This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Java Buzz by Janek Schwarz. Original Post: Dealing With Information Overload In Emails Feed Title: The Wannabe Java Rockstar Feed URL: http://weblog.janek.org/Archive/Categories/javablogs.rss.xml Feed Description: The Wannabe Java Rockstar: Janek's weblog where all posts go to Eleven Latest Java Buzz Posts Latest Java Buzz Posts by Janek Schwarz Latest Posts From The Wannabe Java Rockstar

Dion asks for better handling of duplicate emails. In his scenario, an email is sent to a couple of lists and individuals. If you're among the individuals and on two of those lists you'd get three copies of the email. Instead, he suggests, the email program should give you only one.

I sympathize with that. But from a UI standpoint I have to object. If I received only one of three emails I'd suspect two got lost. That's not the impression an email program should give. I think it is better to deliver every email and mark the duplicates as read.

Another thing: suppose you regularly sent emails to yourself. You'd never get them.

I understand where Dion comes from. But given the sorry state of email with it's misconfigured servers and mailing lists or it's crude handling of encodings, I don't think email programs have a chance. They'd never get it right.