I still write the occasional handwritten letter, but considering how close I am with all of my family; it's time consuming to write each one of them by hand (not to mention the time it takes for them to receive the letter). Emailing is simply easier to do when you're not able to devote a lot of time to keeping in touch with everyone.

Email has indisputably changed the way the world communicates, socially and for business. Many who would have never taken the time to call or write a letter (including myself) will easily type up a quick email. As many of the other comments have noted, communication can now be completed in blocks of time and at both party's convenience, one can keep track of now distant friends and acquaintances with whom one could permanently lose track without email, with multiple recipients one can save time and effort, and attachments and links make email an even more useful tool. Even with all this, email isn't perfect in that reflection is often lost (resulting in the use of sometimes irritating emoticons), some people will often use email when instant feedback and communication is necessary, and many need to learn more protocol and not send/forward everything. Nevertheless, as email has become some common and spam has become such a problem, hacking my way through my email is becoming more and more of a chore (as with snail mail) and spend less time sending and reading real email. Moreover, as one gets older and has more responsibilities, computer use for work and more practical tasks start to take priority. All off this results in a loss of one star for emailing.

I like to keep in contact with my friends by E-mail. One thing I don't like is chain letters, I think they're garbage.

It is a little impersonal but that is the way society is going and if you don't like it well may be you need to go some where that does not have the tech yet.

only way anyone's ever going to hear from me, don't like talkin on the phone and don't like trying to keep stamps in the house, not to mention I may have corpal tunnel therefore hard for me to hold a pen

I only e-mail when I want something from someone. (Example: DVD movie or a videotape of a sports game). But I hardly e-mail people on RIA unless some viewer asks me something or has a comment.

I love e-mailing people. After school, it's the first thing I do when I go online. Besides RIA of course.

I don't really use email to keep in contact with people - I use messenger for that. Emails for me is so that I can get updated on new release films, gigs, general updates etc

I like sending e-mail more than getting it because I mostly get spam.

Probably what I use the computer most for. I get a lot of email. Second would be surfing the web.

email is a good thing, but in my line of work it has nearly replaced the phone. I'm in the mortgage biz, and I am finding more and more people and companies I deal with spend more time reading email than they do answering their damn phone. Many people I deal with will not return a call but they will answer email... seems to me they sit around on the internet all day! Well, I do too BUT I still answer the phones in the office. I pride myself on NOT dumping people into voice mail, but I seem to be in the minority. Anyway, rant aside, email is wonderful and I'm more than happy to use it instead of paying $.37 for a lousy stamp.

The most inexpensive way that I know to beable to keep in touch w/ family and freinds. I can't believe that they are still selling stamps at the post office w/ paying your bills online now.

Oh, the wonders of email! I absolutely adore email, heck, I must as I have some five or six email accounts that I’ve gathered through my years at being online. The only thing I do not like about email is the spam that seems to have taken over some of the accounts. I have family and friends spread all over the world, with email it makes it possible for us to talk more than if we still had to depend on the postal service. And with email, it doesn’t matter what time of day or night it is, if you feel the need to write someone, you just do it.

E-mail is a great invention, and I use it every day. I just have one problem with it: all people check their regular mailabox every day, but SO MANY of them only look at their e-mail once every week or month, and sometimes even less often. It's hard to get an answer when I e-mail people, including some businesses.

I think email is fantastic. It's more fun, quicker, and cheaper than writing real letters. And it has opened up a world of communication between distant friends and relatives that otherwise would not be able to or not take the time to communicate. Sure SPAM and useless FWDs can get annoying, but the good definitely outweighs the bad here.

Very useful tool, it allows for an almost immediate transmission of a message to any part of the world. (That is, if I take the time to actually CHECK my e-mail). I'm tired of all the junk and porn mail (About 10% of my mail seems to be from people telling me that I can increase my penis size, which I guess would be impressive, since I don't HAVE a penis to begin with, and even if I had one, I think I'd be insulted if some stranger told me it was too small!). But, as mentioned in a existing post, at least it's not wasting any paper. Anyway, I'd still rather just call the person up if I want to talk to them.

E-mailing is the future of worldwide communications. I love it! To think that at a fixed monthly rate ($20.00 or so), you can e-mail anyone around the world instantly. It saves on paper usage, time, money on phone calls and it saves us 37 cents.

Everybody loves e-mail. It is one of the greatest inventions in the world!!!!!

I now use my email about 99% more of the time than the phone or actual mail. sad but true

Although I hope that snail mail never dies out, you cannot deny the convience of electronic mail. Quick text messages, pictures, stories and other messages can be transmitted back and forth quickly. Although spam mail is annoying, overall e-mail is a great feature of the growing coolness called the internet.

i don't do that alot, but it can be fun and usefull.

E-mail has been great for the past years. Especially mailing lists. I handle one for our class, and it has been helpful in our schoolwork. It's a GREAT way to communicate, keep in touch with people thousands of miles from you. It's economical, both with money and time. It's easily accessible. You don't have to be at home to check if someone sent you a letter. However, SPAM could be highly annoying, the filters of some web-based e-mail haven't been that high (like HoTMaiL) and it's an easy way to obtain viruses. The good thing is, e-mail always does more good than harm. Once again, we just need to be CAREFUL.

I do use my computer alot for emailing and it's so much easier on the pocket book then phoning long distance but it can't replace listening to the sound of your loved ones voices. Also if you want a response right away you usually have to use the phone for that unless of course you're using a messenger service but that's a different topic.

I love to use my email. I think it is a great way to communicate with people from all over the world. I have a pen pal who lives about 2500 miles away. It would cost a ton to talk on the phone. I belong to a group online and I see email come from every where in the world. How cool to have that feature. I have had a blast writing and receiving email. I also learned to be careful and not open anything suspicious, unfortunately there are some jerks out there. For the most part i have really enjoyed turning on the computer and hearing the words "mail truck"

Never been much of an e-mail fanatic. If I want to contact people (which I usually don't) it's a good thing. Sending pictures and little greatings are also much easier to send by e-mail than post or by phone. It can cause a problem, I currently have 6 e-mail adresses and only use two of 'em actively. One of those is completely filled with junk-mail. I have 32 special filters, the ordinary junk-filter is 'high' and yet I can get up to 100 (sometimes more) disgusting, perverted, and just plain stupid mails a week. At least I don't get that by using the phone.

E-mail has basically changed the way I communicate. Sure, I still use the phone, but e-mail is so much simpler. The person on the other side does not know your tone of voice (a good thing sometimes!!). You can send attachments with your mail, thus e-mail can act as your fax machine as well. It is just plain convienient. It will never act as a substitute for the phone though. E-mail is timely only in certain circumstances.

I love email! It not only allows you to keep in touch with people you might not have otherwise, it also gives you a chance to take as little or as much time as you would like to do it, write something more meaningful than a quick phone call might be. Even e-junkmail and SPAM wastes no trees and is easier to dump than the junk mail you receive at home. And, when you consider that you can email someone on the other side of the globe for the exact same price you could someone next door this an extremely cheap way to communicate. I'm sure some money-grubbing utility or private company will try to destroy THAT great feature in time, but right now it's one of the best means of communication available and still one of the greatest features of the Internet

E-mails are good because you can answer them when you have time and it's easier to block unwanted people from sending you E-mails. I much perfer talking to my friends on the phone or face-to-face though. Nothing can beat human interaction, IMHO.

I'd much rather communicate by email than phone. It is so much more convenient and you can answer your mail at your leisure, whereas with phones, you often get calls at inconvenient times, or you get telemarketing calls. If you don't like your email, it's much easier to just delete the offending mail. You are not hassled with a persistently ringing phone.