From QWERTYUIOP to 100 Emails a Day: The Accidental Revolution

The Message Nobody Remembers

In late 1971, Ray Tomlinson sat in front of two computers at Bolt Beranek and Newman in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He typed something—probably 'QWERTYUIOP' or 'test 123'—and pressed send. He doesn't remember exactly what it said. Neither does anyone else.

And that's the point. The first email ever sent wasn't a grand announcement. It was a programmer testing whether his code worked. A 'neat thing to do,' as Tomlinson later described it.

An Unofficial Project That Changed Everything

Tomlinson was working on ARPANET, the precursor to the internet. His official task was adapting SNDMSG, a program for leaving messages on the same computer. Then he had a thought: what if messages could travel between computers? Nobody asked him to. That unauthorized side project became the foundation of how the world communicates.

The @ Symbol: A Decision Made in Seconds

You use the @ symbol every day. So do 4 billion email users worldwide. Ray Tomlinson chose it in about thirty seconds. He needed a way to separate the user's name from their location. The @ symbol was perfect. Rarely used. Clearly readable. Already on the keyboard. A decision made in seconds has now been typed trillions of times.

53 Years Later: The Monster We Created

• 347 billion emails are sent every day in 2024
• The average professional receives 121 emails daily
• Workers spend 28% of their workweek managing email
• For property managers: 100+ emails per day is standard, 4.2 hours daily on email-related tasks

Ray Tomlinson's test message has metastasized into a productivity crisis.

The Tragedy of Email's Success

Email succeeded because it's universal, asynchronous, and documented. These same qualities make it overwhelming. Anyone can email you. Every email is a task deposited in your inbox without your consent. Everything is recorded, which means everything must be handled properly.

The Automation Gap

For fifty years, the answer to email overload has been: hire more people. That's not sustainable. Belgium has classified syndic as a shortage profession. The gap isn't in email technology—email works perfectly. The gap is in email handling. We've automated sending messages. We haven't automated reading, understanding, and responding to them intelligently. Until now.

The Next Chapter

Tomlinson's innovation was making email possible. Our innovation is making email manageable. When a co-owner emails at 11 PM about payment status, they get an accurate, personalized response in under three minutes. Email remains the interface. But the burden shifts from humans to intelligent automation. Fifty-three years after that first test message, we're writing the next chapter.