how many unread emails you usually got?

I have about 28,000 emails in my main Gmail inbox at the moment, but zero unread. I delete tons of things unread if I can tell from the subject line that I don't need to care about them. (I have four Gmail accounts, one of which I haven't looked at in years, and a Hotmail account that I mostly have just to sign up for stupid bullshit that demands an email address.) Once a year or so, I go in and delete a year's worth of the oldest stuff.

I really don't understand why/how people leave emails unread. Read 'em or delete 'em as soon as they show up.

I do have sympathy for those that don't have a job that involves sitting at a computer. Whenever I'm traveling and actually living my life the emails (mostly trash) pile up faaaaast. It's only because I have a computer-based job that I'm able to swat them away regularly.

I don't really understand why people use the iPhone mail app if they also use Gmail ... not in a "disgusting savages" way, just in an idgi way ... like when we had that thread where it turned out that a significant number of people flush toilets with their feet.

I don't really understand why people use the iPhone mail app if they also use Gmail ... not in a "disgusting savages" way, just in an idgi way ... like when we had that thread where it turned out that a significant number of people flush toilets with their feet.

I am also very appreciative of the gmail tabs for "promotions" "updates" and "forums" ... I am so not counting these in my "virtuous" 11-100 unread on average (though currently I'm at about 150)

I use gmail app for my gmail and iPhone Mail for my other account
― gyac, Thursday, May 19, 2022 1:44 PM (one minute ago)

this makes sense! thx

0 unread, maybe about 20 in the inbox

i feel like all of you "0" unread ilxors are from a different planet than me ... a more organized, chill, "knows how to live" planet

I’m definitely not more organised but I do hate seeing the notifications numbers

i treat my personal gmail like an old usenet group - there's a constant flood of stuff from mailing lists etc. and i just click on stuff that catches my eye or seems important. thankfully google is generally pretty good about putting "emails i should be aware of" in my primary inbox though it's obviously very biased when it comes to what advertising ends up there vs. "spam".

work email is 0 always.

Oh I should add that I still use the 'classic' gmail view.

Work email is definitely NOT 0, I'm the opposite, lol. But that doesn't bother me, I just ignore the stuff that isn't relevant.

Sometimes I'll select everything and pick "archive all". I've come back around to actually reading my email most of the time. Mostly it's shit about my medical appointments. There's this one group I'm a member of that's so old-school that they actually run a LISTSERV still, I love it so much.

i feel like all of you "0" unread ilxors are from a different planet than me ... a more organized, chill, "knows how to live" planet

Oh my email game is a complete mess, I read everything as it comes in and say "shit I can't deal with this right now, at some point I'll skim through the inbox and respond to this" and sometimes I do and sometimes I don't -- as a result, nothing's unread but also the whole thing is a morass of tasks undealt-with!

I suppose you could, generously, describe my willingness to leave the tasks undone as "chill"...

yeah i made the "0 unread" vs "0 unread *and* 0 in inbox" with trad email rather than gmail in mind.

27,720 unread in personal account, 418 in podcast account, 3 in work account, 17 tabs open in firefox (some 2 months old), ADHD still officially undiagnosed

my pocket account has crept back up over 400 unread articles tho

i wish i could turn off where it says 'x-minute read' because that puts me off even starting the long ones

0 for work, i only get like 10-20 emails per day and at least skim all of them as they come in
my personal acct usually has a bunch of autogenerated stuff like receipts unread but only a few real things so voted 1-10

I really don't understand why/how people leave emails unread. Read 'em or delete 'em as soon as they show up.

it turns out we just have to keep ourselves fed, clothed and sheltered ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

am kind of in awe at the ability to deal with every email as it arrives, day in day out.

You can read it without dealing with it! I do it with dozens of emails every day!

Are you guys changing the status of an email back to unread if you haven't dealt with whatever it entails???

if I read an email and don't deal with it immediately then that email is never, ever getting dealt with

i feel like all of you "0" unread ilxors are from a different planet than me ... a more organized, chill, "knows how to live" planet

I hate shit accumulating. Read and done.

well that's why you mark it unread! voodoo chili's way is exactly my way. it's a hack but it basically works. the only achilles heel of this system is when you're blowing through emails and forget to mark something unread. i do occasionally toy with the idea of using different color flags for different subjects, like a glimpse into a better way, a more deliberate and organized way, but i never end up doing it.

xpost

I also use the classic gmail view.

19k unread in personal account.

25k unread in work account

108 unread in small press account


Blows my mind that people care about the numbers.

As in, getting to zero.

Who cares?

i don't know because it's not my way but presumably they care because in their system it's proof they've dealt with everything, which you have to admit is a pretty gratifying feeling

Oops, I guess I lied - I've been funneling pictures of friends' babies from Tiny Beans into a separate folder, and there are now 341 baby updates that I have not looked at.

I hate shit accumulating but shit still constantly accumulates and if I can ever push my way up out of the shit to take a breath there's a whole new load of shit that I somehow forgot about ready to accumulate all over me again.

OK, so if "read" means "dealt with," and the emails in my inbox that I consider "read" are those which in a normal person's system would be marked as unread, then I guess I have thousands and thousands of unread emails.

i get basically no spam. i unsubscribe from everything and all the receipts etc. go directly to saved email. i read what's left (not much!) for the same reason i would open hand addressed letters i get in in the mail. it's usually something cool.

i would like a better system for sending receipts to their own folder. i have a few rules set up but they catch maybe 30%. i am assiduous about unsubscribing to shit though.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210425 makes it easier (doesn't help with old emails, is not free)

Too goddamn many (in my personal account and my work account alike)

Voted for 10K+ plus but 10K is only a fraction

Are you guys changing the status of an email back to unread if you haven't dealt with whatever it entails???

No, but if I think I'm gonna need to come back to something I use Google's little gold stars.

Around 150 unread in personal email and 0 in work email. In my previous job, I got thousands of emails each week and had around 7k unread when I quit.

Y’all have made me self conscious, this thread and sharing my screen with a new supervisor today and his aghast face at my inbox numbers.

This is giving me an idea for a new poll. Stay tuned.

Personal is a total shambles (3500+ unread in gmail. Work is probably under 20 and those were read then marked unread to remember something and never marked read again.

see this is why i think moving stuff you've dealt with out of the inbox is good.

if you leave everything in the inbox and manually mark as unread the emails that you still need to deal with:

read = i have dealt with it
unread = i have not dealt with it. i might have read it. but maybe not.
in the inbox = means nothing

if you move stuff out of the inbox once you've dealt with it then

read = i have read it
unread = i have not read it
in the inbox = i have not dealt with it

surely this is better? it's the same amount of work.

Oh, yeah, I wouldn't defend my method. Have we talked about how I use my calendar as a diary/to do list?

scraping the bottom of the minutiae barrel, i love it

This ranks right up with my legendary 'how old is your alarm clock?' thread

work email, which is the only one that matters, is always zero unread and usually <10 in inbox. idk i've always been that way.

I am in awe. So you just delete or file them immediately?

i'm the same... yep, delete or file immediately.

i aggressively delete anything that's irrelevant. for other stuff i try to deal with it as quickly as possible. i have a pretty good filing system and also some "action folders" for stuff i need to get back to in the near future.

I feel like my entire work life is stuff I need to get back to in the near future. I often rely on my emails to respond/follow up when I haven't received a response on items, which is a lot. I guess I could do that even after I file an email in a folder, then delete that folder when I am done with that project. Hmmm.

well that's why you mark it unread! voodoo chili's way is exactly my way. it's a hack but it basically works. the only achilles heel of this system is when you're blowing through emails and forget to mark something unread. i do occasionally toy with the idea of using different color flags for different subjects, like a glimpse into a better way, a more deliberate and organized way, but i never end up doing it.

xpost

― Tracer Hand, Thursday, May 19, 2022 2:56 PM (three hours ago)

oh, fuck changing things to "unread" (affectionately in the washing a hat way), I use folders for things that are dealt with. ... granted my folder system is only so sophisticated in that all work-related emails go in the folder "0-Work" ... but at least it means that when I scroll through the inbox, I am only seeing emails I still need to attend to. ... It means things are less likely to get buried on page 2 - many.

I do try to do this "keep your shit together" tip I learned from a client, which is "if you can deal with what an email is asking you for in 2 minutes or less, do it right away" ... the problem is the emails that require more effort to respond to, and those end up sitting in the inbox for longer.

lol in my three main Gmail accounts — one personal, two professional — I have 104,558, 37,456, and 31,435.

I could/should just delete all the unread ones, but I probably won't until Google tells me I'm out of space.

Those of you cleaning out your inboxes daily, do you also move corresponding sent emails to folders as well so all the correspondence related to that topic/project are together?

lol extremely good question

“sent box zero” would be deeply impressive and of course disturbing

once it gets to like 100 unread I delete (without reading) most of them, read any that were important. I hate unread emails and sometimes I miss important shit.

at work I'm always at 0 unread because I don't get enough in a day to where I can't catch up. when I was a project manager it was typically 100 unread

lol extremely good question

“sent box zero” would be deeply impressive and of course disturbing

― Tracer Hand, Friday, May 20, 2022 9:23 AM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

Yeah, I use my sent mail more than my inbox on some level. My “system” so to speak:

1. Send email.
2. Set calendar reminder to follow up on response needed (markups I’ve sent, signatures I need, responses not received, etc.).
3. When calendar pops up, find original sent email, respond to all and follow up.
4. Lather, rinse, repeat until task is completed.

i like this

that's a pretty good system, PBKR. but have you tried this?

1. stare at the inbox
2. inbox counter goes up
3. set timer.
3. read email, or at least click on it to make the counter go back to 0
4. stop timer.
5. log timer results in "precisionliving.xls", learn lessons, repeat

1. stare at inbox
2. Goto line 1.

Re: moving into folders, an effective search beats any kind of taxonomy.

― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, May 20, 2022 3:36 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is true and it's why i leave everything in inbox in gmail. but when i started working in the mid-00s and had to use outlook, "effective search" was not a strong suit.

I have about 150 unread, almost all from the same small group of frequent spammers. A few companies refuse to remove me from their mailing lists.

Also, why don't businesses understand how email works by now? I bought a set of tires from one place and now I get weekly emails about their big sale that week on tires. Hey guys, I just bought four, I'm not going to need another set for another 5 years, stop sending me weekly emails.

Re: moving into folders, an effective search beats any kind of taxonomy.

― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, May 20, 2022 12:36 AM (eight hours ago)

depends on if you know what you are searching for? ... idk, this is actually a really interesting philosophical question tbh

i’m not going to pretend my way is any good but your way requires eventually moving every email that comes into your inbox to…. somewhere…. whereas i don’t do that at all so no it’s not the same amount of work

― Tracer Hand, Friday, May 20, 2022 3:08 AM (ten hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

eh, i guess i'm comparing the hassle of re-marking "unprocessed" emails as unread (a key press) with the hassle of removing processed emails from the inbox. they're both a keystroke (unless you're the kind of graybeard/sicko who files emails into specific folders).

you're right that you have to do the archive keystroke more if you remove stuff from the inbox than the mark unread keystroke if you do that.

but if you use gmail, you're presumably also using the keyboard to change to the next email. there's a key to do that, but there's a key to do that _and_ archive the current email. so if you're changing to the next email anyway, it's no extra work.

can i just say, this is one of my favorite topics and i'm having a lovely time.

in gmail hit ] to remove the current email from the inbox and switch to the next email. [ does the same but switches to the previous email. it's good.

unless you're the kind of graybeard/sicko who files emails into specific folders

i have maybe a few dozen gray hairs, and no beard ... I guess I'm a sicko? But, seriously, I think some of this is related to the fact that the language and systems (e.g. the term "folder") are semantically connected to physical organizational systems. I was putting documents in actual manila folders before I had email, and filed emails into specific folders. It's a cognitive task that I associate with organizing things, having all the things in their proper places, and knowing where those are. ... Metaphorically, the non-foldered emails feel like stacks of paper all over the place.

I could tell you stories about the guy I worked for in the early-00s who would print out emails and news articles and keep them in folders. He never threw anything away and his filing system was just these very general topics like “insurance captives” so he ended up with nearly two dozen stacks of paper 1-3 feet tall around his giant office. It was like a kid building a fort out of paper no one was ever going to read. And he viewed himself as an environmentalist, but he was just a boomer.

what is an insurance captive?

xp - I don't know if he still does this, but this local legendary punk dude who has a record label wouldn't read email, so he would have his employees print out emails that were sent to him and then fax them to him.

An insurance captive is an insurance company created by some larger companies that only insures the company that created it. I haven’t dealt with them in a long time (and not much at that) but they had a lot of tax advantages and allow the company to keep any underwriting profits instead of having them go out the door to a third party insurer.

Can also be used to self insure large SIRs/deductible and such.

that's super interesting to me, actually.

i wouldn't necessarily call morrissey a punk dude

lol, wrong dude

do you all read emails sequentially? (moreso for business than personal).

I don't use a threaded view in Outlook, but if I get an email that's part of a thread, I just read the most recent and then read all of the previous ones there, so I know what the latest is and the history of discussion.

but I do know a lot of people who start at the bottom and work their way up, so they might respond to an early email in a thread that has since been contradicted later. like, maybe a thread says "can you send me a mockup of your latest presentation", and 5 emails in someone says "actually, I'd like to hold off doing that until further internal review", but the person sees the old email first and sends the presentation before they see that later they were asked not to.

idk if i'm the weird one or not, i always assume people read the older messages first even though I don't.

If I've been on vacation, then yeah I go reverse chronological sometimes. I'll also read ILX threads from the bottom up. :)

well, yeah.

Although it seems like bottom up has a different meaning in both cases but maybe that's what you intended.

I love reading ILX threads from bottom up, feels like watching a prequel to a horror film

RIght. Often there is a Natives Are Restless/Dr. Livingston I Presume moment when one is close enough to the headwaters of the thread and detects the scent of an OLDE ILXXE Troll like C-man in the wind.

^helluva description there

And then the drums stop, and it's very, very bad because...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKyJou39Kks

^6:15

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

good spread

the moderately responsible middle is the least represented! good job ILX!

Has nothing to do with responsibility

I will die on this hill with my unorganized tens of thousands of unread emails

If they were letters, they would be a literal hill to die on, and lo, we would think you were mad. I salute you.

I save all my important letters fwiw

returned to work for the first time since 6/27, and...only had 130 unread emails! mind boggled, that's....really not that many! - in my previous role, that woulda been 1,000 - 2,000 at least.

and yet still, I can't begin working until all of them are read, even if I flag them as important for later. or it'll drive me nuts.