Part 4 : Email and the Future

What are the impacts of the Internet on a country like India - is India following the US pattern, or does it have special benefits or disbenefits for the country?

The Internet has meant different things for different countries and peoples. For India, the major effect has been greater accessibility to information, data, audiences and markets around the world. Within the country too, it has streamlined data delivery, made it more widely accessible and less expensive.

These unique advantages, which may not be as important in developed nations, will have special advantages in some geographic regions. The potential in making specific forms of information and services accessible to remote corners of a country like India, where communications networks are poorly developed or even non-existent in parts, is truly mind boggling.

We've mentioned email management, but you're also an expert on email publications. Why the great interest?

Because it gives you access to a very sacred portion of a visitor's computer - the email inbox !

An e-zine (email newsletter) is a unique vehicle to stay in touch with visitors to your website, to develop a trusting relationship with them, to regularly inform them about updates to your site and send them news about their interests.

Everyone needs an email publication; everyone should know how to do it right. That's why I even wrote a book on it - E-ZINE LAUNCH: How to Create, Publish and Market your own profitable Email Newsletter on the Internet.

How do you see the email medium developing in the future?

Email is still the "Killer Application" of the Internet. More than one half of all Internet users regularly read and send email. This number is sure to explode as the Internet grows.

In the future, email will probably become more interactive, colorful and intelligent. Many companies are now offering email with graphics, animation and even music. HTML email brings a website to the reader rather than having him/her go out on the Internet to see it. Today, most of our inboxes are crammed with unsolicited commercial messages (a.k.a. Spam) which wastes time and resources. As the medium matures, better advertiser targeting, more incentives to readers (like getting paid to receive ads), and less intrusion on one's privacy (by perhaps stringent legislation) will help restore the fun and joy to receiving email.

Looking to your future now, where do you see yourself in a year’s time? What are your plans?

A year is too far ahead in Internet time to make predictions :)

Over the next few months, I plan to grow and develop my not-for-profit organization to help families and patients with heart birth defects, the CHD HELP LINE. I've been neglecting it lately, but have to get it back on track.

In a year, I hope to tie in all my online activities and put them together in one area. Work on this is half-done. The entire site should work towards a unified purpose - TO HELP PEOPLE.

And you think there will still be room for the small independent website to compete with the big boys?

Most definitely, YES !!!!

My reasons are based on personal experience. There must be a cluster of heavily funded, seriously hyped and promoted health-care websites on the internet today. Still, my site fills a niche - it draws a select special kind of audience, and gives it more than what a comparable big corporate business site can hope to.

Personalization, mass customization, huge databases that can be mined and milked for superior service, still can't compete with the one thing the small (or one-man) show has to pit against them - HUMAN PASSION.

Read on for our "featured five" questions in the final part of our interview with Dr. Mani.