Can you private message peeps on Hacker News? | Hacker News Reader

Can you private message peeps on Hacker News?

14 pointstrixjo23 comments

No, IIRC pg asked once and some people said they didn't want yet another messaging system to check.

Personally I think it would be great because a) not everybody remembers to leave contact information and b) you get the instant context and can forgo the "hey, I'm not a stalker but I thought you wrote something interesting on HN"

I agree totally. +1

Having my news.yc and reddit lives linked to email would be chaos. The additional messaging system to check would be more convenient -- not inconvenient.

not everybody remembers to leave contact information

This is really a usability issue. It might be more effective to make it clear what is and isn't private than to build an internal messaging system.

Those who want to be contacted should probably just leave their email address or preferred method of contact. It takes just as much effort to use an email client as does using a messaging system; the only difference is one would be checked on a regular basis, the other, not so much. Plus, as mentioned, people don't want yet another inbox to check. For those who don't drop a link to their homepage or list their email address, I just assume they're not interested in communication.

You can make the inverse argument that people not interested in a messaging system could just not use it while giving those who want it the context + convenience of a native message box.

True. The option to turn it off would be very nice, if not essential for a lot of people. But I am just pointing out the fact that I have missed opportunities because of messaging systems on other sites. I would have responded almost immediately had the same message came to me in the form of email. Its the result of me forgetting to check 20 different messaging systems I have on various forums/communities - there are just so many to check, and I can't check them all each day and thus some get ignored. I guess to each there own, but on another note maybe someone wants to solve this "checking in on message systems of online communities" problem. Could be the disqus.com of messaging systems.

I would add my email address to my profile if there was some way to build in spam protection such as re-Captcha's mail hide tool:

http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/

My primary email address and several secondary addresses are public in easy to find spots on the web, including my HN profile. All these addresses use gmail and I am not having a problem with spam.

reCAPTCHA's mailhide can generate a URL that the user can visit to obtain your email address. Perhaps you can post that URL in your profile. It's long and ugly though.

I would really like it, especially if it defaulted to "off", and you could set certain account age, karma, or karma-per-last-timeperiod thresholds for people to contact you. Even if messages just got forwarded on to email vs. a mailbox on the site.

The road to BBcode and smileys is paved with site-specific messaging and karmic business rules engines.

Just add an email address to your profile, like everyone else who is interested in meeting new people.

Something like this would be really nice, even if it's just something like how Wikipedia does it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:EmailUser/Jimbo_Wales (You'll need an account to visit that page.)

It sends an email on behalf of the user, and the recipient can reply back to the user via email (the sender's email address appears in the From: field.)

It works pretty well there, and there could be a karma threshold and a setting to disable it here on HN if it were to be implemented.

No need for a private message area.

But it would be nice if yc would email people on your behalf. Most people do not think of adding their email address to the profile area.

Ya this might be a nice opt in option. It preserves privacy and keeps people from having to handle yet another messaging system too. My email happens to be a google talk handle. So that occasionally leads to contact.

So, how would YC magically come up with that email address to use if you didn't put one in your profile ?

I think he means the "About" section, which is publicly viewable as opposed to the "Email" field, which only the admins can see.

Yes.

Put your contact info in your profile, check the profiles of people you want to talk to, and get on with your life. =)

YC peeps can message each other, not open to everyone.

I don't think so. Some people put emails or websites in their profile.

I would personally not like to see this. Let's not.

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