Computer and Library Learning (Archived)

Georgia Tech’s School of Interactive Computing has a research project that recently designed a new app for Gmail users called courteous.ly with the intent of publishing one’s email load to those likely to be in contact with you. For Gmail users who voluntarily sign up for courteous.ly (not affiliated with Google or Gmail), the program will analyze the Gmail users’ email patterns, the current state of  their inboxes, their unread message counts, and their sent mail volumes to ascertain their current levels of email traffic.

If one puts [whenever] in the subject line, courteous.ly won't deliver the message right away. Instead, the Gmail user will receive it soon, after her/his email load goes down. The Gmail user might appreciate those messages. Also, an email with just a one-sentence question in the subject goes right to the top of the Gmail user’s inbox.

Courteous.ly is intended to help email users with etiquette and politeness and tell contacts when it might be a good time to send an email message to a Gmail account holder. After joining, courteous.ly monitors the Gmail account for 12 hours and provides 10 minute updates thereafter to tell contacts how busy a Gmail user is at a particular time.

Is there a point to courteous.ly? Perhaps there is but some sources, including the Globe and Mail, remind us that email has been in decline as a communications tool for several years.