Taking Minutes of Meetings

Why are these people smiling? They've just completed my three-hour class called Taking Minutes of Meetings. They shared experiences of recording minutes in all types of meetings.
They learned
How to write and use an agenda
How to deal tactfully with unreasonable demands
What to write down and what to ignore
How to partner with the meeting's chair for excellent results
How to format, check, amend, and file minutes

They saw a movie of a formal meeting and followed the minutes as they watched.

Respectfully submitted,
Rosemary Camilleri

Hi, Bob,

When I write an e-mail that is not a response, I begin my message with a salutation. Often that salutation is Hi plus the name of my addressee: Hi, Bob or Hi, Friends. But few writers today use the comma after Hi, even though that comma is grammatically correct.

Grammar books tell us that when we use someone's name or a group name in direct address, we should place commas around it:

Hi, Jim, how are you?
Good evening, Madam.
But, Bob, you never told me about your brother.

I am tempted to stop using the comma in salutations, just because so many people suspect that it is an error. (For the same reason, I have stopped using i.e. and replaced it with that is. So many people think erroneously that i.e. means for example.)

What do you think about commas in e-mail salutations?