For example, the following e-mail would likely not generate a reply with many of the famous names at the Institute: Hi professor. I’d love to stop by sometime to talk about <topic X>. Are you available? Responding to this message requires too much work (“Are you available?” is too vague to be answered quickly). Also, there’s no attempt to argue that this chat is worth the professor’s time. With these critiques in mind, here’s a version of the same message that would be more likely to generate a reply: Hi professor. I’m working on a project similar to <topic X> with my advisor, <professor Y>.
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