I read the other day an email that desperately needed some editing. Writing without editing is pretty much the same as speaking with little attention to what we are saying. The great advantage of the written form over the spoken one is that you can go back an edit. Not editing what you write is both a poor use of the written form and a sign that you don’t care much for the person that will read your message.
It’s not that a typo is not allowed, no one is perfect. But to write something without punctuation is just insane. All too often I hear people say that, because they are not writers or journalists they are somehow excused of writing poorly. I think it is just plain laziness. It’s a laziness that reads as our lack of interest for a craft so important to us by which we express what we feel and think.
How is it, that common sense doesn’t rouse in these situations? Why is it so difficult to realize that a 500+ word email written in a single paragraph without punctuation is just illegible. It costs so much to get the ideas out of that mess. The laziness to which I refer does service to no one, and buries even the meaning of your well-intended message.
So do yourself a favor and go back and edit the message a bit before hitting the send button.