I think email (and by extension, mail) is traditionally static because the medium never allowed for dynamic updates. I don't see the harm in trying to improve upon that. If a solution is found that allows for full transparency of those updates with sufficient privacy, why not?
Should email stay the same as it has been for another 50 years? I don't think it will.
But maybe that's not an evolution of email but in direct contradiction to it. Maybe it's something entirely different that is needed ... an industry standard for notifications.
Unfortunately the current landscape of the market is not favorable to create proper industry standards anymore like it used to, as all the big players feel that they have no need to co-work anymore to solve a cross-industry problem.
If they had worked on addressing some of those shortcomings alongside the launch of Amp for email, it would have gone a long way to promoting adoption.
I have received dynamic email a couple of times over the last couple of years and each time it has been a pleasant experience. For example my local mechanic sent a reminder that it was time for my vehicle inspection and my oil change. I was able to schedule my appointment for these directly from the email without having my email reading interrupted by having to switch windows or tabs.
And how could there be no privacy concerns? At a minimum, a server somewhere is going to be notified every time you open the email, so it can check for updates.
But it is what it is. The main problem with amp for emails is that email marketers don't have the time to make them. We're always excited when somebody get something out that's awesome, but it stays at that.
We're back at our day to day operations. Unfortunately amp is staying in the "Important, but not urgent" category for a few years now.
Look at this email for example: https://reallygoodemails.com/emails/discover-more-with-the-b...
If take email marketing to be a legit line of business, you might like this feature. But your assumption would be invalid. Email marketing is detrimental to society. It's the not-illegal spam. Don't market to us.
Are you having a bad day my man? Hope it gets better.
Because you're working in marketing, and you literally don't care about people. People to you are just money making machines that you need to squeeze to get that sweet ROI, OKRs, hockey stick graphs on "user aquisitions", increased ARPU and other crap.
I've yet to remember a single marketing crap in my inbox I didn't delete immediately upon receiving.
From where this community is standing, this is a big opportunity to work on fun projects. Email development is specific a little bit, but it's greatly enjoyable for many.
Whether it's worth the risks, hmm, maybe, maybe not, I've seen a few great arguments in this thread.
Actually, from this thread, I feel this type of email I mentioned MIGHT be acceptable in a sense. The ones where you can do a functional thing from email, like accept a calendar event are a different story.
But we're a long way from having amp as a standard practice.
It has a large graphic and extremely low information density, and doesn't actually provide much value. It's just an ad. And an ad that obviously comes with tracking.
I'm certainly not the target demo for that email, but if the marketing emails I get that are intended for my demo were like that, I'd consider them to be spam.