Emailaholics Reveal Their Habits

KentuckyFC writes "People can be accurately classified according to their email habits, say scientists from Yahoo Research in NYC, who have been studying the way 125,000 people use email on university campuses in the US and Europe. The team found that people fall into two clearly distinct types of emailer. The first group, 'day labororers,' tend to send emails throughout the normal working day between 0900 and 1800 but not at other times. On the other hand, 'emailaholics' tend to send emails throughout the waking hours from 0900 to 0100. These groups are pretty stable: roughly 75% of users stay in the same group over a two-year period. That gives a pretty good way of classifying individuals that could be used by demographers. Interestingly, the technique can also be used to spot spambots which do not fit into either group."

Comments

Overly simplistic criteria

[mwvdlee]

So basically anybody that uses e-mail outside of working hours is an "emailholic"? Doesn't that include pretty much every person who has a computer at home?

Re:Overly simplistic criteria

[wjh31]

if you look at the graph in TFA, there appears to be a third small cluster in the region of the 'A' marker, which is people who start emailing early evening, and finish late at night, which i guess is those who use their e-mail accounts at home after work

there is not much info about the email accounts montiored. Im guessing the day labourors are those who use their account just for work, with a sperate for personal stuff, and the emailaholics are those with one universal address. The subgroup i pointed out could then represent the personal accounts for the day labourors

Re:Overly simplistic criteria

[John Hasler]

According to the article that makes both of you spambots.

Re:I Don't Know If I Buy This

[click2005]

You should start by admitting you have a problem.

"I'm an emailaholic. I drink 4 bottles of emailahol every day."

Re:Xaholics

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for bringing our attention to this Aholicgate scandal, you Gateaholic.

Re:I Don't Know If I Buy This

[SlashDotDotDot]

These groups are pretty stable: roughly 75% of users stay in the same group over a 2 year period.

My email habits change very frequently. Where do I fit in?

You fit into the other 25%.

Re:I Don't Know If I Buy This

[Anonymous Coward]

If you were an emailaholic you'd be drinking a fifth of emailahol a day - not showing up for work, getting fired, ruining your relationships, having an email in the morning to get going, just one big fucking nightmare of a life.

Re:Anonymous Cowards are cool!

[Lonewolf666]

If this finds widespread use, it won't last long anyway:
The spambots will start keeping regular working hours ;-)

My 'habit'

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

I sometimes find myself logging into my email purely as a reflex action. Typing 'ma' in the url bar then down arrow once to highlight mail.yahoo.com, and typing my username and password in before I even realize that I'm doing it.

I wish there was a yahoo email monitor that worked through the system tray. There's a widget, but it sits on the desktop and I hate having things permanently sitting in front of my other windows.

Re:I Don't Know If I Buy This

[Anonymous Coward]

You are obviously a spambot.