Language and the Internet

The language of e-mail 117

companies which retain a paper record of their messages, printing
out the most recent ones (as opposed to the entire message history)
is very much easier if they are at the beginning of a chain, as there is
no way of knowing which pages to select for the printer if they are at
the end, since e-mail pages are not formatted on-screen in terms of
printer pages. ‘Print pages 1–2’ is an easy instruction; ‘Print pages
11–12’ requires research. (‘Print all’, of course, is also an easy option

• but at the expense of increasingly bulging filefuls of duplicated
  pages.)
  Some usage manuals disapprove of the within-message reaction.
  ‘Add your reply above or below –never within– the original
  message.’^25 In fact, within-message commenting is very com-
  mon, when several points are being made which require in-
  dividual attention. A within-message reply to (1) above might
  read:

>I hope to be there by six, though everythingdepends on the

>trains.

I know – remember last time?

>Will you be coming by train yourself, or are you driving this

>time?

Car

>I know Fred is bringing his car.

It would not be intelligible to give this sequence of responses at the
end of the message:

>I hope to be there by six, though everything depends on the

>trains.

>Will you be coming by train yourself, or are you driving this

>time? I know Fred is bringing his car.

I know – remember last time?

Car

or at the beginning:

(^25) Flynn and Flynn (1998: 9).