Sending emails with HTML or not?

Question

I am developing an application which will send 1000's of emails and I'm debating on whether or not to send html in the email. I have two questions:
1. Do most email clients support html? Most of the recipients of the emails will be AOL, hotmail/msn, or yahoo clients. Are there any stats on how many people are running clients that don't support html?
2. The emails I send require an embedded image. Can I send an email with an image and it not be a html email? If so, how? A multipart email? If anybody has an example that would be great!
I'd prefer to not use HTML if possible.
Thanks,
JEB

Answer 1

Here is a simplified version of the code. I've left out simple variable declarations, methods, and try-catch blocks but they are obivious...
        // AQUIRE THE JAVAMAIL SESSION OBJECT
        Properties props = new Properties();
        props.put("mail.smtp.host", smtpHost);
        Session session = Session.getInstance(props, null);
        // PREPARE THE MULTIPART MESSAGE
        Message message = new MimeMessage(session);
        message.setFrom(new InternetAddress(from, personal));
        if (bcc != null)
            message.setRecipient(Message.RecipientType.BCC, new InternetAddress(bcc));
        message.setSubject(subject);
        MimeMultipart multipart = new MimeMultipart("alternative");
        BodyPart bodyPartText = new MimeBodyPart();
        BodyPart bodyPartHtml = new MimeBodyPart();
        BodyPart bodyPartImage = new MimeBodyPart();
        bodyPartImage.setDisposition(Part.INLINE);
        FileDataSource fds = new FileDataSource(photo);
        bodyPartImage.setFileName(fds.getName());
        bodyPartImage.setDataHandler(new DataHandler(fds));
        bodyPartImage.setHeader("Content-ID", "23abc@pc27");
        message.setRecipient(Message.RecipientType.TO, new InternetAddress(to));
        // THESE METHODS JUST RETURN TEXT OR HTML, RESPECTIVELY
        String htmlContent = createHtmlContent();
        String textContent = createTextContent();
        // SEND A HTML AND TEXT ALTERNATIVE EMAIL FOR THOSE WHO DON'T SUPPORT HTML
        bodyPartText.setContent(textContent, "text/plain");
        bodyPartHtml.setContent(htmlContent, "text/html");
        multipart.addBodyPart(bodyPartHtml ,0);
        multipart.addBodyPart(bodyPartImage, 1);
        multipart.addBodyPart(bodyPartText, 2);
        message.setContent(multipart);
        // SEND THE MAIL MESSAGE
        Transport.send(message);Hope this helps,
JEB