Internet Tutorials - Netiquette

Conquering Computers: Tutorial Centre
The Internet
Updated: Monday, 04 February 2008

Number 3: E-Mail Etiquette

You’ve probably heard of the term before but not known exactly what it means, but e-mail netiquette is an unofficial (more or less) set of rules and guidelines to help everybody become (more or less) consistent in the way they use e-mail. It is similar to the rules and trends we hear about with regards to writing or typing letters, such as where the addressee should go, do we put commas after the ‘Dear John’ part, do we indent the first line of every paragraph, and so on.

There are many web sites out there choc-full of information (and rubbish) about e-mail netiquette, and some form the basis of this outline.

The main site of reference for this information comes from http://wise.fau.edu/netiquette/net

Keep in mind that here we will not be covering the steps involved in creating and sending e-mail, receiving e-mail, and so on. We’ll leave that for another time. So, assuming that you know the basics of how to e-mail, let’s look at some of the (more or less) accepted ideas of how to write your e-mails.

E-Mail & File Management

The content and maintenance of a user’s electronic mailbox is the user's responsibility:

Check e-mail daily and remain within your limited disk quota.
Delete unwanted messages immediately since they take up disk storage.
Keep messages left in your electronic mailboxes to a minimum.
Mail messages can be downloaded or extracted to files then to disks for future reference.
Never assume that your e-mail can be read by no one except yourself; others may be able to read or access your mail. Never send or keep anything that you would mind seeing on the evening news.
Keep attached files you send to a minimum size, around 1.5 MB to 2 MB maximum is a good rule.
Routinely and frequently virus-scan your system, especially when receiving or downloading files from other systems to prevent the spread of a virus.
Your files may be accessible by persons with system privileges, so do not keep anything private in your disk storage area.

Basic e-mail Netiquette

(1) Keep paragraphs and messages short and to the point.

(2) Focus on one subject per message and always include a pertinent subject title for the message.

(3) Include your signature at the bottom of your e-mail. Your signature should include your name, position, affiliation and Internet addressee and should not exceed more than 4 lines. Optional information includes your address and phone number.

(4) Capitalize words only to highlight an important point or to distinguish a title or heading. Capitalizing whole words that are not titles is VERY RUDE AND GENERALLY TERMED AS SHOUTING!!!

(5) *Asterisks* surrounding a word can be used to make a stronger point.

(6) Use underscores before and after a book title, e.g. _War and Peace_

(7) Because of the International nature of the Internet and the fact that most of the world uses the MM DD YY format for listing dates, be considerate and avoid confusion of dates by listing dates including the spelled out month; example: 24 JUN 96 or JUN 24 96

(8) Follow chain-of-command procedures for corresponding with superiors. For example, don’t send a complaint via e-mail directly to the ‘top’ just because you can.

(10) Be professional and careful what you say about others. E-mail is easily forwarded.

(11) Cite all quotes, references and sources and respect copyright and license agreements.

(12) Be careful when using sarcasm and humour. Without face-to-face communications your joke may be viewed as criticism. When expressing any emotion, use emoticons (see next part).

Use Emoticons

These are small symbols used to indicate some emotion in your e-mail. Examples are as follows. Turn your head and look at them side-on:

:-) Your basic smiley. This is for a sarcastic or joking statement, or just to say you’re happy.

;-) Winky smiley. User just made a flirtatious and/or sarcastic remark.

:-( Frowning smiley. User did not like that last statement

:-I Indifferent smiley. Better than a :-( but not quite as good as a :-).

:-> User just made a sarcastic remark. Worse than a ;-).

>:-> User just made a really devilish remark.

>;-> Winky and devil combined. A lewd remark was just made.

Acronyms

These can be a great way to save time on typing, as well as on connection time if you still type your e-mails while you’re online.

BCNU – Be seeing you

BTW – By the way

FWIW – For what it's worth

FYI – For your information

IMHO – In my humble opinion

OBO – Or best offer

ROTFL – Rolling on the floor laughing

RTFM – Read the funny manual

TNSTAAFL – There’s no such thing as a free lunch

TTFN – Ta ta for now

TTYL – Talk to you later

Finally

As stated in the beginning, this is a list of suggested outlines regarding how to write your e-mail messages and the sorts of standards to keep in mind. It is by no means compulsory to stick by these, but they give us a base from which to work. With e-mail fast becoming the main route over which communications are sent, it makes sense for everybody to maintain some sort of consistency.

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