Stephanie Miller, VP, Email & Digital Services at Aprimo, asks: Should response rates be the final arbiter for removing someone from the file? This has been a "best practice" for years. Especially so, since ISPS and other receivers now say that engagement is so important in the email channel ...

Aprimo's Stephanie Miller Offers Summary And Opinions:

At the Email Insider Summit, Pontiflex VP Jordan Cohen said that Facebook and Twitter aren't the principal challenge to email as a marketing vehicle since they are mainly entertainment vehicles. Actually, social media has proven to be more of a threat to TV and magazines.

Social media is moving so fast that questions always arise what's next. Would Twitter become Friendster? Pontiflex executive Jordan Cohen: "Saying Twitter will be gone in two years, it's like saying 'The Simpsons' are going to be off the air in two years."

At the MediaPost Email Insider Summit, Eloqua's Dennis Dayman takes on the question whether email is dead with the social media boom. The numbers don't indicate it yet. There are 188 billion emails sent a day, but of course Twitter (300 million accounts) and Facebook (maybe 1 billion) are growing.

Think twice before cutting an email marketing list based on low open rates. Some people take action simply based on the subject line, said Nicole Delma, who works for music download site RCRD LBL.

Coinstar, known for its kiosks offering cash for change and Redbox, has moved into T-shirts.

Email marketers who feel social media has clients more interested in that emerging platform than tired old email, may be overlooking something.

Geeks have been kind to T-shirt company Threadless. One fan had enough time to take a T-shirt called "The Communist Party" and turn it into a cake.

In a keynote address at the MediaPost Email Insider Summit, Threadless CMO Cam Balzer says the Chicago T-shirt company has been a leader for a decade in crowd-sourcing. There's a new "marketing democracy" going on and he says: "Most of the time, it feels almost like occupying Madison Avenue."