Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!purdue!bu-cs!kwe
From: kwe@buit13.bu.edu (Kent England)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Networks considered harmful
Message-ID: <44942@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Date: 19 Dec 89 19:22:05 GMT
References: <8912190403.AA05387@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> <NELSON.89Dec19094003@image.clarkson.edu>
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Reply-To: kwe@buit13.bu.edu (Kent England)
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Organization: Boston U. Information Technology
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In article <NELSON.89Dec19094003@image.clarkson.edu> 
nelson@clutx.clarkson.edu writes:
>
>The way to market E-mail is to glom it onto a FAX machine.  Make a
>little box that you plug in between your FAX machine and the phone
>line.  Give it enough smarts so that it can distinguish between its
>carrier and the FAX machines, and automatically forward the call to
>the FAX machine.  Put some RAM in it so it can hold incoming messages.
>Put a RS-232 (ugh) line on it so a computer can read its output.
>Write some software for the PC and Mac that downloads the messages
>from the little box.
>--
	This is interesting.  What *is* the right way to market
e-mail?  

	In the national research and education internet market, the
way to sell e-mail is to sell the network (NSFnet, ARPAnet, whatever).
e-mail is a "free" service that comes with the (subsidized and
exclusive) network.  The network comes first and stands in the way, if
you can't join.

	In the commercial arena, services like CompuServe set up
information servers that provide e-mail, conferences, news, etc.
e-mail is a mainframe-based service to allow subscribers to converse
with each other.  Lately, the proliferation of various commercial
information services has led to the need to interconnect the various
commercial systems together as an afterthought driven by the
subscribers' desire for ubiquitous service and not as an integral part
of the original service offering, as one might think.  The information
service comes first and stands in the way of e-mail which is an
afterthought.

	Compare this to fax.  With fax, you buy hardware from a vendor
and use an existing network for connectivity.  The fax hardware
conforms to several well-established standards (for modem signalling,
pixel placement, and page description).  You subscribe to no service
whatsoever, except the voice network service.  You don't have to
belong to an exclusive networking club like the national research and
education club and you don't have to subscribe to some information
service that provides mail forwarding and mailbox service like
CompuServe, et al, as an afterthought.  You just buy your box, plug it
in and start dialing.

	I think there would be a market niche for e-mail if someone
would offer an e-mail box like Russ Nelson describes.  Of course, you
have to have a PC to read and compose e-mail, but at least the network
and the information service providers don't get in the way.

	Kent England, Boston University