On or about Fri, 11 Mar 2005 15:22:30 +1100 Raul said - >Evie Leder wrote: > >>I don't understand what the fuss is. IF PM allowed rich text or multipart >>outgoing emails, those who didn't want it would not have to use it. It >>would widen it's base, which would be good for the company. (but, with >>the text-only zealots, it might be a difficult move) Perhaps it could be >>set up with plain text as the standard, and only by changing a >>preference would it allow you to send multipart emails.... >> >>It would be helpful when dealing with commercial clients who expect me to >>be able to send multipart emails and also for me to know more about >>sending them. For those who don't want it, well, they could turn it off. :) > >What you say is to some extent true. I for one wouldn't mind if PM >offered HTML editing, because I would just turn it off, as you say. The >point is rather whether including it would widen their base enough to >justify the expenditure of resources given their target market and other >features they would not be able to apply those resources to. It's a >business decision, not a technical one. As I understand it, CTM has >taken the position that they would rather address the kind of features >that make them different from other mailers and that meet the needs of a >certain kind of power user who is frustrated with the limitations of >other mailers. Whether this is a successful long-term business strategy >remains to be seen, as does any niche-oriented business strategy, but in >my opinion, and I think that of many Powermail users, it is, as we now >have FoxTrot, very flexible filtering, excellent spam control, good >scriptability, multiple inbox views (the recent mail window) etc., all of >which help handle large volumes of incoming mail, generally much better >than the alternatives. And there are still things CTM could do, to judge >from the lists of feature requests you see on this list, that many, and >perhaps most, of us would like to see before HTML editing, which is big, >difficult to do well, and does nothing for helping one manage lots of >incoming mail efficiently. > >If I'm not mistaken, we "text-only zealots" would prefer CTM did these >things, as they are useful to us, rather than put resources into >something expensive that we don't care about. Does that make us zealots? > I think it just means we have our interests and the pro-HTML camp has >theirs. No need for name calling. After all, I could say that people >who really care about outgoing HTML also probably care about mobile >phones with polyphonic ring tones and multimedia messaging. Both are >sexy; both are largely pointless or even obstructing when the volume of >communications is the major issue. But I won't say that, as it would be >name calling. :-) > >The real question for CTM is how providing HTML editing at cost X >compares to providing something else at cost Y that helps the Mac-using >professional inundated with 1000 emails a day to sort it all out and deal >with it efficiently today and later on when he needs to search it. And >how the numbers X, Y, the 1000 above, and the number of people getting >that many mails, are likely to change in the future. At the rate the use >of email is growing, I think their bet looks pretty good. They won't >take over the world, but they will always have a market, and it will grow. > > >-- >Raúl Vera >Director >Orbit 3 Pty Ltd >http://orbit3.com > > Hear, hear, well said
Graham
