. To me, that is a fundamental offering of the internet. Is this being viewed as an issue? The only attempt to fix email I saw was Internet Mail 2000 by Daniel J. Bernstein (http://cr.yp.to/im2000.html). Its seems like no one is bothered about this issue.
Can I send an email to someone and easily see the status of my email as "waiting in the inbox to be read."?