As a medium of communication, email has become an almost indispensable tool for business, personal, educational and social purposes. In all likelihood, its importance in the future will grow at an almost exponential rate, despite the various problems it has caused, such as the plague of spam that is choking the internet.

Compared with the regular postal mail, email has the advantage of being easy and quick. It also has the advantage of being delivered into the recipient’s mailbox for them to read and reply at their convenience, but without the lengthy time delay involved with “snail mail”. It doesn’t oblige the sender to engage in small-talk with the recipient, as telephones do. It may usually involve a 10-15 minute conversation to deliver a simple message to a friend through telephone, since no on wants to appear rude by hanging up too soon. The great convenience brought by emails really benefits us a lot and saves us much more time.

Email is an electronic version of a written memorandum. Remnants of the memo such as the “To”, “Cc” and “Subject” fields, where closely emulate that of the traditional memo, can be seen in the header. Even though the days of making an actual “carbon copy” are long gone, the term “Cc” is retained because it still somehow makes sense to people. Many people under the age of 40 may have never seen a sheet of carbon paper, such as was used in offices to make a copy in a typewriter of the original memo.

There are no “official” rules governing electronic communication. Although many people have been attempting to establish one standard or another as the default, there is no common agreement. So beware people telling you there is one right way, they are assuming too much. As a general rule though, netiquette involves the same principles as plain old etiquette—basic respect, courtesy and ethics.

Everyone should know the basic email etiquette and do as it tells when writing emails. By following the principles outlined below, the recipient of your email will be more likely to read and act, if not be favorably impressed by your message:

◇Subject Line to Summarize the Message. Summarize the body of the email in the subject line, making the recipient clear about what you are going to talk about. For example, instead of “Subject: Time”, say “Subject: Time of second meeting, 9:00 a.m., 15 June”.

◇Don’t Assume the Recipient Knows the Background. Apply enough contextual information to the recipient at the beginning of the email so that he/she could know what the matter is about. If in doubt, put background information in. For example, instead of “can I ask some days off?” say “My father, who I have not seen for six years, will be staying with us recently and I respectfully request time off between June 9th and June16th inclusive.”

◇Reply within 24 Hours. Try to reply the email within 24 hours, less if possible. It is a polite manner to reply the email immediately, and the recipient will appreciate it. The habit of replying immediately can also make you look efficient. The longer you leave it to reply, the more likely you will forget or have too big a log-jam of unanswered email.

◇Allow Time for a Reply. Email messages are not usually required to be answered immediately, though it is good practice if you do. Before sending a reminder, allow some time for a response, some times even a few days. Not everyone is online 24 hours a day.

◇Keep It Brief. When writing an email, try to make it concise and to the point. Get rid of the redundant information, nobody wants to scroll down through pages of text in order to reach the message they want to read. But not so brief that it causes the problem outlined in the previous.

◇Use the BCC Field When Sending Bulk Email. When you are going to send a message to a group of people, you can just put their addresses in the BCC field. In this way, the privacy of the recipient is respected, and the spammers are prevented from harvesting the email addresses for their dastardly purposes.

◇Avoid Angry Outbursts. Don’t send or reply to email when you are angry. Wait until you have calmed down, then compose the email. Once written and sent, it can’t be recalled. Angry or intemperate email has a way of rebounding on the sender. As a guide, ask yourself, “would I say this to the person’s face?”

◇Don’t Shout at People or Threaten Them. The capitalized letters (UPPERCASE) or oversized fonts will make the reader feel being shouted at or even threatened. If you have to use uppercase, use it very sparingly and only to emphasize a particularly important point. You may ask yourself: “could I raise my voice to the recipient if I was talking to him/her face to face?” One way to add emphasis is to enclose the word/phrase with an asterisk, for example: “It is good not to eat out in the dirty restaurants.” Large sized fonts (greater than 12) are not appropriate for general use except for people with visual impairment.

◇Spelling. Check your spelling! If you don’t know how to spell something, look it up.

◇Correct Punctuate and Grammar. Use punctuation in a normal manner. One exclamation point is just as effective as five !!!!! Use correct grammar as with any written message.

◇Layout Message for Readability. Use breaks and spaces between long sentences and paragraphs to make it easier on the reader.

◇Don’t Forget Attachments. Remember to include the attachment if the reason for sending an email is to send a file. It’s easy to forget. One strategy is to attach the file before writing the email.

◇Keep the Thread. Use the reply option on the sidebar in your mail when replying to an email. This will keep the message in the “thread”, and make it easier for the recipient to follow.

◇Don’t Reply to All unless Necessary. Think twice about sending a reply to everyone. Perhaps only selected people need to see this email. Sending it to everyone may simply be contributing to an already cluttered in-tray.

◇Sharing Large Files. Don’t send file attachments larger than a megabyte unless it is directly necessary (like large spreadsheets, presentations, and/or work-related documents). In most cases, such attachments might have curiosity value for some but which end up clogging mail servers and in-boxes much to the annoyance of systems administrators. If you want to share photos, videos etc., use Flickr or YouTube or any of the other many such services now freely available.

◇Edit the Superfluous Text out of Emails. When you are sending email that has “been around” in the sense that it has been replied to or forwarded many times, take the time to remove the angle brackets “” from the message. It’s irritating for many people to see text in such disarray. The easiest way is to copy and paste the text into a word processor, and use the search and replace function to remove any unwanted characters. The example below breaks both this rule and the one about shouting at people by using uppercase:

◇Chain Letters. As more people are using email for more varied purposes, it has become more common to use email for multilevel marketing, chain letters, pyramid schemes and other dubious purposes. The example above is one of the more benign examples of an implied threat as a way to motivate the recipient to take action. Another example is the chain letter that claims to be for the benefit of a dying child or promises to make you rich overnight if only you send it to five more people, and send $10 to the person who sent it to you. Most people find these email practices particularly annoying.

◇Correct Priority. Avoid marking an email “high priority” when it is really “normal” priority.

◇Acronyms, Abbreviations, and Emoticons. Acronyms and abbreviations are OK to use in email as long as you don’t over do it, and the recipients can reasonably be expected to know what they mean. Although they are a popular and useful way of expressing emotion in email, avoid using them in any business emails. Here are some basic ones that people frequently use in emails:

2L8—too late;

AAMOF—as a matter of fact;

AFAIK—as far as I know;

B4N—bye for now;

CMIIW—correct me if I’m wrong;

CUL—see you later;

FWIW—for what it’s worth;

FYI—for your information;

IKWUM—I know what you mean;

IMHO—in my humble opinion;

KWIM—Know what I mean?

ROTFL—rolling on the floor laughing;

TIA—thanks in advance;

TYL—talk to you later.

Emoticons (for example: ;-) a winking smiley face) are good when used in context. When communicating in person you use visual cues and tone of voice to receive a clearer message. Since there are not visual or auditory cues with email, emoticons can be used to clarify what you mean. As a general rule, you probably shouldn’t use them when talking to someone in authority unless you’re sure. Here are some examples:

:) happy;

:( sad;

:o very surprised;

;) wink;

;* kiss;

8) person with glasses smiling;

:& tongue-tied.

◇Don’t Be Over-familiar with the Recipient. Many people are offended by strangers being over-familiar. For example, you may react badly to people you don’t know addressing your nickname. Only friends and family call you that. As a rule, use the title or form of address that you would use in verbal communication.

◇Not Suitable For Work (NSFW) Warning. Some workplaces are tolerant of non-work related email, though not too many these days. Especially if the email you are sending contains “adult” material, be sure to include the NSFW warning in the subject line. Otherwise, this kind of email might get someone into trouble with their boss.

◇Illegal Activities. When using emails, avoid the illegal activities such as discrimination (racial, sexual, religious, ageist etc.), libel (defamatory statements), illegal information (how to kill or injure people, incitement to violence, racial hatred etc.), some adult material (child or violent erotica). This advice does not apply to the vast majority of email users, who would never indulge in the aforementioned practices. But for those so inclined, not only are these likely to offend the recipient, people found engaging in illegal activities involving email are likely to have strong sanctions brought against them by the institution and by the civil authorities.