Email: An Art of Conversation

Skip to the link at the end if you don't want to read my rambling but might be interested in some humor.
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Email blunders in my inbox irk me a bit... so just a quick post to vent my frustration.

It is sad that I can think of only 3-4 people I personally look up to - the promptness, conciseness & thoughtfulness of their emails continues to amaze me. I am far from perfect but I do spend at least twice the time and effort to read & respond than most people. Coming across as a good conversationalist might be NOWHERE on the radar for a lot of people but it is my personal goal & heres what I want to remember to ask myself before I hit "send" -

1. A quick response sends a sense of virtual proximity & approachability. How often am I able to accomplish this? How confidently can my contacts count on me for a quick reply regardless of when they contact me? 
2. Am I forgetting to attach a document I've referred to? More importantly if I have attached it, have I changed the file name to include my name, date & an appropriate title - i.e. not something like "freaking Parkinson's paper" :P
3. Mass emails: Am I CC-ing all the right people? when responding, am I cognizant of all the people who are going to read my opinion? :P Am I abusing the power of "reply all" & annoying anyone?
4. Can I avoid emails back & forth by simply being more specific or providing more info? 
5. Have I exhausted all sources of independent learning before emailing to ask a question? And if I do still need to email, am I effectively conveying that I have infact exhausted all other sources? 
6. Is my subject short & relevant?
7. Instead of composing a new email - could I perhaps respond/forward so the receiver can be reminded of an old conversation & the thread can continue without having to be redundant.
8. Too many "...", exclamation marks or smileys? Am I treating emails different from chat?
9. How hard is it to find the point I'm trying to make? Can I be more concise? 
10. (the most under-rated of all) Am I actually making an effort to connect with the person? Is he/she travelling or sick or giving a talk or has an exam or celebrates a festival - to try to remember something they had told me in passing/might not expect me to remember & throw in for example, "ps- good luck with... or Happy blah blah" To care genuinely, pleasantly surprise someone & show them that its not just all business! :-)

For your amusement - http://theoatmeal.com/comics/email ;-)