I was out of the office on vacation last week and made a concerted effort not to check email or do work while I was out. Nice while it lasts, but brutal coming back to over 2900 unread messages. (I do social media monitoring via Twitter and other searches, hence the huge number of messages.)
Even though I was totally slammed with going through this huge quantity of email I noticed a message from a listerv I subscribe to and took the time to write a response because it was something I felt I could help this person with. I hit send and braced myself for the onslaught of “out of office” replies I knew would pour into my already-full inbox. Nothing. Waited a few more minutes. Nothing. Checked my sent messages to make sure the message had actually gone out–it did.
Then I realized even though the message was sent out it was probably rejected because this particular listserv doesn’t accept html. (ASAE I’m looking at you.) Now maybe I’m wrong and my message somehow got cut off at some other pass and it’s not the listserv’s fault. But I’m pretty sure it is. And I’m SO not happy about it. More than not happy, actually–sort of livid, to be honest.
WHY is ASAE still using listservs that don’t accept html? That are horribly inaccessible via the web? That clog up my inbox with out of office replies every time I post something? Why did they spend dues money on a white label social network that sits there, basically dormant, while the crappy listserv flourishes? If the listservs are so active why did they pick a private social networking platform that doesn’t support email integration?
This calendar year alone I’ve presented at various ASAE events on a number of occasions–always on social media. They’re very big on hyping social media to members–so why are their own social offerings so crappy?
Leave a Reply