Mind your e-manners

You’ve been e-mailing long enough to know that TYPING IN ALL CAPS IS THE E-MAIL EQUIVALENT OF SHOUTING! You use subject lines that are descriptive. You no longer forward hoaxes that promise riches if you send the e-mail to "everyone you know." Here, then, are a few e-mail etiquette items you may not have heard about yet.

• When replying to an e-mail, include a quote from the part of the original e-mail you are replying to.
• Do not include a long list of recipients in the To: field. The e-mail addresses can fall into spammers’ hands. Instead, put that list in the Bcc: (blind carbon copy) field. Since you have to address the e-mail to someone in the To: field, put your own e-mail address there.
• The contact info in a signature file can be very helpful, but try to keep it to four or five lines. If you feel you must include more than that, go ahead, but know that some recipients will be annoyed. And when you are replying back and forth several times to the same message, remember to stop include your signature after the first time.
• Before sending a large file attachment, get the recipient’s permission. Also, it’s a good idea to let people know what kind of file you plan to send to make sure they can open it. You create some serious frustration when your recipient spends 17 minutes downloading a file she then can’t open.
• Avoid marking an e-mail message as urgent or priority unless it really is.

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