Are you signed up to receive HEART UK's e-newsletter?

I'm signed up, but it comes out nearly empty every time, with just a link to a web page. I'm not always online when I read my email, so that's a bit useless. I read the "plain text" version, if that helps.

I am not particularly IT savy so took advice from someone who is. They suggested that your email settings may not have been configured to read html emails – so will just display them as plain text!

If you change your email settings to display emails as html then you should be able to view the HEART UK eNewsletter in all it’s glory!

Warning: rant ahead

Well, that might be OK for you or your rich IT-savvy friend who's probably on a fast fixed internet connection, but if I changed my email settings (and probably upgrade the email app I use to one that displays html email better and maybe buy a bigger memory card for it), I'd have to pay to download to my mobile all the wasteful html, graphics and colours which don't usually contain any extra information and mainly make it harder for people like me to read or use text-to-speech. For example, in the current edition you link to, the graphics are 60 times the download size of the text, and those graphics and colours include such joys as white on light red, white on light blue and light green on a sort of mauve - all rather difficult to read combinations. Now on one newsletter, maybe that's not too bad, but it's not the only newsletter I get and I don't really want everyone to start doing it.

Most email software automatically produces a plain text version for those of us who asked for it. Could HEART UK's newsletter software do that too, please, instead of just sending a link telling us to visit the website?

I love HEART UK and I'd be happy to read more about it, but I feel that email newsletters should be used differently to web pages. They should be more textual, factual and self-contained so my email app can download them while I'm in a cafe or station with wifi and then I can read them or listen to them easily while I'm travelling, without incurring extra expense or waiting until I'm in another wifi cafe.

What are the main aims of that newsletter, after all? Keep people informed and involved, collect tracking data and attract website visits, or something else?

Thanks for coming back to me on this and for the further information which I will again feedback to see if there is something more we can do to help.

OK, I think this improved a bit: it seemed to have a more useful plain text version in the latest edition. From the relatively large size of the email, I think the html/rich version was still included, so it's more expensive than it needs to be, but at least I got something to read this time! Thank you!

I am probably the most IT challenged person on this site....but I really like the look of the latest newsletter, much more up to date and containing useful new information which can be difficult to find on the main website.

I particularly liked the piece on aspirin as it is giving scientific information which (for once!) is telling us that it's not helpful for primary prevention. I hate the "dogma" around statins sometimes and it's good to get a balanced view.

Great that you like the new version. I hope you will be even more excited when I tell you that the new design reflects the look and feel of the new website due to launch in March/April 2012. Watch this space.