Everyone who joins a new group or society knows there are certain conventions that must be observed, and the internet is no exception.
One difference in the virtual world is that there are no unwritten rules. In fact, the rules are written all over the place, as guides to "netiquette". It is a good idea to learn them, even if you plan to break them.
The problem with netiquette is that it is based mainly on the internet that existed 10 years ago. In those days, many people had slow connections, and computers had very little memory.
Resources were scarce, so there was peer pressure not to waste or misuse them. Brief notes were good; long formal letters were bad. Long "sigs" were bad. Chain letters and "spam" (unsolicited commercial email) were very bad - and they still are, especially if you are paying by the minute to download them.
There is a curmudgeonly tendency that still wants to be economical with the content of emails and newsgroup postings. In this view, everything should be sent as plain text. However, many people now have powerful computers and fast internet connections, both at home and in the office. They don't want to be limited to a few lines of plain text. Instead, they want to use different typefaces and coloured backgrounds - "rich text" - and attach pictures or even video clips to their messages.
The sparks fly, of course, when "rich texters" send their bloated encoded email and graphics to people who are diehard plain text users. Me, for example.
Most email software lets you choose whether to send messages as plain or rich text - usually HTML, the markup language used to create web pages. In Outlook Express, you can set this globally. Go to Tools, select Options, and click the tab marked Send. This shows a properties sheer with radio buttons for Mail Sending Format and News Sending Format.
You should select Plain Text for both options. With mail, you cannot assume that a recipient's mail software will be able to understand HTML. Almost all mailing lists and Usenet newsgroups also run on plain text.
However, you will still be able to use rich text whenever you like. When you start a new letter, simply select the Format menu, and choose the format you want.
Before closing the dialogue box, click the button marked Plain Text Settings. This lets you set a line width. Most software can handle lines at least 80 characters long, but it is better to choose a shorter number, such as 72. Long lines tend to get broken in transmission, especially when they are subsequently quoted and have angle brackets (>) added to the front.
While netiquette still insists on using plain text unless it is mutually agreed otherwise, it makes sense to reply to letters using the format in which they were sent.
Outlook Express 5 provides exactly this option as a tick-box item on the Send sheet. America Online's latest software stupidly sends both: AOL users should read the Unofficial AOL Email FAQ (file of Frequently Asked Questions) at http://members.aol.com/adamkb/aol/mailfaq.
The other thing that causes friction is the use of "sigs" or signature files. A sig is - or was - a piece of text that could be added automatically by the software to the end of every email message you sent.
Netizens typically used a sig to save retyping contact details: name and address, job title, phone numbers and so on. Many sigs also include a brief, sometimes witty, quotation, such as: "Money is the root of all evil. Send $9.95 for more info"; or "Any really good job is one you can do in your pyjamas" (Scott Adams of Dilbert fame).
Almost all email software lets you add a sig, and some programs let you have different sigs for different purposes.
To add a sig in Outlook Express 5, go back to Tools|Options and click the Signatures tab. Click the button marked New, and type or copy your sig into the lower box, marked Edit Signature.
It is also possible to use a file as a sig, by clicking the lowest radio button and browsing to the file you want to add.
This is useful for sending vCards or "virtual business cards", which enable recipients to load your contact details straight into an addressbook without retyping anything. The facility can be, and is, misused to send multimedia sigs that lookmuch like advertising banners.
Sigs are great for people you only write to occasionally, but if you see the same sig many times a day, it becomes more than a little tedious.
Large sigs can also be a waste of resources: it is not unusual for sigs to be much bigger than the messages they are attached to.
As with the use of plain text and rich text, using sigs is now less a matter of netiquette than of common sense.
It is a pity there is not more of it about.
