Comments on: A cure for e-mail attention disorder?

Silicon Valley start-up develops e-mail management system that borrows heavily from the virtual economies and currencies.
Images: Handling e-mail overload

[adlyb1]

Give me a break!

I already spend too much time trying to properly communicate with other people I work with and now I have to *buy* their attention?

This is simply not the way to improve productivity.

[airwalkery2k]

Just need to collect a few more

Sorry about the delay, boss. I just need a few more Serios before I can send the memo to the Moscow office.

[rcrusoe]

You have got to be kidding

If I didn't get fired for suggesting this kind of lunacy, I would the first time an executive didn't get an important email because the sender was out of "stamps".

IMO, in corporate America this plan will fail because cutting off someone's ability to use email would have more serious repercussions for I.T. than cutting off their oxygen.

[tony kaye]

A cure for e-mail attention disorder?

Seems to me this would take even more time.

[screamforme]

complete waste of time

So now I not only have to read the email to decide if it's spam, I have to give some kind of ranking? I guess workers in CA don't have much to do during the day.

[freemarket--2008]

Re: complete waste of time

I think the assumption is that external SPAM will still be filtered as usual. This scheme would cut down on internal SPAM. It does seem a bit too wacky for the mainstream though.

[HerbWexler]

build intelligent email

The number of in office emails can be reduced by adding some intelligence into the msg.

How many emails are sent to clarify earlier msg and to followup because the original msg did not get a reply.

If an email asks a question there could be some automatic responses such as Yes, No, I dont have that info, I'll respond in x hours.

The same kind of answers you would get if you called the person on the phone.

Emails haven't changed much in a decade. There is room for improvement.

[ddesy]

Better yet...

Why not simply use good communication skills? Effective written communication doesn't require technological interventions.

[aaroberts]

Mind boggling stupid idea for essentiall a non-issue

This is an overcomplicated stupid idea. If people are sending out needless communication that needs to be managed by the people not some dumb idea about virtual currency.

Get rid of spam and then you'll be doing something worthwhile for email.

[ramudd]

Yes it is stupid.

I agree. A stupid idea for sure. I get 75 SPAM email each day and it never get off my server thanks to MailWasherPro. Simple and easy.

[hadaso]

System down in 3 minutes. Save your work!

This unSerios "solution" doesn't acount for assymetry or broadcasts. There are people who need to send lots of email and there are people who need to receive lots of it. They cannot work with the same monthly allowance. And no one will be able to send important broadcasts with a limited allowance.

So now you need to give different allowances for different people and you're back to square one. This might work for a company of 6 people like the company developing this scheme. In big companies access to broadcast lists is given more according to ties with management or IT than according to needs. The same will happen with "extra Serios".

Now to the idea of making it work accross more than one organization: thisw will invite lots of porn/gambling spam. Just like they do with captcha: present them to real porn/gambling consumers in their peon/gambling sites, they will require payment in Serios to access porn/gambling and then will be able to send their spam in and gain high ranking. So you'll need to do real email whitelisting which you can do right now without Serios. Back to square one...

[reverse-auctions]

Cant see any real point but instead creating more work, but alas job security!