Email Isn't Broken

And it isn't just for To Do lists, either.​ Here's my personal screed about email.

First of all, let's get a few things straight. 1) I already have pretty good systems in place for managing email but they could be better; I don't think email is particularly broken, it just needs better management tools; 2) I don't give two shits about getting to "Inbox Zero;" this is not the Nirvana it's portrayed as.

The Inbox Zero Myth

Much ado has been made about the concept of Inbox Zero. I believe this all derives from the Getting Things Done movement that was all the rage a few years ago and that has really set down roots in certain quarters. GTD never really made much sense to me at the time — it's just task management, which any reasonably adult and disciplined person should be able to handle on his own — and Inbox Zero doesn't either.

The idea behind Inbox Zero is that if you can get your Inbox down to zero, then you've probably addressed everything — or at least many of the things — you need to address in any given day, and you can then reclaim your own brain. And there's probably a good deal of truth to that if a lot of your job involves responding to email, which for many of us it actually does.

So applications have been developed that give you immediate ways of dealing with email such that it stays out of your Inbox. Mailbox is the latest such app. In Mailbox, when you get an email you are intended to act upon it immediately, either by responding or by filing the email into one of Mailbox's preset filers. Mailbox will then, at a later date that you can specify, remind you of any emails that still require action by returning them to your Inbox.

The problem I have with this method is that it doesn't help you get anything done. It just offloads tasks that can't be acted upon immediately into a folder. This isn't Getting Things Done, this is hiding the things you've chosen to skip or ignore, and rather than productivity, it's essentially procrastination.​ Where Inbox Zero is supposed to signify accomplishment, the Mailbox method simply provides that illusion.

Frankly, Inbox Zero just doesn't really matter much, especially if all you're doing is filing things rather than acting on them.​ What you're trying to manage with an app like Mailbox is action, behavior, and I don't think an app — or at least not apps like the ones I've seen — can really help you do that.

Where Mail Is Broken

The problem with thinking about Mail like a simple To Do list is that it belies the many things Email is actually very good at, in particular, the sending and receiving of Electronic Mail, which is still, even in this day and age, horrendously useful. ​It also ignores all the other things people have begun to use email for.

From where I sit, there are certainly numerous ways in which email — and specifically email clients — can be better.

Spam

Junk email is still a problem, and no one has really cracked that nut to my full satisfaction.​ Gmail does about as good a job as anyone, and sometimes even offers to unsubscribe to messages you mark. But I think we need more of this, even better tools for managing spam than simply marking things "Spam." Rules are great, but I'd love to see more sophisticated and dynamic rule-making tools that query me when I mark something as Spam. As it is now, I either rely on server-side spam filters, or I write rules and blacklists by hand. And that's kind of a drag. 

Bacn

Which leads us to bacn, spam's lonely, slightly more attractive forgotten cousin, that non-malicious advertising email that we all get but don't necessarily want to see or really know how to manage. Some folks have been trying to figure out how to deal with bacn, and the tools sound intriguing. I'm looking forward to trying them. But right now there is no standalone email client or service that I know of that offers built-in bacn management.

File Sharing

I realize that email is not the proper tool for sharing files, and yet people do it all the time. There have been some good attempts at making email clients with better large attachment handling through services like Dropbox, but there's still not what I'd call a good option here.

Identities and Authentication

We all have multiple online logins these days, and multiple email accounts. Authentication and identity are huge issues, the scope of which spread far beyond the world of email. Still, email clients could be much better about handling multiple accounts.

Saving Your Ass

How many times have you forgotten to include the attachment you meant to send? How many times have you forgotten to CC someone on a particular thread? Not too many email clients do much to prevent the sorts of common mistakes ​we all make all the time. Gmail does a pretty good job here, but this is still an area rife with opportunity for email client authors.

Etc.

There are even more areas in which email could be improved. ​This is just a handful of the many and varied ways we use this invaluable tool. Email clients that attempt to simplify what email can do are doomed.

Developers that seek to pigeonhole the email paradigm are going about it the wrong way. Email is extremely good at what it does; this is why it's been so successful as a product. Think about it: ​email has been around in much the same form for 20 years. There are few other tech products you can say this about. Indeed, I'd argue that its success is the reason it has the problems it has today. It's so good at what it does that people have begun using it for everything.

How to "Fix" Email

If you really want to make email ​work better, I believe you need not to make it different or simpler in functionality, but rather to make it better at dealing with its newfound complexity. Don't reenvision email as something else — that's already been done by everyone who uses email — but instead make a client that accounts for all the new uses we've found for email. Yes, it's now a To Do list, but it's also an FTP server, and a chat engine, and a scheduler, and a file manager, and a database. And it's still one of the most primary tools we use for peer-to-peer communication, we still use email for email.

Right now, for my money, Gmail in the browser is as good an email client as there is. It's fast and reliable, it works better than most for many of the aforementioned uses, and it even saves my ass from time to time. But it could be so, so much better at all the new little things we want to do with email. ​

I think whoever writes the client that deals best with all these eventualities simply and elegantly will have the winner.

Mailbox

I have an unbridled obsession with finding the perfect Mail client app. This is a bad obsession to have, because the perfect Mail client just doesn't exist. And it doesn't look like it will for a long, long time; no one wants to make it.

Nevertheless, every now and then some foolhardy startup comes along and takes a stab. The most recent entry in the realm of the Mail client is called Mailbox.

The Queue

I don't want to spend much time talking about Mailbox's much discussed queueing system for new users. While you can download Mailbox now, today, for free, the app requires that you reserve a spot in line. And it's a long line. I reserved my spot weeks ago and am only now trying the app for the first time. Mailbox says it's adding users gradually to ease the load on its servers. Maybe that's true — they're certainly having some problems right now — or maybe there's some clever marketing going on — or maybe a little of both — but suffice to say, you should be prepared to wait a while before you'll actually get to use the app.

Also, while we're on the topic of the limitations of this new app, be aware that Mailbox currently only works with Gmail, and it's only made for iPhone.

Inbox Zero

The ultimate goal of Mailbox is getting your Inbox down to zero. I suppose if this is really important to you, then the app might be worth waiting for. But if it's really that important to you, you've probably already done it. It's not that hard. If you really want to get your Inbox down to zero, simply select all your messages in Gmail's browser client and hit the Archive button. If there are messages that require a response, respond to them.

I'm also not sure I really see the point. The zero-mail Inbox just isn't that big a deal to me. Having zero mail in my Inbox doesn't actually mean I've gotten anything done, it just means I'm not looking at it right now. While this does have its benefits, I'm not sure it's worth disrupting my particular workflow by adding a unique and additional mail client that exists solely on my phone.

Swipes and Snoozes

In Mailbox you file messages away, either to Gmail's archive, or to a sort of "Remind Me Later" area (which exists in Gmail as a group of Mailbox-specific labels), via the use of swipe gestures: swipe right to archive, swipe left to "Snooze" a message for later.

I must say, I do love the gestures. They're fun, beautiful and easy to get the hang of. And I love the ability to file things away for later. But that's really all Mailbox offers. Frankly, archiving a large number of messages can already be done easier and faster using Gmail in the browser — just batch select and hit Archive. And individual Gmail messages can already be archived with a swipe in Apple's iOS Mail client.

So we're left with snoozing messages as the primary useful feature of yet another email client app that now exists only on my iPhone. This means that every time I want to use this feature I have to get out my iPhone and launch a separate app. Wouldn't it just be easier to leave that handful of messages that you want to be reminded of in your Inbox? Or, if you need time-delimeted reminders, use iOS's Reminders app, or Calendar?

To Do Lists

Mailbox rests on the presumption that people use email as a sort of to do list. And that's true. But Mailbox overlooks the rather crucial fact that people use mail for other things as well. One unintended use of email is as a file transfer application. I see people try to send large files via email all the time. And some mail apps have even tried tackling this problem using services like Dropbox, but Mailbox doesn't. And, of course, email's primary function is reading and writing email messages, but Mailbox's mail composing window is fairly paltry and unappealing, offering little in the way of innovation. Mailbox is essentially a novel mail filing app, not well suited to writing or any of the myriad other ways we use email beyond its original intents.

Simplifying Email

While Mailbox goes some distance to simplifying mail management on one hand — and it does so in some novel and even enjoyable ways — overall it complicates the whole process by adding an additional layer to the management of mail while offering very little else in return. If Mailbox existed in a vacuum, if it were your only Mail client, it might be acceptable. But it's not. And it can't be, at least not in its current, rather limited form. If you use Mailbox, you'll still need to go to more full-featured clients for richer composing and mail management features. And those clients will now be populated with Mailbox's folders, yet be completely unaware of Mailbox's behaviors.

Mailbox is another outlier in a world where what we really need is better integration. That's been my quest: an email client to rule them all. One email application that does everything — writing, reading, file transfers, to do lists, and everything else including saving my ass — perfectly across all platforms. Mailbox is not that app.

In Defense of Maps

First off, let me just say, people need to chill the fuck out and quit all the bitching. Yes, I grasp the irony of bitching about people bitching. But the fact is that, before the iPhone all cell phones were total pieces of shit, and no one ever complained about it. Now Apple releases a new and better iPhone every year and all people do is complain about it. It reminds me of Louis CK's brilliant Everything's Amazing and No One's Happy bit.

Second, and along similar lines, I want to take a moment to respond to a ridiculous attempt at tech punditry by the New York Times' Joe Nocera. Let me be clear from the outset: I am not a tech pundit. I make no claim to be able to write competently about business, tech or otherwise. When all's said and done, I'm a technician. But I've been following Apple and using and supporting their products for over a decade now. And I have a brain and a perspective, and these things lead me to call bullshit on Nocera's article.

Nocera is basically arguing that, now that Apple is big and Steve Jobs is gone, the company will never be innovative again. And his Exhibit A is the iPhone 5 and the new Maps application. Let's go through his article bit by bit and see where things fall apart.

Nocera starts off by invoking the Ghost of Steve Jobs:

As Apple’s chief executive, Jobs was a perfectionist. He had no tolerance for corner-cutting or mediocre products.

This is certainly true. But Jobs also knew when to ship. And he knew that shipping great products was as important as making them. And Jobs understood that 1.0 releases would be feature incomplete and imperfect. And that that was okay. Take any new Apple release from the last decade — like, I don't know, the first iPhone — and you'll see what I mean. I'd argue that Maps is not mediocre, it's just new.

Nocera then writes:

The three devices that made Apple the most valuable company in America — the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad — were all genuine innovations that forced every other technology company to play catch-up.

This is certainly true. But suggesting that this level of innovation is possible on a yearly basis is folly. These are once-in-a-decade releases. Most innovation comes not in leaps and bounds, but rather in baby steps. Take Mac OS X, the iPod or even iOS as examples of consistent, year over year evolutions. This is how it works.

Nocera complains a bit more about Apple's recent lack of innovation, and then goes on to criticize the new Maps application:

In rolling out a new operating system for the iPhone 5, Apple replaced Google’s map application — the mapping gold standard — with its own, vastly inferior, application, which has infuriated its customers. With maps now such a critical feature of smartphones, it seems to be an inexplicable mistake.

But what Nocera fails to grasp is that it's not a mistake at all. Maps is an example of the very innovation that Nocera claims Apple now fails to attempt. Let's face it, the old Maps app hadn't been significantly updated since iOS 1. And with relations between Apple and Google strained, getting Google to improve the product was, I'd guess, an increasingly daunting task. Apple's belief was that they could do it themselves and do it better. The new Maps is the first iteration of that gamble.

Nocera then goes on to write about how this never would have happened without Jobs, and then:

Apple’s current executive team is no doubt trying to maintain the same demanding, innovative culture, but it’s just not the same without the man himself [Jobs] looking over everybody’s shoulder. If the map glitch tells us anything, it is that.

No, the Maps "glitch" is exactly the kind of innovative nudge Jobs would've done. It is, in fact, precisely how Apple has innovated over the past decade: by destroying the old and rebuilding it. The current team, to my eye, seems to be behaving perfectly in the Jobsian style, even if they may not be able to sell it as well.

Next, Nocera begins to contradict his very own argument:

When Jobs returned to the company in 1997, after 12 years in exile, Apple was in deep trouble. It could afford to take big risks and, indeed, to search for a new business model, because it had nothing to lose.

So wait, you're saying that Apple has just replaced the "mapping gold standard" on its flagship products with what it believes will one day be a better solution, thus pissing off lots of people, taking huge amounts of criticism and possibly hurting the brand, at least in the short run, but that they're no longer willing to take big risks? Whatever their motivation, and despite what you may think of the app, replacing Maps with their own, non-Google version is a hugely ballsy move and shows that that's just not true.

Nocera then goes on to make the inevitable Microsoft comparison, followed by some erroneous assumptions:

Once an ally, Google is now a rival, and the thought of allowing Google to promote its maps on Apple’s platform had become anathema. More to the point, Apple wants to force its customers to use its own products, even when they are not as good as those from rivals.

This is just wrong. From what I understand, Apple's license with Google had simply expired and they needed to decide if they would extend that license or go a new way. Apple has allowed a Google-branded YouTube application onto iOS, as well as Google's Chrome browser. And it's my understanding that a Google-branded mapping solution is in the works. If it's not, you can only blame Google for this. If it is, I have little doubt that it will soon be available in the App Store along with all the other Google products. This isn't Apple being anti-competitive, it's Apple being competitive. Apple thinks they can win here, not by forcing people to use its own products, but rather by making better ones.

Whether Maps is a good app or not is arguable. It has features not found in Google's maps app, but lacks some of that app's functionality as well. I've used it and I think it's good for a version 1 product. I certainly think the turn-by-turn navigation is very well implemented. And for most daily uses I think I'll be able to get by just as well with this new Maps, though, being in New York City, I will dearly miss street view in certain instances. Innovation always incurs tradeoffs, though. We technicians are well aware of this.

But Maps is not an indication of Apple being in decline or failing to innovate. If anything, it's just the opposite. This seems to be the same old Apple, making year-over-year improvements and taking the occasional risk that a change that pisses people off today may just be the thing everyone wants in a year or two. They're not always right about this, but they keep trying, and Maps and the iPhone 5 are the proof — not the refutation — of this.

Addendum:

One other thing has occurred to me while reading more about Apple's difficulties with the Maps launch. I keep reading that Google has had turn-by-turn directions in the Android version of its Maps app for some time now. But we've never seen this feature in iOS. This seems a strong indication to me that Google was not in any huge hurry to update its iOS Maps offering. Turn-by-turn is a feature — admittedly, perhaps the only one right now — where the new Apple Maps is actually better than the Google-made Maps. And its an important feature to a very large chunk of potential iPhone buyers. But more importantly, the addition of turn-by-turn is evidence that Apple wanted to make the Maps product better but was not getting any help from Google.

The fact is, none of us — not Joe Nocera, and certainly not me — knows what really went on behind the scenes to make this Maps deal go down. It's clearly been in the works for some time and there have likely been numerous factors at work. But I do believe that at least part of the decision was based on Apple making a better product for its customers.

Gmail In the Browser

This is exactly why I continue to use Gmail in the browser:

No other mail application on the desktop helps me to this degree. And Gmail's web app has an undo send feature. Undo send! (It's in Labs; turn it on!) This has saved my ass countless times. No other email app saves my ass like Gmail's web app.

I sincerely wish Apple (or the next brave soul to attempt an email client — Sparrow guys, I'm looking at you) would just write down all the cool stuff Gmail's web app does — 2-step verification? Hells yeah! — and build it right in to their app.

Until then, I stick with Gmail's web app. It saves my ass.

More Thoughts On Feedback

It occurs to me, as I think more about the problem of interface feedback, and as I ponder the things in computing that drive me bonkers, that the problem of feedback — when to let a user know that something has happened or that something is happening — seems to be one that's getting worse. I complained about it a lot in my criticisms of The Mac App Store, but it bothers me throughout a whole host of applications.

The browser, for instance: I often find myself clicking a link to a slow website — or maybe there's some other network hiccup — and nothing happens. Or at least that's how it seems. There actually is a subtle indication that I've successfully clicked, and it comes in the form of a pinwheel or a progress dial in the loading tab — what we used to call the Throbber back in the Netscape days — that tells me that, yes, I clicked and now the page is loading. But these subtle indicators are often lost on new users, or less tech-savvy ones. And, to be quite honest, they're often lost on me as well.

Links are small, and with the inaccuracies that tend to accompany touchpad use, I miss them a lot. This is especially true on pages like Facebook which often load new content just before you click said link, causing your link to shift position, thus causing you to miss it through no fault of your own and in a way that you might be completely unaware of. So it's important to know simply that you clicked. That you nailed it.

Clicking in one spot and then having to look in a completely different spot to see if I successfully clicked is not only inefficient, it's really annoying. It totally breaks my flow and it also doesn't make much sense except within the historical context of the Netscape-style Throbber. Why not make the progress indicator closer to the link you just clicked? Or cover the page with some sort of translucent graphic? Or use some sort of Heads Up Display?

The Finder is guilty too. The throbber for searches performed in a Finder window is a small radial line throbber in the status bar in the lower right corner of the window. By default, in Lion, the status bar is hidden, thus the throbber, too, is hidden by default. But even when visible, it's nowhere near the search bubble, nor is it anywhere near where the search results begin to appear. Unless you know that the throbber is there — and I certainly missed it for a long time — you'll likely be oblivious to its existence.

But, you say, search results appear so instantaneously, there's no need for a throbber. Well, sure, except when they don't. Say you're searching a network volume, for instance. This type of search is much slower since it doesn't rely on the local Spotlight database to perform the search, so results can take some time to appear. Also, without a throbber, how do you know when Spotlight has finished searching, particularly on a large volume with lots of results? Feedback, my friends. Feedback.

This should be the rule — and maybe it already is somewhere, but if it isn't it should be. If I click on something I should get immediate feedback that tells me simply that I successfully clicked, that I hit my target, and it should be obvioulsy apparent. Details beyond this, like what's happening now that I've interacted with my computer, should also be evident. But it seems like lately we're really falling down on the, "Hey, you clicked something," front. And it's been bugging me. A lot. Because in computerland, clicking on something and receiving no feedback whatsoever has always meant one thing and one thing only: it's broken.

Browser developers, OS programmers, you want to rethink an interface? You want to make a better mousetrap? Start there. Start with feedback. It's quite basic, but feedback is so very important to the computing experience. And while I wouldn't say it's completely broken, it, like everything in life, can always get better.

Long live the Throbber!

UPDATE: One reader has decided to begin recording every instance of radial throbbers he can find. Check 'em out at Samuel Henry's Space!