Globally Speaking

The way an email message looks on your screen is not the way it will look on all other screens. We urge you to resist the temptation to format your message in an elaborate way, because it might end up looking messy on your recipient's screen.

Email clients differ in how they format and display messages. If anything, their differences are increasing as newer software packages provide more and more formatting options. Unusual fonts, bold and italic fonts, colored fonts, tabs, and hanging indents may look good on your screen, but they can cause problems for your recipient.

For example, in March 2000, one of the authors received a carefully indented and justified email message from India:

  Dear Mr. Martin,

  Your message.

  As  far as we are concerned  there is no  confusion  at
  all and I am here to clear the confusion as Chairman of
  the group.

However, when Martin hit the REPLY button, the above text appeared as:

  >      Dear  Mr. Martin,         Your  message.            at
  >  all and I am here to clear the  confusion as Chairman of
  >  the  group.

We also recommend against using HTML formatting for your messages, even though it may work well for attached files. As dull as it sounds, the best approach is to use a fixed-width (typewriter-mimicking) font such as Courier, arranged flush left with one blank line between paragraphs — at least for your first message to someone. If you want to move on to a fancier look in subsequent emails, add a PS asking your recipient if his or her software can handle colors, indents, and so forth.