ARTWORK: Beth O’Sullivan
growing our economy won’t make us happier ANGUS PADLEY EDITED BY ROSE DIXON-CAMPBELL
Email is arguably one of the most influential technologies of the 21st century. It has become the communication cornerstone of almost all modern institutions; from governments to universities, schools, businesses, and NGOs. And it is easy to see why. Previously, sending and receiving mail required a lot of time and labour. It had to be handwritten, addressed, stamped, and taken to some kind of postal service. Depending on the era you lived in, the delivery of a letter may have taken weeks or months. To put it into perspective, according to research at Stanford, a letter sent by a Roman Soldier from his fort in Northern Britain back home to Alexandria in Egypt would have taken fifty to onehundred days under ideal conditions. Even then, the sender often had to chance upon a merchant heading in the desired direction, pay an expensive fee, and then pray it ended up in the right hands. In comparison, an email from London to Cairo can be written in five minutes and take milliseconds to be received at virtually no cost.
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