Why e-mails are pretty worthless

[jpgray]

Letters, phone calls or faxes seem to me immeasurably superior.

The letter or fax takes up space--a huge mailbag is significant and has weight, whereas an email deluge adds only a few more kilobytes. A bag of letters is a physical entity that has to be disposed of, whereas one big highlight and click and millions of emails can disappear. The phone call takes up a human being's time, and therefore is guaranteed of getting SOME attention--there is no guarantee with an email, which may jsut go through an impersonal sorter, recieve a form reply, and be banished to the trash.

The e-mail is the laziest possible means of communicating. It costs virtually nothing, and takes little time. Further, it has a terribly unprofessional image due to advertising and spam. This without mentioning an email letter coming from "[e-mail]" is not going to get the same attention as a letter from Ms. Jane Doe, or a phone call from her--the internet mailing system is too anonymous, impersonal and unprofessional to have the same kind of impact these days as a letter or phone call.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't JUST email your congresspeople, press agencices or other entities if you want them to hear your opinion--call them, write them letters, send them faxes. These things are much harder to ignore and much more likely to produce an effect.

[htuttle]

1. You can send a fax online at congress.org

That's my preferred method of communication with my representitives. Before the IWR, I paid to have some 'hand-delivered' telegrams sent from that site -- it was cheap (coupla bucks), and I felt it was worth it.

[economic justice]

2. PRIORITY MAIL!

If you have something you think is especially important or well done, send it Priority Mail! It's about $3.50 or so and I have received PHONE replies because of my sending things this way. It stands out.

[in_cog_ni_to]

3. You can purchase Priority Mail Postage Online

at http://usps.com/. I do ALL of my postage via the internet. I love it!

[jpgray]

5. That's an interesting idea

Thanks for putting it up.

[KoKo]

4. Faxing is good. Letters are still backlogged testing for anthrax, and

many folks are leery of phone calls because of various reasons, but fax if you have access to one, is a piece of paper, and you don't have your "goofy" intenet handle throwing folks off, like with e-mails. I've faxed my Senators and Congresspersons and gotten responses, so they do read them.

That's what I found worked best for me.

[DUreader]

6. I usually call, I like the congress.org free fax

I'll have to crank that up