it also helps to just drop out of life
― Bruce Stingbean (Karl Malone), Friday, 20 May 2022 02:05 (two years ago) link
One fallacy about the unread count is that I have actually read the from and subject lines. If I haven't opened them, it's usually for a reason. Just leaving them boldfaced is basically the laziest way of categorizing them as trash.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, 20 May 2022 03:43 (two years ago) link
10,000+ unread
― aegis philbin (crüt), Friday, 20 May 2022 03:45 (two years ago) link
0, I have Outlook set to mark them read as soon as I click on them, I scroll through so they’re marked read whether I’ve paid attention to them or not.
― papal hotwife (milo z), Friday, 20 May 2022 03:50 (two years ago) link
a lot of the emails i get are promoting music shows in my area
unfortunately i can barely leave the house, so mostly i just delete them on sight. but i haven't yet brought myself to unsubscribe, because i guess there's always hope
― mookieproof, Friday, 20 May 2022 04:12 (two years ago) link
I can kind of get not reading email but I used to live with a guy who didn’t open his mail. Not junk mail. Bills. Priority mail. Hand written letters.
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Friday, 20 May 2022 04:55 (two years ago) link
We use the "unread means not actioned" method at work, on 2 inboxes shared by 4 staff that handles thousands of emails a day. Judicious use of filters to auto-move the bulk of it to set folders also in use .Without all that we'd be up shite creek. A lot of the emails are ignorable reporting from server alerts or order updates, but theres just as much important crap coming in constantly from actual customers as well.
My current personal work account has 500ish unread messages but about 400 of those are just Jira ticket updates.
― Stoop Crone (Trayce), Friday, 20 May 2022 05:32 (two years ago) link
xp this is also me. I mean I get around to them in the end but there might be 20+ items before I do so. if I got handwritten letters I would probably open those immediately as there is no fear factor there.
― Portrait Of A Dissolvi Ng Drea M (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Friday, 20 May 2022 06:21 (two years ago) link
surely this is better? it's the same amount of work.
― Tracer Hand, Friday, 20 May 2022 07:08 (two years ago) link
Work email is a task list essentially. Delete anything that isn't relevant, move to a series of folders when task is complete (or far enough in the past that it's effectively complete) and trust in the now pretty blameless email search functions if I need to recover anything.
Personal email is a bit messier, but basically the same principles apply (albeit no folders with Gmail, just archive and use the search when necessary)>
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Friday, 20 May 2022 07:29 (two years ago) link
28k in personal inbox, 193k (!) in work - mostly old error messages. 0 unread in both. Re: moving into folders, an effective search beats any kind of taxonomy.
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, 20 May 2022 07:36 (two years ago) link
Those of you cleaning out your inboxes daily, do you also move corresponding sent emails to folders as well so all the correspondence related to that topic/project are together?
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 13:21 (two years ago) link
lol extremely good question“sent box zero” would be deeply impressive and of course disturbing
― Tracer Hand, Friday, 20 May 2022 13:23 (two years ago) link
once it gets to like 100 unread I delete (without reading) most of them, read any that were important. I hate unread emails and sometimes I miss important shit.
at work I'm always at 0 unread because I don't get enough in a day to where I can't catch up. when I was a project manager it was typically 100 unread
― mookie wilson shaggin balls (Neanderthal), Friday, 20 May 2022 13:28 (two years ago) link
lol extremely good question
“sent box zero” would be deeply impressive and of course disturbing
― Tracer Hand, Friday, May 20, 2022 9:23 AM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
Yeah, I use my sent mail more than my inbox on some level. My “system” so to speak:
1. Send email.2. Set calendar reminder to follow up on response needed (markups I’ve sent, signatures I need, responses not received, etc.).3. When calendar pops up, find original sent email, respond to all and follow up.4. Lather, rinse, repeat until task is completed.
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 13:47 (two years ago) link
i like this
― Tracer Hand, Friday, 20 May 2022 13:49 (two years ago) link
that's a pretty good system, PBKR. but have you tried this?
1. stare at the inbox2. inbox counter goes up3. set timer.3. read email, or at least click on it to make the counter go back to 04. stop timer.5. log timer results in "precisionliving.xls", learn lessons, repeat
― Bruce Stingbean (Karl Malone), Friday, 20 May 2022 15:19 (two years ago) link
1. stare at inbox2. Goto line 1.
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 15:26 (two years ago) link
Re: moving into folders, an effective search beats any kind of taxonomy.
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, May 20, 2022 3:36 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
this is true and it's why i leave everything in inbox in gmail. but when i started working in the mid-00s and had to use outlook, "effective search" was not a strong suit.
― call all destroyer, Friday, 20 May 2022 15:33 (two years ago) link
I have about 150 unread, almost all from the same small group of frequent spammers. A few companies refuse to remove me from their mailing lists.
Also, why don't businesses understand how email works by now? I bought a set of tires from one place and now I get weekly emails about their big sale that week on tires. Hey guys, I just bought four, I'm not going to need another set for another 5 years, stop sending me weekly emails.
― Lee626, Friday, 20 May 2022 15:47 (two years ago) link
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, May 20, 2022 12:36 AM (eight hours ago)
depends on if you know what you are searching for? ... idk, this is actually a really interesting philosophical question tbh
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 16:26 (two years ago) link
i’m not going to pretend my way is any good but your way requires eventually moving every email that comes into your inbox to…. somewhere…. whereas i don’t do that at all so no it’s not the same amount of work― Tracer Hand, Friday, May 20, 2022 3:08 AM (ten hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
― Tracer Hand, Friday, May 20, 2022 3:08 AM (ten hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
eh, i guess i'm comparing the hassle of re-marking "unprocessed" emails as unread (a key press) with the hassle of removing processed emails from the inbox. they're both a keystroke (unless you're the kind of graybeard/sicko who files emails into specific folders).
you're right that you have to do the archive keystroke more if you remove stuff from the inbox than the mark unread keystroke if you do that.
but if you use gmail, you're presumably also using the keyboard to change to the next email. there's a key to do that, but there's a key to do that _and_ archive the current email. so if you're changing to the next email anyway, it's no extra work.
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Friday, 20 May 2022 17:16 (two years ago) link
can i just say, this is one of my favorite topics and i'm having a lovely time.
in gmail hit ] to remove the current email from the inbox and switch to the next email. [ does the same but switches to the previous email. it's good.
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Friday, 20 May 2022 17:17 (two years ago) link
unless you're the kind of graybeard/sicko who files emails into specific folders
i have maybe a few dozen gray hairs, and no beard ... I guess I'm a sicko? But, seriously, I think some of this is related to the fact that the language and systems (e.g. the term "folder") are semantically connected to physical organizational systems. I was putting documents in actual manila folders before I had email, and filed emails into specific folders. It's a cognitive task that I associate with organizing things, having all the things in their proper places, and knowing where those are. ... Metaphorically, the non-foldered emails feel like stacks of paper all over the place.
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 17:58 (two years ago) link
I could tell you stories about the guy I worked for in the early-00s who would print out emails and news articles and keep them in folders. He never threw anything away and his filing system was just these very general topics like “insurance captives” so he ended up with nearly two dozen stacks of paper 1-3 feet tall around his giant office. It was like a kid building a fort out of paper no one was ever going to read. And he viewed himself as an environmentalist, but he was just a boomer.
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:10 (two years ago) link
what is an insurance captive?
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:12 (two years ago) link
xp - I don't know if he still does this, but this local legendary punk dude who has a record label wouldn't read email, so he would have his employees print out emails that were sent to him and then fax them to him.
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:14 (two years ago) link
An insurance captive is an insurance company created by some larger companies that only insures the company that created it. I haven’t dealt with them in a long time (and not much at that) but they had a lot of tax advantages and allow the company to keep any underwriting profits instead of having them go out the door to a third party insurer.
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:24 (two years ago) link
Can also be used to self insure large SIRs/deductible and such.
― PBKR, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:25 (two years ago) link
that's super interesting to me, actually.
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 18:46 (two years ago) link
i wouldn't necessarily call morrissey a punk dude
― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Friday, 20 May 2022 19:17 (two years ago) link
lol, wrong dude
― sarahell, Friday, 20 May 2022 19:18 (two years ago) link
do you all read emails sequentially? (moreso for business than personal).
I don't use a threaded view in Outlook, but if I get an email that's part of a thread, I just read the most recent and then read all of the previous ones there, so I know what the latest is and the history of discussion.
but I do know a lot of people who start at the bottom and work their way up, so they might respond to an early email in a thread that has since been contradicted later. like, maybe a thread says "can you send me a mockup of your latest presentation", and 5 emails in someone says "actually, I'd like to hold off doing that until further internal review", but the person sees the old email first and sends the presentation before they see that later they were asked not to.
idk if i'm the weird one or not, i always assume people read the older messages first even though I don't.
― mookie wilson shaggin balls (Neanderthal), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:09 (two years ago) link
If I've been on vacation, then yeah I go reverse chronological sometimes. I'll also read ILX threads from the bottom up. :)
― change display name (Jordan), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:12 (two years ago) link
well, yeah.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:13 (two years ago) link
Although it seems like bottom up has a different meaning in both cases but maybe that's what you intended.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:14 (two years ago) link
I love reading ILX threads from bottom up, feels like watching a prequel to a horror film
― mookie wilson shaggin balls (Neanderthal), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:14 (two years ago) link
RIght. Often there is a Natives Are Restless/Dr. Livingston I Presume moment when one is close enough to the headwaters of the thread and detects the scent of an OLDE ILXXE Troll like C-man in the wind.
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:27 (two years ago) link
^helluva description there
― mookie wilson shaggin balls (Neanderthal), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:29 (two years ago) link
And then the drums stop, and it's very, very bad because...
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:31 (two years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKyJou39Kks
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:33 (two years ago) link
^6:15
― Apollo and the Aqueducts (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, 23 May 2022 16:35 (two years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Sunday, 29 May 2022 00:01 (two years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Monday, 30 May 2022 00:01 (two years ago) link
good spread
― mookieproof, Monday, 30 May 2022 01:03 (two years ago) link
the moderately responsible middle is the least represented! good job ILX!
― sarahell, Monday, 30 May 2022 16:45 (two years ago) link
Has nothing to do with responsibility
― we need outrage! we need dicks!! (the table is the table), Tuesday, 31 May 2022 20:36 (two years ago) link
I will die on this hill with my unorganized tens of thousands of unread emails
― we need outrage! we need dicks!! (the table is the table), Tuesday, 31 May 2022 20:37 (two years ago) link
If they were letters, they would be a literal hill to die on, and lo, we would think you were mad. I salute you.
― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Tuesday, 31 May 2022 20:59 (two years ago) link