E-mail

I don't know why, but I got obsessed with e-mail today. Both the University of Akron and Ashland University have opted for Microsoft's e-mail client (and they look identical), so I decided to finally learn how to send a message gracefully. They both have a "contacts" list, but the only use for that one seems to be producing a printed directory. Strange that the "contacts" simply won't work as a way to send e-mail. They have a directory that's the entire school. Nice. And they have a listing of all the addresses of anyone who ever sent me anything. Apparently people at Microsoft like to search through big lists.

I read a couple of online articles and was about to conclude that getting from a simple personal directory to an e-mail message was a six-step process of navigating, clicking, copying, clicking, navigating, etc. Then I noticed a very tiny (like about 1/16 inch) box that didn't seem to be associated with anything. Yep. That's it. The magic box that everyone knows is there, so they don't discuss it. The box that starts an e-mail message from the contacts list. It's a bad case of COIK: Clear Only If Known. Everyone knows how to use this product, so nobody would think of telling a new person how to.

That success made me bolder. I tried to find the Facebook message function. It only took about half an hour of searching through help documents, and suddenly when I clicked on something I was in my own message area. I think Facebook had mercy on me, or maybe a person must go through this initiation before being allowed to message. Anyhow, once I had done this, the item appeared on the menu above the page. I swear it wasn't there before.

And people wonder why we love the Mac so. Click the icon. Type a couple of letters of your friend's name, and the machine finds several guesses from your address book. Click the one you like. That's it. Never takes twenty minutes. Never takes even five.