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Give the guy a little credit for creating a working email _system_ in an era where email hadn't proliferated very far

Define "proliferated very far". Many other computer systems had email systems. The problem back then is that theses systems didn't often communicate with each other. For example, ARPANET extended across the country by 1977 had email. This guy invented an email program that worked at one university from what I can tell.

"V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai is not a member of the MIT faculty and did not invent email. In 1980 he created a small-scale electronic mail system used within University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, but this could not send messages outside the university and included no important features missing from earlier systems"

From what I know from him, he never claimed he created electronic messaging.

These are his claims. Judge for yourself.

He just thinks he created a more useful version of it and that the term email can be attributed to him. That's his opinion, so what?

Well he sued someone who disagrees with that opinion for libel. By your own argument should you sue someone for a different opinion? One of the things not mentioned is that he sued one of authors for re-posting comments from other users in an article. That's not remotely how libel should work.

Shiva Ayyadurai will certainly have something to say about this!

http://www.inventorofemail.com/

He calls himself the "inventor of email" which is silly. He registered a copyright with the US copyright office. Again, there did not seem to be any innovation involved. He wrote an email program, and registered his copyright. The only remotely interesting thing about it is that it was named EMAIL. If he had produced a television and called it TELEVISION, and it was after other people had already produced and refined televisions, it would be false to claim to be the inventor of television.

Why do the RFC not count? No explanation.

Actually there is, it just isn't a very good one:
This quote, “email underpinnings were further cemented in 1977's RFC 733, a foundational document of what became the Internet itself.” [5] is a misuse of the term “email” because the RFCs (Request for Comments) and RFC 733 were written documentation not a computer program or code or a system.
http://www.inventorofemail.com/claims_about_email.asp

So apparently coming up with the idea, describing it in detail and documenting isn't inventing it, but if you copy that idea that's real invention.

Noam Chomsky and the linked website go out of the way to not mention Ray Tomlinson. Mr Chomsky does not compare Tomlinson's program from 1971 to Ayyadurai's program in 1977. A real argument would go feature by feature and explain what was present and what was missing. Instead Chomsky pretends Tomlinson doesn't exist. The linked site http://www.inventorofemail.com/ even has the gall to refer to Tomlinson as a mascot instead of using his name. All evidense is hand waved away with no explanation. Why do the RFC not count? No explanation. For some reason Chomsky is hung up on what the program is named. Suddendly naming your invention in english is important.

That website of his (which makes some pretty ridiculous claims) has a public comments section. Disqus is an option for sign-in.

It is the craziness of the mass media that translates a copyright filing as "Invention".

He calls it his invention, too. Check out his website at www.inventorofemail.com. He basically claims that, while there were previous implementations of electronic mail-like messaging systems, the first to have the features of modern email, including multiple folders, to/cc/bcc, subject lines, etc, was his program called "EMAIL", thereby making EMAIL the first modern e-mail system.

Also, it's not the term "EMAIL" that was copyrighted, but the program and its user manual. As others have pointed out, you can't copyright a term.

Wow, this self-important wanker even has inventorofemail.com. The Boston interview seems to state his weak-ass case the best. When faced with Tomlinson's 1971 record, he says that isn't really e-mail. Apparently he thinks that some subset of having folders or blind carbon copy are somehow amazing innovations, the things that made his work modern e-mail while earlier ones were not. Whatever.

He has several more I believe ..... dremail.com?
LOL propoganda

Wow, this self-important wanker even has inventorofemail.com. The Boston interview seems to state his weak-ass case the best. When faced with Tomlinson's 1971 record, he says that isn't really e-mail. Apparently he thinks that some subset of having folders or blind carbon copy are somehow amazing innovations, the things that made his work modern e-mail while earlier ones were not. Whatever.