The OII asks how much Email troubles its Users

"Can the Internet Survive? Internet Security, Technology and Governance: Problems and Solutions", an Oxford Internet Institute (OII) seminar day at the London Business School dealt with a range of high-level policy issues but ended on a more individual note.

Exploring, in particular, email and the response that users have to its shortcomings, Bill Dutton, director of the OII, referred to the Institute's recent study on the hazards of using email. It all came down to how much you used the Internet and how experienced you were as to whether you were plagued by viruses and spam; there were no significant demographics, he said. The more you use it, the more trouble(d) you get.

But in looking at what this signalled for the future of email, he pointed to the need for some qualitative research to make sense of these findings. People may identify themselves as concerned, but, he said, 'some people are ballistic if they get just one spam, whereas for others it is 80 out of 100 messages'. The OII is about to undertake some work to find out more about tolerance.

Putting this in the context of how one uses email and manages the quantity of uninvited messages that arrive (even from work colleagues or friends), Dutton said that people were building artificial secretaries for themselves, using filters, adware and the like. 'It is the politics of reconfiguring access: we make it more difficult to get access to ourselves, but each strategy produces a counter-strategy.'

The discussion of email was taken on by Susan Douglas of the University of Michigan, who is a cultural historian specialising in radio and who identified many parallels between the development of the two media, but kept reminding the audience how young email really is.

Speaking about the way she approaches email herself, she said 'Two years ago, when I opened email, I would say: "Who's out there hailing me?" and now I see myself as repelling trespassers.'

She talked about the depersonalising effect of email, both as a medium with limited social cues, and also in terms of the exposure it brings. 'I'm imagined as a resource node on the Web, not a person. Telephone does not give that sense of entitlement to people who don't know me.'

She continued: 'They say that the Web has flattened hierarchies. Well, I'd like to see some reinstated. I don't want to help with every question. The good thing, though, is that if I do get messages I don't want, I have the time and space to count to 10.'

Nonetheless, she acknowledged that she was both a slave to email because it was now so embedded in working practices and simulataneously attracted by its lure.

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