Other people send you messages in the same way, and they appear as a list on your computer.
Most people check their e-mail messages daily, in the same way as they check their mail box.
Mailing lists take e-mail one step further. When you join a list on a certain topic, e.g., travel for people with disabilities, you agree to accept messages from other people on the list on that topic. They will appear as part of your regular list of e-mail messages. To contact people on the list, you send your message to a central e-mail address, and it is forwarded. Newsgroups are similar to mailing lists, but confine discussion to a specific place on the Internet, so that messages are not mixed up with your ordinary electronic mail.