Throughout my recent series of postings, Build a Better E-Mail Message, I spelled e-mail with a hyphen.

While writing those three articles, my fingers kept typing email. I got so tired of having to go back to insert missing hyphens, I paused to research the correct spelling of e-mail. My usual resources confirmed e-hyphen-mail, so I conscientiously kept inserting hyphens.

However, since then, I’ve noticed, all over the Internet, many occurrences of email. I pursued further research.

Caveat: My research consisted mostly of searching Web sites that popped into my mind
or were already in my bookmarks, and took me, wow, almost an hour.

The Experts Take a Position…

The correct spelling is e-mail, according to those who determine such conventions.

These experts in language usage and spelling include Associated Press, Chicago Manual of Style, Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publications, Merriam-Webster and the Oxford English Dictionary.

• Netlingo explains that, when the e replaces the word electronic (as in e-mail and e-commerce), the word needs a hyphen. Terms such a elancer and ezin are unhyphenated because the e implies electronic but does not specifically replace it.
• The hyphenaters at FuturePerfect make the good point that we write T-shirt not Tshirt and U-turn not Uturn.
• In my Microsoft Manual of Style (an actual book, not a Web site!), I read that, when it comes to e-words, one should “always hyphenate for clarity.”

…which the Worker Bees Ignore

As for the business people who spend their days sending e-mail; well, they all send emails.

These people and companies include Gmail, Hotmail, AOL, productivity mavens David Allen, Michael Mann and David Seah, email marketing experts Constant Contact, and web services experts MB/I.

Here are further oddities:

• Yahoo! and Apple avoid using that pesky e. Yahoo offers Yahoo!Mail and the Apple app is called Mail
• E-mail is used by one of the major style guides for technical writers, the Microsoft Manual of Style for Technical Publication but…
• Email is used by one of the major professional associations for technical writers, the Society for Technical Publication.
• Although the Microsoft Manual of Style states that e-mail is correct, Microsoft Word’s spell checker doesn’t flag either email or e-mail as incorrect. (Nor did the spell check here in our blog app.)

In other words, the experts have spoken and no one listened. Me, my fingers keep on typing it email.