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Comment by thinkingtoilet | Hacker News Reader

I've stopped unsubscribing to emails I didn't sign up for and just send to spam. It hurts their "reputation" score and wastes their money (however small amount). I encourage people to stop unsubscribing and just send it to spam.

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I'm almost as severe. I look for an unsubscribe button in the email. I click it. If I am not immediately unsubscribed from everything, I mark the email as spam.

I won't do business with companies that spam me.

Here I am, already giving you money, and you want to spam me?! Even after I clicked unsubscribe?

The worst are the BS claims of "account status emails", which are just spam.

I moved my entire portfolio to another bank, filed a complaint, then filed complaints as I closed each account/card. The goal to have plenty of record as to why.

Screw that.

This is admirable and I agree in principle. Based on what I've seen, I'm surprised there are any companies you find suitable to do business online with. I would like to follow your path, but have been unable to without making significant compromises.

Ugh my student loans went to a new servicer who I swear to god is paid by the email sent to me. I get an email letting me know when the payment is coming out (hint: it's the same numeric day as last month, plus or minus a day to account for non-banking weekend days) and the amount (hint: it's the same amount it always is, because that's how payments work) and then I get an email from them after my payment completes and then I get an email from them every time someone changes a punctuation mark in the roughly 400 pages of horseshit that I signed when I was 18 years old to get an education, and of course the fucking MESSAGES.

"There's an important message in your inbox, please log in to check"

And then you go look and it's like "the white house wants to alleviate student debt, if you don't want your debt discharged fill out this form" And it's like...

a) who in their right mind wouldn't want that

b) there's no way in hell I'm getting my debt discharged, I make WAY too much fucking money

c) this is a matter of public policy and developing news, why the fuck was this sent as a secure message

This is what gets me. Are you going to take out another student loan, because of engagement? EG, spam, and their name on your mind.

Of course not!

Yet there's a marketing (eg, engagement) department thinking up this junk.

With respect to the first part of your comment, I'd much prefer overcommunication of financial transactions about to happen and acknowledgement that they did rather than the other way about. And some communication about changes in Ts&Cs is often required. Those often come by physical mail. A lot of people here probably prefer more notifications about things like credit card transactions. I don't personally but many do even if it means a lot more routine email.

This is all well and good, if it can be turned off if set.

People used to find out about financial transactions monthly with their bill in the mail. It's fine to have more info, but that doesn't mean it must be forced upon us.

And the transactions described are not really out of the blue financial transactions. The first message is about transactions that happen every. single. month. There's no need to say "we're going to do what you want us to do". That's silly. An agreement was already signed to that effect. The person knows it's going to happen. It's just 100% wasted, useless info.

And while I know you're responding to the 'first part' of the post, the communication I'm describing in my (GP) post, is about just random emails with no actual value.

> I won't do business with companies that spam me.

I just wouldn't be able to do business.

I get spam newsletters that I never signed up for from my alma mater, the GaTech ChE school. The tiny unsubscribe button 404s! Into the spam bucket it goes.

If I get more emails after unsubscribing I file a complaint with the FTC, then forward the response I get from the FTC to support@<spammer.com>. So far that has a 100% success rate.

I have different reasons for not doing it: unsubscribing usually requires opening a website riddled with tracking, thus running potentially dangerous code on your device. Secondly, it confirms that your address is active and that SPAM message was read. Unsubscribing from one garbage can result in being added on several other garbage spam lists.

Me too. I don't care if it's a "legit" business. Unsolicited bulk email is spam, period. If I wanted to receive junk mail, I would have signed up for that explicitly, which I most assuredly did not, no matter how many other products or services I might have purchased from that sender in the past.

Yes, I go a little further. If I get more emails than I consider acceptable (even if I signed up originally), I mark it as spam. call me mean, but this is my email address and if you're gonna send me endless spam emails which obviously no one actually wants, then you're spam.

Same - I've given up unsubscribing and sending it straight to spam. Especially if I never signed up for it in the first place.

If I did sign up for it, I do the polite thing and unsubscribe if they make it easy.

But yeah - spam is getting aggravating. I am getting spam text messages now....

I make extra-sure to do this to political fundraising.

It can also lead to emails that other people did want getting routed to their spam folder which they never look at.

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