"As a workflow, that seems appropriate for email, but also any channel through which requests are made of us: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, even SMS or iChats," he says.
Salutations such as "Hello" or "Hi" are appropriate for email, as is the "Dear" used in letters, but greetings such as "Yo, dude" are not.
For example, our focus on email is appropriate for Apache projects, but other projects with different policies may also use IRC, issue tracker or newer mechanisms (e.g., Slack, HipChat, Mattermost) as a communication channel, so those communications would need to be included.
And if you really have no other choice, or it simply feels more appropriate for you to reply by email, then be polite and professional in your response.
News UK, publisher of the Sun, had argued in its submission to the ASA defending the promotion that it was "appropriate" for the target audience – 93% of email recipients were male – and that it would not offend them.
"Any reasonable person... should have known" that private email was not appropriate for these conversations, Comey added.
Watch for emails asking for note-takers.
"Each of our deals is designed to be appropriate for the particular context," Scholl explained via email.
