[shutter]

No, you can win e-mail tetris without cheating.

You must decide for yourself which action your e-mails require: Trash, Defer, or Action. GTD gets this right.

If you don't make those decisions as e-mail enters your box, you're effectively saying (while playing tetris) "I'm going to ignore all of the L-shaped blocks and deal with the wreckage they leave behind later." Yeah, you'll lose. You have to make a decision on _every_ piece that drops into your inbox.

Filters can do wonders, if you really do have a huge influx of mail. You don't have to read and respond to every message unless you really want to.