An e-mail message *can* in fact, be HTML, as HTML is a text payload like any other.
Perhaps he was saying he won't spend the time looking for information amongst html tags. Sure you can send html, it's just not nice for the reader.
It's not his (or the world's) fault your MUA is locked into 1982 mode and won't process the tags that are included in it.
Date isn't the only factor, people turn off html rendering in current MUA due to the security risk Lots of network people also work in security and don't need the extra risk For mail I receive most spam and attempts to exploit the user/client are html. Almost zero legit mail needed to have html You have to tolerate receiving html as there's too many who don't care. The sender has to tolerate their mail may not be read, may be removed by spam filters or the recipient reducing their opinion of the sender. brandon