Remember, my contention that there is nothing in the free software space that can do what Exchange does as easily and effectively as Exchange does it is and will remain unchallenged for the forseeable future, unless something momentous happens with Opengroupware.org.

It's too easy to focus on the technology itself instead of what we're using the technology for. It's infrastructure; it allows things to happen.

I use email every single day of my working life as part of my job; I effectively and rapidly communicate with the people I need to.

The company has an Exchange server, and I use Outlook. I had zero input into this decision, and really quite resent Greg's implication that I'm a biggot [sic] because my employer chooses to use a commercial messaging server that's not his favourite pay-for closed-source capitalist exploitation/ratware product, which is Groupwise.

Outlook's actually REALLY REALLY good at the PIM side of things(calendar/contacts/tasks), and blows chunks as an email client, but I get over it and get on with the far more important business of making motorway signs work - which, after all, is what brings home the bacon.

I'm not going to go into the gory details of my job, but it involves tracking multiple conversations with a lot of different people both within the company and without.

Yes, I need a computer. Simply keeping on top of what I've said to whom and when would turn into a full-time job and I'd need my own secretary.

A single scheme update (the basic unit of my work) can involve conversations and data exchange between a couple of dozen people, in the extreme case.

And computers aren't crutches in MY corporate life - they're the tools with which we provide information to the driver at the roadside (and back again), 24 hours a day, 365 days a year - that's what we do.