Maybe it’s the general air of confusion, maybe it’s the frustration, maybe it’s the constant complaints, but something tells me this new email transition is not going well.

I mysteriously did not receive any emails during the first week of the transition. I must not have followed the forwarding rule directions exactly as they were given – even though I did.

Then, when I went to email a couple of faculty members, I tried to find them in search engine, and it didn’t work. Are some people not in the new address book? Did I do something wrong?

No. It just turns out that faculty and staff were not switched to the new g.emporia.edu system. They’re addresses stayed the same.

But I don’t get it because many of us relied on the address book to email our professors.

This wouldn’t seem like so much of a let-down if some rather obvious precautions had been taken. First, a trial run probably could’ve helped out. I’m no computer whiz, but I don’t see why that couldn’t be possible. Second, doing it in the middle of a semester seemed like a bad idea. I’m swamped with tests, quizzes and reports – trying to figure this out is not at the top of my priority list.

Some say this is the inevitable backlash from any technological change. Check your newsfeed the next time Facebook makes a switch in style and format. The outcry can be deafening. But when the primary function of a service, in this case the exchange of email, is not just altered, but hampered by the transition, we have to pause for reflection.

Even with all of this frustration, I like Gmail. I like how I don’t need to sign in constantly. I like that we can finally mark things as spam. And I know we’ll all get accustomed to it eventually.

Even if this was a switch for the better, it wasn’t achieved in a very efficient manner. Hopefully, the next time we attempt a large-scale change, it will be with more forethought and common sense.