Shareware, freeware, and e-mail have created the illusion that everyone's your buddy. I've sent numerous queries to a guy who writes and gives away a great little chess database program. He usually gets back to me right away, answers all my questions, and even thanks me for my detailed bug reports. Sadly, this kind of personal and prompt attention seems to be the exception, not the rule. There's a darker side to the world of e-mail.
Civility seems to be going out the window.
Because it's so fast and easy to use, people are now getting deluged with e-mail. A friend of mine told me he actually gets frightened and turns off his computer if he sees more than three or four new e-mail messages downloading Worker overload is one of the leading causes of stress in the contemporary office, as employees are expected to do more work for less pay. Some people complain that they often lose several hours in a single day just reading and responding to e-mail. As a result, people are prioritizing ruthlessly, and e-mail civility isn't making the final cut. Three recent experiences confirmed my theory.