Tai-Li Wang (Editor: Veronique Autphenne)

Faster than a speeding letter and cheaper than a phone call, electronic mail (e-mail) has become a main communication medium of the 1990s. The Electronic Mail Association estimates that over the next two years, as the percentage of home PC owners who go online rises and Internet connectivity becomes more popular around the world, the number of active electronic mailboxes could double from an estimated 75 million now to somewhere over 150 million (Kosiur 1996).

More than twenty-five centuries ago the Persian King Darius established a courier messaging service. Since then, the quest for cheaper and more efficient ways of telecommunications has never ended. The first e-mail system was software on interactive and multi-user computers (time-sharing computers) which allowed users on the same computer to send mail to each other. Such systems existed by the end of the 1960s like MULTICS, PDP-10, etc (Palme 1995).

At the beginning of the 1970s, some computers used at research centers throughout the United States were connected through a network called ARPAnet. It was expected that this network would be used mostly for file transfer and running programs on remote computers. However, e-mail soon became the largest volume application on the ARPnet. At the same time, two independent groups, Murray Turoff in the Washington D.C. and Jaques Valee in California, developed two of the earliest conference systems, EMISARI and FORUM/PLANET. The two early systems played important roles as generators of ideas and experimental labs in the area of e-mail (Vervest 1987).

During the 1980s, the most important new networks were UUCP and BITNET. They used variants of the ARPAnet mail protocols. They distributed computer conferencing system with users on thousands of computers around the world. Many researchers in Europe also started to use X.400 in the mid-1980s, and an informal X.400 network was developed under the name R&D MHS.

The growing use of local area networks (LANs) towards the end of the 1980s encouraged the development of a number of electronic messaging systems for such networks. Many systems were developed by personal computer software companies such as Word Perfect Office, Lotus Notes, CCmail and Microsoft Mail (Vervest 1987).

Public computer conferencing services also grew during the 1980s, mainly in the U.S.. Services were provided by American Online, CompuServe and BIX. Their services combine computer conferencing and e-mail with access to databases of texts and public domain software.

An e-mail system (EMS) is different from traditional mail in how messages are created, how they are delivered and how they are handled after being received. An EMS user needs to translate the information into a format that can be transmitted through a communication network. Typically, the device is a computer, a communication processor terminal or a terminal (Trudell et al. 1984). The electronic form can be thought as a code into which all numbers or characters are converted to computer-readable formats. The standard form of the coding is the American Standard for Communications Information Interchange (ASCII). Once the message has been translated into an electronic code, it can be transmitted over the network. The communication network can be just ordinary telephone lines or other types of equipment specifically designed for electronic data transmission, such as Tyment, Telenet, or Uninet. All of them employ a technology called packet switching to insure high-speed, error-free transmission.

There are two main methods used in an EMS system to deliver messages: direct delivery or centralized delivery. Information can be delivered directly from the sender to the recipient, or all messages can be sent to a central storage area, which holds the messages until the recipient is ready to pick them up. Figure 1 provides a schematic comparison of the two kinds of networks (Trudell et al.1984).

Figure 2 shows the three most important components in the market for e-mails (Palme 1995). Users dial up or connect to the public electronic mail services, such as a university’s computer, and use these systems to read and write their messages. The internal company electronic mail systems represent the chances of marketing software to various companies. The provision of networks transfer messages between various internal companies and public e-mail systems (Palme 1992).

In addition to these three market components, there is also a market for the sale of the general hardware and operating system software used by e-mail systems. The Public Telephone and Telegraph companies (PTTs) in most industrialized countries have set up e-mail exchanges based on the X.400 standard. They want this to be a regular telecom service. They also want people to use a worldwide PTT-run e-mail net in much the same way as people use telephone networks. In the States, there is no single dominant telecom company.

E-mail services are provided by several companies, some of them connected to telecom companies. Some of the largest are Telenet, Dialcom, MCI Mail and GE-Quik-COMM. Many of the PTTs in other countries have bought software from some of these American systems. However, the efforts of the PTTs to establish themselves as the dominant e-mail network providers have not been very successful. In spite of their efforts, the largest usage of e-mail is on the Internet, not in the PTT-provided nets. The Internet works as a kind of global backbone for e- mail, with gateways to most other nets. Programs used for accessing the Internet, such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft’s Internet Explorer thus serve as the key gateways for sending and receiving e-mail (Trudell et al. 1984).

Many surveys have been done about the application patterns and effects of e-mail on people and organizations. One important result is that e-mail does more than just change the form of communication from other media to computers. The introduction of e-mail changes communication patterns, so that people communicate with different people more often, and about other subjects than before. Figure 3 shows the result of a survey investigating into the use of e-mail (Palme 1995). The percentages show that over 50 per cent of the users perceived e-mail as a new way, rather than a replacement of other important media. This may lead to the conclusion that if a communication medium opens possibilities for new kinds of contacts that would not have been practical or economically possible without the new medium, then people will take advantage of the new possibilities and change their patterns of behaviors. Research in the use patterns of e-mail also shows that it is mostly used for resolving small, simple issues and for group communication. If the issue can be concluded with a maximum of four to six lines of messages, e-mail is valued as the most suitable communication medium (Palme 1995).

Today, most e-mail is text only. Some skeptics claim e-mail has destroyed the art of correspondence—whatever might have been left of it in the age of telephone. Many people may have mixed feelings about technology. We admire the speed and convenience e-mail has brought to us, while missing those times you would get a two or three-page letter with beautiful watermarks and delicate designs, and an unique handwriting to express a particular taste.

E-mail users now are demanding richer message formats to give a more personal touch with e-mails. Some systems can send documents containing sound, graphics, animated graphics or spreadsheets. Hot sale software products on the market are Novita’s LiveLetter, Broderbund Software’s Print Shop LiveMail, and PictureWork’s NetCard (Georgia 1998). The concept behind LiveLetter, for example, is to act like a Web page where e-mail messages are created and displayed as HTML documents, and able to work on hotlinks, Java applets, multiple folding, sorting and filtering tools, and so on. A problem with such new fashion is that not all systems are supported in a standard way by messaging software packages. There is a risk that not all recipients of a message can open all parts of the message, unless they all use the same messaging software. Multimedia will probably become more common with more advanced user equipment in the near future.

The emergence and rapid growth of e-mail from concept to experimental service, and then to commercial uses result form the quiet revolution in communications and computers brought on by the U.S. semiconductor industry, along with the computer and communication industries which have been fueled by it.

Not everyone agrees on the proper ethics and etiquette in e-mail. One community of users may have ethical rules that are in direct contradiction with those in another community. New users of e-mail tend to begin by trying to apply ethics learned in other communication media like postal mail, telephone, or face–to-face meetings. However, not all principles suitable for other media are appropriate for e-mail. For example, general courtesy rules for friendliness and consideration may be more important in e-mail, since users cannot immediately see a negative reaction and correct or clarify what exactly a message means. Experts advise e-mail users to wait for a few hours to calm down before writing a potentially harmful message, since the message is so easy and fast to deliver, but not allowing the sender to retract it (Cole-Gomolski 1997).

There are few laws controlling e-mail. When the use of e-mail is more widespread there may be more control of the medium through legislation. It is dangerous, however, to try to make laws controlling a technology under development—the law may quickly become antiquated and could even cause more harm than benefit.

When John Hancock signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, he wrote his signature so large that as the saying goes, King George would be able to read it without his spectacles. But were the Revolution to happen today, a modern counter-revolutionary could wreak havoc simply by typing Hancock ‘s name on the bottom of an e-mail message pledging allegiance to the King and posting it on the Internet.

Proving authentication in the computer age is not just a matter of idle speculation. Some security techniques have been deployed to protect the data transmission or verify the sender. Digital Signature is one of them to safeguard that a document really comes form the claimed originator.

The digital signature technique is based on an algorithm discovered by three professors of computer science at MIT, Ronald Rivest, Adi Shamir and Leonard Adleman. This so-called RSA algorithm encrypts messages so that they cannot be read by anyone other than the intended recipient. Using RSA based software, e-mail users could create a digital signature by encrypting messages with a very long number, called a secret key, which users would keep safely locked away in their personal computers. Anyone who also has cryptography software can then decode messages by using another long number, the matching public key that would be distributed on the Internet (Mcintosh 1996).

The power of digital signatures is that they are extremely precise. If someone alters the signed message, even slightly adding a period or a comma, the signature will no longer verify. However, the lack of a reliable system for distributing public keys and for verifying a public key really belongs to someone prevents the popular adoption of digital signatures. Another obstacle is the concern that cryptography can also used by drug dealers, terrorists or organized crime to defeat court-authorized wiretaps. In spite of the concern, new e-mail security services like Certificate Authorities are springing up. VeriSign, the largest, will certify the public key. The service fee is $295 for the first year, $95 for annual renewals. Most VeriSign’s current clients are companies, but VeriSign plans to aim at the general public markets. Consider the hypothetical case of the modern-day John Hancock. When the Continental Congress placed its Declaration of Electronic Independence on the Internet, Hancock would add his own digital signature to the bottom and a copy of his public key. His public key, in turn, will be signed by Verisign.

It is too early to predict the future of such digital signature services. However, because of its very nature, the digital world should be potentially more secure than the analog world. Undoubtedly, how to create a free and safe digital environment has become the key issue for the future utilization and success of e-mail.

Cole-Gomolski, B. (1997) 'Spec delivers e-mail security', Computer World, 14 July.

Georgia, B.L. (1998) 'Creative e-mail communication', PC Computing, V11, n2, February.

Kosiur, D. (1996) 'E-mail grows up', Byte, December.

Mcintosh, J. (1996) 'Digital Signatures', Technology Review, November/December.

Palme, J. 'Cost/Efficiency analysis', Electronic Mail.

Palme, J. (1992) 'Experience with the use of the Com computer system', QZ Universities Data Report.

Palme, J. (1995) Electronic Mail, Norwood, MA: Artech House.

Trudell, L, Bruman, J. and Oliver, D. (1984) Opinions for electronic mail, White Plains, NY: Knowledge Industry Publications.

Vervest, P. (1987) Innovation in Electronic Mail, Amsterdam: Elsevier Science.

Source Figure 1: Trudell et al. (1984). Designed by author.

Source Figure 2: Palme, J. ‘The market for electronic mail,’ Electronic Mail.

Source Figure 3: ‘Values for people and organizations', Electronic Mail. Figure designed by author.

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