There’s nothing wrong with my no-email policy | Hacker News Reader

There’s nothing wrong with my no-email policy

theguardian.com

74 pointszabzonk57 comments

It's easy to tweet anger at someone, less so in an email, and even less when you need to write,package, address, stamp, and send a letter. Probably cuts out a lot of the crap and only gets things that matter or what people are really passionate about.

It's probably just as easy to send an angry email. But something a public medium like twitter doesn't really allow is subsequent apologies - people are often afraid of admitting guilt publicly.

Running a quite large site, we get our share of angry support (email) tickets. Although we don't have to take any shit, we are generally nicer than we have to be ("Please find some mental counseling. Issuing death threats over not getting your ticket answered within two hours is not normal.") and received our share of apologies.

We also regularly get shit thrown our way via twitter, but don't expect any apologies there.

Twitter (and in general social media) is probably a good thing to avoid for communication if you are not a large company that can staff up for it. Threads can devolve very quickly into “campaigns”. I would not want to have my medical staff spinning a bunch of cycles with pr related stuff or being subjected to mobs.

Companies use the same technique if a customer wants to cancel a service from them. A very effective technique to use as a dark pattern in a businss context.

I had a gym that required a certified letter to cancel.

Do what works for you. I absolutely love email. I'll pick up the phone and call someone too, but most things I do aren't so urgent I need to call you and interrupt whatever you're doing right this second so that you can give me your full, undivided attention.

I use email to remind myself of things I need to follow up on, coordinate events, and keep new engagements in a single stream of consciousness. It works well for me.

I don't typically get to 0-inbox, I usually have maybe 10-30 emails in my inbox which are all read and are all there for a reason (listed above and more). I religiously unsubscribe from things (or don't subscribe in the first place) and I will admit it takes some work to keep organized.

I also have all notifications turned off and my email only fetches once/hour anyway. I actually get excited when I get new emails because typically there's something in progress and it's some sort of update or new information I can use to do something I want to do.

So there's nothing wrong with a no-email policy. But I there's also nothing wrong with email. Everything comes down to the processes YOU like and find the most beneficial.

It isn't just about what works for him, he will have at least one paid assistant to help with this.

Maybe he thinks their time is better spent doing something else.

Maybe those that pay them have a different opinion.

Valid. Though I don't know why you'd want someone spending half their day triaging emails.

> Do what works for you.

This person should be doing what works best for their constituents, not for them and their staff.

If it doesn't work for him, then it's not optimal for his constituents either.

Or he's not optimal for his constituents...

Apparently he is, or he won't be re-elected because of this choice.

The problem is geography. He wants to serve his constituents. Email makes it far too easy for people who aren't his constituents to take vast quantities of his and his staff's time.

> Letters, phone calls, and, where appropriate, surgery appointments are perfectly adequate for people who genuinely need my help

The insinuation that just because someone may not want to use a particular communication channel (or conversely, may need to use a particular channel), that they then are not genuine in their request for help is disingenuous and self-serving. Someone may genuinely need help and may likewise genuinely want to use email because they do not have ready access to a phone, or find it vastly more inconvenient, and need help in a manner faster than mail or setting up a surgery appointment affords.

The same could be said, in a domain more familiar to HNers, of bug reports.

If you don't take bug reports as tweets, or in e-mails, but insist that 1) they go into a bug tracker, and 2) that they evidence some care (such as, instead of saying, 'X is broken', include a list of steps to reproduce, and an expected outcome) then, well, you must be self serving, and feel that these bugs are not genuine or important.

But, you'll also have a greater capacity to actually deal with the requests where someone made the effort to report a bug in a useful fashion.

You missed out "create an account in the bug tracker".

I hate creating new accounts as much as the next person (maybe more), but if you can't be bothered with that much work why should I be bothered with fixing the bug? I definitely prefer bug reports in the bug tracker, even though I will still respond to those that have been emailed to me.

I'm with you generally, but this...

> if you can't be bothered with that much work why should I be bothered with fixing the bug?

comes off a bit weird. I don't fix bugs as a favor to any individual. I fix bugs because I want the product to be as good as it can be.

In my own projects, when people report bugs to me though methods other than the bug tracker, I just file the bug in the tracker myself so I don't forget.

I agree with you; I'm the same way about bugs in my products. Having said that, a bit more time/effort put into a bug report can save quite a bit of time for me in fixing this and increase the chance of success.

I report bugs as a favor to the developer. Most of the time I never plan to use the fixed software anyway.

That right there is the number one thing that might stop me from REPORTING a bug.

I also am NOT going to sign up to become a full developer just to submit a patch. Don't make me signing some CLA or other thing. Take my clear note saying the patch is submitted as (your choice of) "Too obvious to copyright", Public Domain or CC0 or some other acceptable very permissive thing.

MPs are supposed to serve all their consistuents, though. Open source maintainers' duty to their users is more controversial; but I think most people would agree it's not as strong as an MP's.

> then, well, you must be self serving, and feel that these bugs are not genuine or important.

It's harder to keep track of bugs that aren't on a bugtracker (hence the name) if you don't have time to fix them right now.

I regularly fix easy bugs submitted to me on IRC, but if I can't do it right now, then I require the user to open an issue on my bugtracker or else I'll forget it and fix one of the other 216 bugs on my bugtracker instead.

This is kind of like the idea that the poor person who gave their last $10 is doing more than the rich person giving $10k/month sustainably.

it's ethics vs being _effective_ in the practical reality we live in.

> MPs are supposed to serve all their consistuents, though

Yes, and that responsibility predates computers. So let’s not pretend that they only became capable of doing this effectively After Twitter was developed, just because you and others don’t want to bother with sending a letter.

OMG this! We have this over engineered issue tracking system with incredibly detailed information fields. In my opinion it has failed spectacularly because most people avoid it with a vengeance, and those who try to use it gets older much faster then the rest of us.

Perhaps he should publish his cell phone so he can get incoming text messages from all of us? Or maybe he just needs a FB live account going 24/7 so we can quickly voice or opinion and get a direct response?

This policy of his is so mundane and acceptable, I'm flabbergasted that anyone is pushing back.

It's even harder to argue against when you see that he's been an MP since '97 and keeps getting elected!

Firstly, I find the policy of only accepting correspondence by phone, letter or appointment perfectly reasonable. However...

> he's been an MP since '97 and keeps getting elected!

In the UK, this usually says more about the demographics of the seat than the quality of the MP.

OTOH, email is vastly easier to automate and swamp your resources than phone calls, and so forth.

I also don't find the argument that people can't find a phone to call, but can email to hold much water. My bank is allowed to refuse to take $1k in pennies, there are often good reasons for limitations due to abuse.

It's wrong to suggest that all email correspondence is not genuine, but it's a fair bet that the majority of it is.

I don't think a constituency office should generate arbitrary hoops to make communication harder, but on the other hand they shouldn't have to do a lot of extra filtering work just for your convenience.

Ah yes the ole edge case where you have access to a computer and the internet but are unable to find access to a phone.

likewise there is nothing wrong with my "no phonecalls" policy and yet people still insist on me using it, ill often contact people or companies about things and get the response "just give me a call" why? theres no reason they cant simply reply using the method i contacted them with but thats not all

first up phone calls tend to go "off the rails" no one simply answers the question and says goodbye and hangs up so you waste a lot of time, not only that but theres the fact that phone calls arent very private, not only is the person youre talking to hearing you but anyone within earshot and the person on the other end of the phone is usually oblivious or ignorant to your location and who may be around you, if they ask something which you may consider sensitive you then have to avoid the question (and potentially reply by a more private means of communication after, wasting more time)

youre also put on the spot, theres no time to consider your response to something youve been asked you have to respond pretty much instantly which can go wrong in many ways, its why salespeople like to use the phone, its much easier to get someone to agree to something they otherwise wouldnt if they had more time to consider what theyd been asked

sadly the bottom line is we are all at some point usually forced to use a method of communication we arent comfortable with, the best you can do is try to minimise it

Nothing wrong with my "email only" policy either - no phone or video calls. Granted, I don't work in sales or customer support, but in the "back office".

My working, thinking, and writing style requires big blocks of focused time, with no interruptions. A phone call or a scheduled meeting is a sure way to disrupt and reduce my productivity. I reserve phone/video calls only for personal purpose, not work-related, and even then it's rare.

Surprisingly, in my X years of working I've found that most people are willing to tolerate or adapt to my preferred communication methods.

On occasion, in particular when I need to interact with those working at large corporations, I've had people who just insist on "hopping on a call", even after repeated explanation. Every time I've begrudgingly agreed, I've regretted my decision, lost time, and less productive discussion.

Email is (near) perfect for me, as I can batch them at the start/end of my day. I get to sit back, think things through, and reply at my own convenience.

Seems to work for Don Knuth: https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/email.html

I consider Knuth a special case. He isn't really working on projects with pressing/shifting deadlines and timeframes. He does research and writes books. He's basically an author now. So doing things in "batch mode" as he says, makes sense for his particular work flow.

He also has his own secretary. LUL.

Donald Knuth also does reply to email; he just doesn’t tell you he does. I once got a response from him late in the evening, well after any secretary would have gone home.

Knight or Knuth?

The key quote:

“ Much of the organised abuse which has caused many MPs to “burn out” and withdraw from public life results from their opening up themselves and their long-suffering staff to interactive online communications by email and social media. Indeed several have confided that they wish they had adopted my unshakable policy right at the outset.”

I think there’s some wisdom here—-and he is indeed protecting his staff; he wouldn’t be filtering all the email himself.

Having just finished Cal Newport's 'Deep Work', I recall the section about Donald Knuth's similar stance[0] of no-email.

[0] https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/email.html

That’s fine, but then the MP should hire an assistant to manage their email if it detracts from their deep work. Donald Knuth does not have a sworn duty to represent people; he could go and live in the woods for all it would matter

They had a sworn duty to represent people even before the computer was invented. He’s not failing that obligation by not answering email, tweeting his every though or ignoring Facebook friend requests. Your preferred path of communication isn’t the same as his, that doesn’t mean he’s failing to communicate.

https://www.writetothem.com/

A website that you can use to send your MP a message. Not quite as convenient as using email directly but almost so. They have a fax machine purely so that Julian Lewis' constitutes can contact their MP.

For Julian Lewis, it now refers people (with a broken link) to the Parliament website.

e.g. https://www.writetothem.com/write?who=47046&pc=SO42+7ZN

Ah, the fax machine must have died.

... unless you would struggle to address a printed letter due to a disability, Have anxiety, a full-time job or anything else that prevents you from physically attending a surgery appointment, or can't speak. Or all of the above.

It would need to be all the above, and without anyone to help with writing an address (I'm sure someone at the post office would help), and without knowing how to print the address onto the envelope, but still able to use email.

And he's a Tory MP, so in any case this hypothetical disabled person is wasting their time.

>>> "There is nothing “mysterious” about the fact that I do not use email for constituency correspondence: it is openly stated on the homepage of my – very extensive – website"

LOL. Might want to look into that: www.julianlewis.net (do not click)

It directs to a spam / scam domain...

If only someone had a pen ready to write to him...

Works fine for me.

It redirected to a scam site the first time I opened it, but a minute later (after a "curl" looked OK and I opened a private tab) it worked fine.

... surgery appointment?

This guy is a politician, right? Not a surgeon? Can someone explain?

It's a political term in the UK to refer to meetings with constituents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surgery_(politics)

Not that it applies in this case, but a person can be both. Depending on the office, politics can be a very part-time occupation.

There are several UK MPs who are former or indeed currently practicing doctors.

Honestly, I can't fault him for this -- and I say that as a person who uses email as my primary communications method.

His reasoning makes sense to me, and if his constituents don't mind, then it's hard to say there's something wrong with his approach.

Wikipedia says that this guy has been an MP since 1997. Presumably that means he has won many elections and thus his constituents do not think his no-email policy is a problem.

Or that he has a safe seat.

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