I recently wrote a post on why you should archive emails instead of deleting them. In that post I explained that the days of deleting emails was almost over because of the evolution of email and technology as a whole.
I would now like to present an infographic that gives a very good overview of the current trends in online communication and presents a graphical timeline of the evolution of email. The infographic was created based on a study conducted by Microsoft and includes results from over 1200 internet users over the age of 18.
The infographic is included towards the end of this post but first, here is my take on the results:
I was surprised to learn that 91% of people expect to use email at home just as much, or more, in upcoming years as they do now. With the evolution of social media, video conferencing and instant messaging, I would think that the use of email would decrease as the number of communication options increase. Maybe Microsoft is trying to skew the results to recruit more Outlook users?
I was also surprised to see that respondents feel that face-to-face interaction is actually increasing at a higher rate than both the use of phones and instant messaging. On the same note, users think that the use of phones and instant messaging will decrease at a faster rate than face-to-face interaction. This goes against the main concern many people currently have with online communication: No more face-to-face interaction.
The rest of the infographic is basically a timeline on the evolution of email. Microsoft takes us from the time when email was first introduced at MIT in 1965, all the way up until present day. Ironically, the two most recent events in the evolution of email timeline happen to be Microsoft Outlook updates. You’d think that, with all the information presented regarding Outlook, Microsoft had conducted this study or something. Oh, wait… They did!
Either way, hope you enjoy it and remember to read between the lines! Let me know what you think in the comments below!
