I love my spam filter. Postini is probably one of the best things ever invented and Google certainly made the right call making it one of its own products. It saves me so much time, and in return Google makes money. What a novel concept!

A recent announcement about an unexpected shut-down of a spammer, who according to some reports was responsible for more than half of the spam that attempts to hit our inboxes, got me thinking about e-mail again.

I believe the future of e-mail is now.

Depending on who you talk to, high school and college kids who make up "Generation M" will not rely on e-mail when they get behind a desk and have to collect a paycheck. So why are publishers still concerned about getting subscribers' e-mail addresses? Shouldn't the push be to get mobile phone numbers instead?

Of course, e-mail will stick around for a while perhaps surviving even longer than the once indispensable fax machine. Our e-newsletters still attract both new readers and advertisers. Just the thought of telling editors or marketers to stay within the 160-character limit of a SMS (short message service)/text message and you have the basic argument against e-mail being replaced anytime soon.

But despite great products like Postini, e-mail just doesn't get me excited about its long-term future for delivering content. You can start with Microsoft's stupid decision to revert its Outlook 2007 client back to using a Word graphics engine rather than one used in Internet Explorer. More than one year later, if your ad sales team or marketers don't know about this yet, tell them now!

Publishers also are faced with concerns like an outdated CAN-SPAM law, reputation management and ESPs (E-mail Service Providers) with products you would think are very similar, but once you get under their hoods have some significant differences.

ISPs also are cracking down. My wife, who for the past two years has served on our son's junior high school home and school association, had our e-mail account shut down this week by Verizon for sending two messages to a list of about 300 other parents within one hour. No, I'm not married to Mary Xee, and I don't think she's a Web designer in her spare time.