And then I cover it with love hearts. Animated ones. With sparkles.

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1670435]

context.

With thanks to peteyoung for reminding me that I meant to post this poll this morning, and completely forgot, due to data/code-wrangling.

Comments

[andrewducker]

Oddly, it doesn't feel at all rude to not put a greeting at the top, but not putting a signature and "thanks" or something similar at the bottom does.

[innerbrat]

I'm the exact reverse of this.

[andrewhickey.livejournal.com]

I say "Hi" if I'm replying to an email from someone I don't know well or am having a one-shot business relationship with (e.g. Amazon customer service or something). Were I applying for a job or something else fairly formal, I'd use "Dear Sir/madam" the first time, and then whatever form they used subsequently.
But for any email with friends I don't bother with topping and tailing with formalities, other than my .sig (which just links to my books and CDs).

[dougs.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that the point of a .signature is to confirm that the whole body of the email has been received and no accidental truncation has taken place. If I get an email without a .signature on it, I find myself hunting for other clues that the body is complete.

[fub.livejournal.com]

I start most of my mails with "Vrienden en Vriendinnen". "Vriend" is friend and "vriendin' is a female friend. Most of my mails are sent to colleagues.

[call-waiting.livejournal.com]

I rotate between different variations of 'hello' at the top, and always sign with "-- \n" (in accordancy wich RFC822) and "C." which is a habit I got into in undergrad days, so it's sort of ingrained now. I have no idea what sort of tone it sets though, I'm sometimes concerned it might seem a bit curt.

[matgb]

Depends on context of email. If,say, emailing you a quick question, I'll just ask the question.

If I'm emailing a Councillor on an issue I want resolved, I'll go formal if I don't know them but will normally start with something that mentions their name.

If I'm mailing a bunch of people but want action from one, I'll name that person at the top, but note who I'm cc'ing in and why.

If I'm emailing my MP, I'll start very formal and polite. Unless I've had lots of contact with said MP in person, in which case it'll go less and less formal, but will always start with the name.

One of the reasons I like to put a name at the beginning, especially if it's to someone that likely gets a lot of email, is so they know it's not spam and is actually meant for them.

A large amount of my mail received is round robin style stuff sent to groups of people, normally including a bunch of councillors, some of whom are just about able to hit reply without getting confused.

So if I want a response from one specific person, I have to include that person's name at the top so they know it.

But if I'm sending to someone I know is online a lot and is comfortable there, different approach.
==

In one of my old jobs, the marketing dept decided that all emails had to have a full graphic sig file sent on company logo backgrounded stuff in the company font.

A font which isn't a default install on any PC (although I believe it is on Macs, not sure).

I told the MD that as I was effectively a different marketing dept aiming at a different market, and all my emails went to my targets or internally, I'd use my own version of branding. When he was unsure, I got him to email me at my gmail address.

Straight into spam, and looked terrible anyway.

I wont hat fight, although they're still using the pointless long email footer of pointlessness. Our (group) IT guy informed the marketing director that there had to be something wrong with my machine that he couldn't fix, for some reason it could only send plain text emails and nothing else would work. The marketing director actually believed him...

[greybeta.livejournal.com]

The start of my emails depend on who I'm emailing, but most of the time I'll use Mr. or Mrs. So-and-so for a more formal email or just the first name for an informal email.

I leave a short signature just to differentiate the conversation, I most often use D2.

[makyo.livejournal.com]

I usually begin my emails with "Hello", because it's friendly but slightly less chatty than "Hi" or "Hey". Also, I'm not really a "Hi" or "Hey" person.

[simont]

Normally I don't bother with a greeting at all at the top.

On rare occasions, if I'm starting a fresh conversation with a request for some kind of favour, I'll start with "Hi," or "$Name," just because having the very first text in the whole conversation be a demand of some kind seems overly abrupt and I feel as if I ought to give them at least one word's run-up. In this situation think I tend to use "$Name," if it's somebody I already know, or "Hi," if it's somebody with whom I have no previous communication.

I tend to sign off "Cheers,\nSimon\n-- \n" followed by a sig block. I occasionally feel that this is redundant and I should get rid of either the 'signature' above the "-- " or the mechanical sig block, but I never quite seem to feel right without both. No idea why.

[snarlish.livejournal.com]

i'm a recluse and hardly talk to or email people. by not to seem too standoffish i normally say hey *name* or Hi *name* and i sign because it makes me tell myself i'm finished.

at work, or when sending emails for official reasosn, I often start with Hi (and add a name if i know it.

Letters are a different matter. emails are emails.

hugs,
snarl

[zz]

when remembering to be human i usually start with hi or hello.

i don't understand people signing off with "kind regards" on every email. seems too intimate.
i generally just put my name, unless i'm being deliberately friendly or grateful in which case i prepend cheerio or thanks or something.

[zz]

you missed out "yo" as an option btw.

and i edited our corporate vomit the other day when poking around the mail scanner, because someone had pasted it such that every newline became 2 newlines, making it take up 30-50 lines. *shudder*
it also doesn't start with dashdashspace, but i don't think i'd get away with slipping that in.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

i don't understand people signing off with "kind regards" on every email. seems too intimate.

That's interesting - I actually consider it quite formal and use it somewhat as a distancing mechanism. In legal letters, it's the next level of formality down from "Yours sincerely", which means it's about as formal as you can possibly get in a legal e-mail, short of "Kindest regards", which is almost painfully stiff.

[draconid.livejournal.com]

Practically all my emails are work ones so I always end with my name. I have my full name in my autosignature, but normally I stick my nickname above that - partcularly if it's someone I know.

I'll either put Hi $Name or nothing at the top. If it's a short one liner I'll probably not put the person's name, of if I'm emailing a group of people, and sometimes when I don't know what name the person prefers to be called by. I'll must Hi in front of longer emails. Actually, I'm probably quite random when I pick between the two, but I think I start with Hi more often than not.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

It's very context-dependent for me, especially since my work now involves wrangling people from very different cultures into doing what I want them to do, so I have to be really careful to sound appropriately respectful. For the first e-mail in the chain, it goes something like this:

Work e-mail to someone whose likely response I'm particularly anxious about: Dear $Name//Kindest regards, Liz
Work e-mail to someone I don't know well or someone from a non-Anglocentric culture, or my boss: Dear $Name//Kind regards, Liz
Work e-mail to group of people in our London office: Dear all// Regards, Liz
Work e-mail to group of people not in our London office: Dear colleagues// Kind regards, Liz
Work e-mail to someone I know and get on with well: Hi $Name//Best regards, Liz
Personal e-mail to customer service department of a utility or other organisation I neither like nor trust: Dear Sir or Madam//Yours, Elizabeth Williams
Personal e-mail to an organisation I like and trust: Hi there//Regards, Liz
Personal e-mail to fellow member of Lib Dems, fellow member of a social group or similar whom I don't know well: Hi $Name//[Regards/Thanks], Liz
Personal e-mail to my mother: Dear Mummy//Love, Elizabeth
Personal e-mail to fellow member of Lib Dems, fellow member of a social group or similar whom I know well: Hi $Name//[Cheers/Best/Thanks], Liz
Personal e-mail to someone I know and get on with very well: Hi $Name//Liz xx
Personal e-mail to a partner: Hi sweetie/Liz xx

All first work e-mails also automatically get a signature block added, with full name, job title and contact details and some pointlessly annoying disclaimer text. Subsequent e-mails in the same thread merely get the disclaimer.

The greeting and sign-off in subsequent e-mails tend to take their tone from the other person's response. If it's a bit formal, I'll continue as for the first - and if it's really frosty, I may even knock the formality up a notch, but that's rare. Usually, things get progressively less formal, and eventually the greeting and signature may disappear altogether. The better we know and like each other, the quicker it will happen. The greeting usually goes before the sign-off.

[andrewducker]

Yeah - I have a range of different patterns I use. But I've noticed that I pretty much leave off any kind of greeting nowadays, and nobody seems to notice or care. That may well be because I'm a geek working largely with other geeks, of course.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

In my office, that would probably be considered a bit rude unless addressed to someone you get on with really well. I can think of one partner who habitually does it for e-mails within the London office, and he's definitely considered quite brusque, both in writing and in conversation. And even he reverts to Dear colleagues when writing to other offices. But lawyers do tend to be a bit staid. I certainly wouldn't take offence at it coming from a geek in a non-work context :-)

[luckylove.livejournal.com]

Depends who I'm emailing. I can't actually remember what group I email the most so I can't give an accurate answer. Friends tend to get nothing at all or "Hi" and my MP/MSP, evil corporations etc tend to get "Dear" unless I'm so pissed off with them that the thought of using the word "Dear" anywhere near that particular kind of arsehole makes me feel so sick that I just can't do it. I think that's about it.

[stillcarl.livejournal.com]

The "massive bits of text pointlessly appended onto an email in an attempt to assert legal control" I find are most often attached to forwarded emails.

Most annoying email style? Those where the 'Hi' is in the subject line...

[lilysea.livejournal.com]

It varies.

For example, close friends, and friends I've sent an email to recently: no opening greeting, but close with

hugs,
[name]

or All good thoughts-
[name].

If it's been a while since my last email, I might open with

Hi [name]!

or Hi [name],

If I'm tired/busy, and writing to a close friend to share a link, I will skip the opening greeting and just write something like

Saw this and thought that you might like it! ^_^

[darkoshi]

With work emails that I initiate, I usually start with "Hi, $name". When replying to emails, I usually don't think of adding a salutation until I'm about ready to send it. Then I may stop and think that my reply sounds a bit brusque, and that I'd better add a salutation to make it more polite. Especially if the other person has been doing so in all their replies to me.

When I IM someone at work, I usually start off with Hi $name or Hey $name. "Hey" is a standard greeting here in the South. Since I'm only partially southern, in my mind it is a mixture of greeting and attention-getter.

With personal emails, if it's someone I email a lot, I don't usually put a salutation. Otherwise I do.

I would only use "Dear" when writing to relatives or very good friends. When I was younger, it seemed appropriate to use "Dear" in a formal letter to someone I didn't know, but now I feel somewhat unsure about that. I disagree with the article that only "My Dearest" implies that kind of intimacy. "My Dearest" sounds antique and quaint to me, not something I would write, unless I was flirting with someone.

[fluffworld.livejournal.com]

What with the being hard of hearing, email is my preferred mode of communication most of the time. I always start with [Hi] and end with [Thanks,] followed by my signatire for most vaguely official stuff, because I am normally asking for something or addressing something.

For friends, it always starts with [Hey] and ends with just s for my name.

[spacelem.livejournal.com]

I always write Dear in my cards, emails and letters (although my wife claims that Dear is inappropriate in a card, even if it's to family). I tend to sign things "Regards, Jamie", although that varies sometimes.

I always cut any bits of pointless legalese from my emails, although my work appends it automatically (oh well, at least it will only appear *once* in any email I send).

Oh, and I always write grammatically correct English in my texts (unless I'm really drunk/in a rush, and just want to send a short yes/no/flat number/etc. reply).

[fearmeforiampink]

If I know them and they're not someone that needs to be treated carefully/doesn't really understand the internet, then I launch straight into it.

Otherwise, 'Hey' for informality, "Dear Blah" for formality.

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

How I start an email depends totally on my relationship to the person I expect to read it.

I commonly use...

Hi $name
Dear $name
$name
no greeting at all