Missatgeria

Missatgeria is the practice and system of sending and delivering messages between individuals, organizations, or places. In Catalan usage, the term covers both traditional postal or courier activities and modern forms of electronic communication. It can refer to the infrastructure, protocols, and services that carry messages from sender to recipient.

Missatgeria derives from missatge, meaning message, and the suffix -aria, indicating a field of activity, together with missatger, meaning messenger.

Historically, missatgeria described networks of messengers in royal courts, monasteries, and merchant cities who carried written notes across routes. Over time, it expanded to postal services and commercial courier companies that standardized routes, timetables, and tracking.

In the digital era, missatgeria commonly refers to electronic messaging: email, text messaging, instant messaging, and streaming messaging on social platforms. In logistics and business, it also denotes the delivery of parcels and documents by couriers as part of supply chains.

Key components include the sender and recipient, the message, the transmission channel, and the delivering authority or service provider. Privacy, authentication, integrity, and non-repudiation are important concerns, governed by data protection laws and industry standards.

See also: messaging, postal service, courier, telecommunications, e-mail.