On page 21 of the 3/10/08 issue of Ad Age is a beige box where it is written that marketers are thinking of cutting back on direct mail in favor of increased email in the face of recession. While I, as a guy who helps create lot of email, should be seeing this as a good thing, I also see this as a potential bad thing. First, we all get too much email as it is. The email we do get should be relevant and help improve our quality of life in some way. Emails promising me a 0% APR on transferred balances isn’t either of those things. Second, approaching email as an electronic version of direct mail may be cheaper than the current tree-based method, but I don’t believe it will be better. Marketers who use it in lieu of direct mail because it’s cheaper are missing the unique attributes of the medium and, in fact, are making it less effective, not more.