With so many communication methods to choose from, email, Twitter, Facebook, Sharepoint…we can sometimes be overwhelmed with choice. However, older methods of communication still have a place in society as Canada’s Harold Hackett has been proving.

Over the last two decades, he has sent out more than 4,800 messages in a bottle from his Canadian home along the Atlantic coastline.

Every message asks for the finder to send a response back to Hackett, and since 1996 he has received an impressive 3,100 responses from all over the world, each one with a different story to tell.

The emotions involved in receiving an unexpected personal letter, mean that the older communication methods still have a valuable role to play. Though as Harold has sometimes waited up to 13 years for a reply, there is still something to be said for the speed of new media!

You can watch a video of Harold talking about his messages in bottle on the BBC News website >

Melitta