Dear Karl, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you!
Being a long-term fan of yours doesn’t prevent me from criticizing some of your views – and this is one of such cases.
I am living and working in a country where in-court disputes about the legal and probative value of e-mails are common, with their outcomes generally not quite favorable for email systems - in brief, in most cases standalone email has near-zero probative / legal value, unless it is either a part of sequence of emails or is underpinned with other proof (e.g. clauses in contractual agreements to use specific emails for business, or real-world actions clearly committed in response to certain emails). Also, daily get I in my mailbox dozens of fake emails with clearly fraudulent credentials. Trusting them blindly would be a folly.
At the same time Russian EDRMS and business solutions routinely record a lot of records processing information (e.g. who, what and when did something reacting to this very record, when a record was sent to accountable officials and what decisions were taken by them etc.). If Australians do not do that, that’s your fault rather than the fault of the RM and business systems! :)
As I see it, you are unfairly blaming the poor innocent information systems for the shortcomings of your national recordkeeping practices!
You say that “Any document attached was actually sent” – alas, no! I’ve seen worldwide popular email systems that allowed tampering with send or received messages, and on some occasions that resulted in court cases.
In email systems, uncontrolled deletion or moving to some obscure folders are common, along with inboxes filled with many thousands of uncategorized messages.
You also say that “What's in the body of the email was almost definitely consumed”. – Well, you are a dreamer … Emails being overlooked is common.
And then you say something really hilarious: “It’s also a tiny snippet - so it’s likely almost all significant information”. Wha?! Do you truly believe, that, say, Twitter is a treasure trove of important information just because tweets are really small chunks of text?! I’d say length of message in totally unrelated to the quality of the information.
HI Natasha, I welcome anyone helping me make sense of an idea - it's how I learn! I also don't pretend to always think clearly about everything - and never so clearly that it can't be improved.
I think where I came to on this is that there's an element of intentionality that comes with email that I like - when we're communicating, we're doing it with an expectation that it will lead to a certain type of behaviour from the person we're communicating with - behaviour that is generally in our interest. There's a whole nexus of intention, self interest and other things there that I'm trying to tease out - it's a socio-technical question that I haven't quite resolved satisfactorily yet.
I agree with almost everything you said - there are lots of vulnerabilities in mail servers, and if record making and keeping practices were up to scratch, we wouldn't need to rely on email. That said though, if we can't bring back the global record making and keeping discourse, records work is going to increasingly (IMO) consist of risk assessing systems, and developing ways to assess the intentions of the people using them through their communication.
There's also an argument to be made that if we're in a mess, it's because of how badly email and other systems are used - so I'm aware of the irony. There's still just the edge of an idea here that feels important - so I'm writing and hoping to make sense of it.
I also think it's worth reconsidering some of your views on the snippets idea. If information doesn't cause action, then yes - you're right. If however it conveyed what an action should have been, and it was received and not consumed or ignored, there's a question to answer about authorised forms of communication and what responsibility that organisations should be taking to ensure that communication channels are consumed in a high fidelity manner. I think we can also look to how much trouble Elon Musk has got himself into with twitter so see that the significance of the communication is very dependent on the sender and the audience, and how the information causes them to act.
I'll look forward to joining you one day - just a few busy years with young children and study to get through first.
Happy new year - all the very best for 2024 for you and your family.
Thank you, Karl! Have a fruitful and happy New Year 2024! I am wishing solid health to you and your family; prosperity joy and happiness at home, success at work and academia, and good luck in everything! - Natasha
Dear Karl, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you!
Being a long-term fan of yours doesn’t prevent me from criticizing some of your views – and this is one of such cases.
I am living and working in a country where in-court disputes about the legal and probative value of e-mails are common, with their outcomes generally not quite favorable for email systems - in brief, in most cases standalone email has near-zero probative / legal value, unless it is either a part of sequence of emails or is underpinned with other proof (e.g. clauses in contractual agreements to use specific emails for business, or real-world actions clearly committed in response to certain emails). Also, daily get I in my mailbox dozens of fake emails with clearly fraudulent credentials. Trusting them blindly would be a folly.
At the same time Russian EDRMS and business solutions routinely record a lot of records processing information (e.g. who, what and when did something reacting to this very record, when a record was sent to accountable officials and what decisions were taken by them etc.). If Australians do not do that, that’s your fault rather than the fault of the RM and business systems! :)
As I see it, you are unfairly blaming the poor innocent information systems for the shortcomings of your national recordkeeping practices!
You say that “Any document attached was actually sent” – alas, no! I’ve seen worldwide popular email systems that allowed tampering with send or received messages, and on some occasions that resulted in court cases.
In email systems, uncontrolled deletion or moving to some obscure folders are common, along with inboxes filled with many thousands of uncategorized messages.
You also say that “What's in the body of the email was almost definitely consumed”. – Well, you are a dreamer … Emails being overlooked is common.
And then you say something really hilarious: “It’s also a tiny snippet - so it’s likely almost all significant information”. Wha?! Do you truly believe, that, say, Twitter is a treasure trove of important information just because tweets are really small chunks of text?! I’d say length of message in totally unrelated to the quality of the information.
Hoping to meet you in ISO TC46/SC11 one day! :)
Natasha Khramtsovsky
HI Natasha, I welcome anyone helping me make sense of an idea - it's how I learn! I also don't pretend to always think clearly about everything - and never so clearly that it can't be improved.
I think where I came to on this is that there's an element of intentionality that comes with email that I like - when we're communicating, we're doing it with an expectation that it will lead to a certain type of behaviour from the person we're communicating with - behaviour that is generally in our interest. There's a whole nexus of intention, self interest and other things there that I'm trying to tease out - it's a socio-technical question that I haven't quite resolved satisfactorily yet.
I agree with almost everything you said - there are lots of vulnerabilities in mail servers, and if record making and keeping practices were up to scratch, we wouldn't need to rely on email. That said though, if we can't bring back the global record making and keeping discourse, records work is going to increasingly (IMO) consist of risk assessing systems, and developing ways to assess the intentions of the people using them through their communication.
There's also an argument to be made that if we're in a mess, it's because of how badly email and other systems are used - so I'm aware of the irony. There's still just the edge of an idea here that feels important - so I'm writing and hoping to make sense of it.
I also think it's worth reconsidering some of your views on the snippets idea. If information doesn't cause action, then yes - you're right. If however it conveyed what an action should have been, and it was received and not consumed or ignored, there's a question to answer about authorised forms of communication and what responsibility that organisations should be taking to ensure that communication channels are consumed in a high fidelity manner. I think we can also look to how much trouble Elon Musk has got himself into with twitter so see that the significance of the communication is very dependent on the sender and the audience, and how the information causes them to act.
I'll look forward to joining you one day - just a few busy years with young children and study to get through first.
Happy new year - all the very best for 2024 for you and your family.
Karl.
Thank you, Karl! Have a fruitful and happy New Year 2024! I am wishing solid health to you and your family; prosperity joy and happiness at home, success at work and academia, and good luck in everything! - Natasha