Dear Neatoramanauts,
Do you still write "Dear so-and-so" in your correspondence? No?
That's what author and CNN contributor Bob Greene noticed as well:
Is "Dear" an endangered species?
It would appear to be. You may have noticed that fewer and fewer people begin their letters and notes with "Dear." Some holdouts -- I'm among them -- do, but this may be mostly out of lifetime habit. Even people who grew up using the traditional salutation -- middle-of-the-road, go-by-the-book people -- now regularly begin their notes with "Hi."
This is mostly a function of the digital-communications age. "Dear," which always looked fine atop a business letter, or a handwritten note, is increasingly seen as archaic and old-fashioned on a computer screen or on a smartphone or mobile device.
The pending disappearance of "Dear" is a sea change in the way we write to each other -- yet when you think about it, there are few logical reasons arguing for a longer life for that particular word. We've always used it, just because we've always used it.
Would you miss "Dear" if it's gone forever from our daily usage? Link
But that doesn't feel right for most emails, which are more structured around traditional "memos", with "To:" and "From:" at the top. I don't believe "Dear..." was standard on memos, and that carried over to electronic memos. "Dear ," feels stiff and redundant, as does the "Yours Sincerely" at the bottom.
For informal business e-mails, I tend to use Good Morning or Good Afternoon, whereas quick replies garner a Hi ____.