Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

E-mail and Snail Mail United

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the thinkin-with-your-noggin dept.

bahree writes "The BBC has an interesting story about how some people living in some of the most inaccessible areas of India are enjoying an improved postal service - thanks to the combining of e-mail with traditional 'snail mail'."

4 of 101 comments (clear)

  1. Speaking of the post office by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Email and online bill paying must some day put them out of business. I know they had financial difficulties for a while. I bet they will have to adapt in the coming years or die off.

  2. Not just in India... by pubjames · · Score: 4, Interesting


    I live in Spain, but do a lot of business in the UK. Important snail mail that arrives to our UK offices is scanned and emailed to me.

  3. V-Mail by iCharles · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The concept (handwritten letter->intermediary format->printed copy) reminds me of V-Mail in World War Two. People states-side would write a letter to their man in uniform on a special form. This form would be printed on microfilm, and carried over to Europe or the Pacific. The letters would be printed and handed out to the troops.

    The advantage was that the mail took up significantly less weight. 150,000 letters could be reduced from 2,500 lbs to around 45 lbs. The space savings could be used for war material.

  4. Been done. By FedEx Zapmail by netringer · · Score: 4, Interesting
    The US Post Office (as it was called then) looked into doing this very thing - Faxing snail mail to the post office nearest the addressee. Luckily for them the usual government bureaucracy held them up from getting in place in time.

    Federal Express CEO Fred Smith made a huge investment in FAX over a private satellite network called Zapmail. The idea being they could do better than next day delivery by getting documents there in the next few hours.

    Unfortunately for them high-speed FAX machines using dial-up phone lines became cheap and common and ZapMail was abandoned in a year.

    --
    Ever dream you could fly? Get up from the Flight Sim. I Fly