[Talk-us] Email is (still) viable

[stevea]

Please, everybody, let's not go down the road of "email is dying, dying, dead" (or somewhere along that spectrum).  It isn't.  Email has its half-century birthday right about now, and I doubt most people have been using it for anywhere near that long (I have, but that's beside the point).  Email is a "lingua franca" in the Internet of one-to-one (and sometimes one-to-small-sized-distribution-list) communication, it is a "least common denominator" that very close to 100% of anybody using the Internet has access to (I don't know how close, but I would suspect it is well over 90%).  For that reason alone, email can be neither ignored nor disparaged — well, not at your own peril in doing so, anyway.  I have done excellent collaboration over decades using nothing but email, with spectacular results.  Email works.  (Hard, and well).

You may feel THIS medium (a talk-list, 100% supported by email and its protocols, at least on its front-end for end-users) is archaic and dying, too.  Nope.  You may not like it or even not use it (you are likely using it now as you read these words).  OK.  But many do use talk-lists.  Talk-lists, especially in OSM, especially as they have fractured (properly, essentially) into specialty sub-lists, often based on geographic region, are not going away.  They (like wiki) are a very important glue that hold our community together.

Yes, Slack, Discord and other (social) media are used to communicate OSM topics far and wide.  Some people elect (perfectly reasonably) not to use these media.  OK.

Without a doubt, the various "data silos" which OSM Contributors find ourselves communicating into is increasing.  That does provide a diversity of sub-communities, which is neither wholly bad nor wholly good.  It is not ideal, though.  I suggest that broad awareness of the situation can be helpful, which is why I write these words.  Please be aware that not everybody reads everything, and that nobody in OSM can be everywhere, "see" everything, "do" anything/everything, as OSM's universe of both mapping and communication about mapping is simply too large for any one human to do so.  (Sure, AI/ML/bots help OSM "keep an eye on things" in certain contexts, that's not what I'm talking about here).

Just as we humans are tolerant of other languages and cultures, let's be similarly tolerant of other protocols and communication media, including the "good old-fashioned ones that have proven themselves over decades and aren't going away."  We'll continue to go far as a project as we do.  And yes, let's keep our eyes open at newer communication technologies / protocols / media that might (and in some present cases even DO) improve on aspects like interactivity, collaboration and community-building, because those are very important parts of what OSM is.  We can do both at the same time, but please, let's not cannibalize one at the expense of another.