I've recently made some changes in my electronic communications, primarily motivated by a desire to update the way that I synchronize my calendar, contacts, and e-mail across multiple electronic devices. The upshot is that I'm basically adding another e-mail address to my ever-expanding electronic identity.

Marci rolled her eyes when she noticed the changes that I was making (it was a three-day process to get everything set up the way I wanted). She was baffled by the addition of a fifth active e-mail account, when she barely manages to make full use of her one e-mail account. And to be honest, I can completely understand her bewilderment. If Microsoft would have played nice and let me do everything that I wanted to do through its services, I would have gladly processed everything through my Microsoft (Hotmail) account. But because of a few quirks in their system -- or because of my own ineptitude in figuring out their system -- I opted to update my system through Google, who offers a more comprehensive and more flexible package.

It wasn't anything personal. It wasn't a pledge of allegiance to any new corporate empire. It was just a practical decision -- like picking up a passport for a country in which I already function as a de facto citizen and resident. Fortunately in today's electronic environment, I don't have to renounce my citizenship in any of the other on-line "countries." I just get to pick up another passport, like some kind of diplomat or secret CIA agent.

So what does this mean for all my friends and family who want to keep in touch with me, electronically? Absolutely nothing.

The marvel of modern technology is that no one has to update his or her address book unless they want to. Ultimately, it really doesn't matter which of my multiple e-mail addresses is used. I think of it like an elaborate stacking of funnels, and I've got it set up so they all funnel into the same location in the end anyway. A person could send an e-mail to my Hotmail address (which is the account that I've had the longest, going all the way back to 1995 at BGSU), or to my Gmail address (which is relatively new), or to my Amsterdam50 address, or my GCM address, or to the e-mail associated with my personal website -- and they will all reach me simultaneously through my Gmail account. Pretty slick, huh? At least I hope it's pretty slick.