The backlash against HTML email Jun11 '07

I'm really not understanding the recent backlash against HTML email by certain notable web professionals.

Jeffrey Zeldman started it, and many other professionals are agreeing:

• Shaun Inman
• John Gruber
• Roger Johansson

I'm still left wondering how I truly feel. To be honest, I've never given HTML email much thought. I've always thought it can sometimes be annoying, but the email client can usually deal with it, much like spam.

To some extent, I agree, because I wrote about Excel and Outlook formatting before, and I use similar techniques in Gmail.

For example - in Outlook, there's an option to convert all incoming email to plain text.

Also, in Gmail, before you open an HTML email, it asks you if you want to "show images." You can also set a preference to always show images from that specific sender.

Although I understand where the argument comes from, it still seems like a stretch. Whereas HTML email can be inconvenient and downright sloppy, causing poor readability - it's also somewhat avoidable in all of today's email clients.

Not to mention most email that comes across as HTML usually has an option to subscribe to only the plain text offerings.

It's all about giving the recipients the most options.

To claim it "impedes communication" is slightly hypocritical by web professionals who call themselves "designers." It's just their personal opinion/rant, not some standard that needs to be adopted by everyone.

UPDATE: The argument is that email is not the right platform for design. Perhaps I am misunderstanding the argument as "design impedes communication". Design doesn't impede communication. But they're talking about the platform for design, which makes sense, so I guess I agree.

Categories: Communication , Design , Email , HTML

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