Are social utilities replacing email?

We’re already seeing the shift away from ‘email’ to ‘we-mail’ communication.

Facebook buys FriendFeed and takes lifestreaming to a new level. Tumblr emerges as an all-in-one website and blog communication platform. Posterous enters the scene as an email-enabled blog network doing the work of content aggregator and thought sharer. Twitter, as we’ve known all along, has direct messaging – and we’re seeing a healthy transition away from the more traditional means of sending a note.

Why? Because we can. More importantly, because email isn’t an open mailbox. It doesn’t connect people. And this is the central thrust of the social web.

Now of course, there are a whole host of issues with social correspondence or ‘we-mailing’.

For one, privacy disasters have reared their ugly head. TechCrunch reported earlier this year that direct messages were being exposed through 3rd party apps. Facebook has had its own headaches filtering out viral spam from inboxes – seen those random ‘videos’ your friends have been sending you? FriendFeed is now starting to see its own skulduggery in the form of sexual deviants and internet marketing scammers.

But we haven’t seen this type of stuff before?

The value of social utilities in this regard is that they provide an opportunity to pre-screen content and endorse correspondence through ‘friends’ that are truly yours. Further, they could be the answer to the ongoing debate over IP sharing and privacy that has mostly been attributable to junk mail and spam blasts.

Think about it: by operating through degrees of conversation, we can help each other keep correspondences alive, or shut them down in an instant.

What are your thoughts on this, and what are some of the ways you see this transition evolving?

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