A person declares ‘email bankruptcy’ when he/she has decided to clear the inbox by deleting all the mails up to a particular date. Such a decision may be necessary if the person has been inundated with thousands of emails and has failed to respond on time. Such a backlog is generally attributed to information overload as many high-profile persons receive hundreds of emails everyday. A person may have also fallen behind in reading and answering emails during long vacations or illnesses.
While declaring bankruptcy, the person sends a mass email to senders informing them that their email is being detected and that they may send it once again if they expect a response.
Harvard professor and political activist Lawrence Lessig first coined the term in 2004 when he expressed inability to go through the email backlog and deleted them en masse.
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