Use Of English Test 17 – E-Mail Or Snail Mail

Modern technology has brought about enormous improvements in communications and yet many people are still very worried forwith asaboutat using the latest computer technology. I am often irritatedsurprisedsurprisingirritating to meet colleagues who still don’t know what the ‘e’ in e-mail stands for and they are too tiredtiringembarrassingembarrassed to ask.

They assume you have to be skilled intoaboutinto computers to send a message via e-mail but in fact it is the simplestsimplestsimplerthe more simple thing in the world. It is also the cheapercheapestcheapermore cheaper to send an e-mail message thatfromasthan to send an ordinary letter or a ‘snail’ message which also takes lotasmuchmore longer. An e-mail message is only littleslightlylessleast more expensive than a local telephone call to send; on top of the call itself you also have to pay a fee to your ‘server’. If you send a letter by part-timelow-paidsecond-handfirst-class mail it will take a couple of days to get there whereas an e-mail will not take longeras longlongestmore long than a few seconds. Once you become clevergoodcapableaccustomed to using the system you will be pleasedamazedexperiencedpuzzled at how much more skilfulconfidentcertainefficient it is than other means of communication. Of course, before you have access to e-mail, you will need a fairly stronggreatlargepowerful computer, which can be quite expensive.