A lot of people think that their special snowflake of a spam is the one that users actually want to see. These people deserve to be tasered in the mouth repeatedly, but sadly that hasn't happened yet.
If you don't want to receive these emails, then unsubscribe - or, better yet, don't subscribe in the first place.
This new feature seems excruciatingly pointless anyway. I want all of my emails to arrive into my inbox, with the exception of actual unsolicited spam. If I need to filter them, I can do it myself - I suppose the feature may be useful for Gmail users who aren't comfortable doing this. At least I can disable the new inbox or continue using IMAP for now.
Personally, I consider any promotional mail that was not double-opted-in (that is I had to take some affirmative action to receive a confirmation link, and then I confirmed it) to be spam. I also consider any promotional materials stapled to transactional mail to be spam. I know I am not unique in this opinion.
Citation needed. Mail Chimp strongly recommends double-opt in, I think it's the default. I very much doubt its "almost always" single opt-in.
Now they're not being shoved in my face, not obscuring personal email (which used to be a problem with the old single inbox: I'd miss email from my mom amongst a bunch of random low-value emails), and not sending me annoying alerts on my phone. I don't have to skip past reams of "promotions" when I want to open that email from a friend I got a few days ago. I don't think I see, or open, or "open" promotional email any more or less often than before, but now that it's more on my terms, my mood when I do so is better.
For companies that use promotional email in an honest and straight-forward manner, I suspect the net result of this change may be positive... it's not just about "opens", it's also about the impression your email makes and how that effects peoples' attitude towards your company/service.
* require an email address to create an account to use their service
* without stating this, automatically assume that they now have permission to send you whatever email they want - admin emails, special offers, partner promotions etc
* assume that because they provide an unsubscribe link, those emails are automatically not spam.
It's those sites which I'm really glad Gmail automatically filters them out. Providing an email address because that's a requirement to have an account is not the same thing as giving approval to receive all your marketing and promotion spam.
No, but it's VASTLY more likely not to be (if the unsubscribe link is real and working).
> There are countless sites whose default behaviour goes like this:
> * require an email address to create an account to use their service
> * without stating this, automatically assume that they now have permission to send you whatever email they want - admin emails, special offers, partner promotions etc > * assume that because they provide an unsubscribe link, those emails are automatically not spam. > It's those sites which I'm really glad Gmail automatically filters them out. Providing an email address because that's a requirement to have an account is not the same thing as giving approval to receive all your marketing and promotion spam.
Well, if it's in their TOS (and on most the sites it probably is), then it probably is okay, and you have nobody to blame but yourself (as do we all). The current state isn't optimal, but it's what the public wanted. The race to low cost/free services subsidized by advertising has led to this.
If you really want to not be contacted for a promotion from a company, put your money where your mouth is and choose services where their business plan doesn't require pestering you to use them more.
edited to lighten the accusatory stance of "blame", as it didn't convey my real intent accurately
Similarly, attaching promotional materials to my receipts and other transactional mail is an abuse of the relationship.
Email is a means of personal communication. I trust that when I give out my email, it will only be used for the promised purposes - such as giving me order receipts, or establishing an account. Giving out this email for one purpose is not implicit permission to use it for another purpose.
Previous time I made a similar point on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5705769
If you gave them your e-mail address obviously for another purpose (for example, as an account ID, or to receive a confirmation message when your order is dispatched or your card is charged) and they then use it for general marketing then that's so clearly an abuse of trust that IMHO they deserve and should expect to be treated as a spammer.
As far as what the law says, here in Europe, you might get away with sending marketing to such addresses under PECR if you still collected the address at the time of a sale or in connection with a genuine sales enquiry. However, it's a fine line, and one mis-step in any of several conditions will put you the wrong side of the law. Also, the preceding comments relate to the specific EU anti-spamming regulations, but there are more general laws regarding harassment etc. in most jurisdictions as well.
There's a pretty simple test for your situation, really: if you want to send people marketing messages but aren't willing to ask their permission explicitly because you think they'll say no, your messages are probably spam and you're probably a spammer.
This isn't a conversation about "SPAM", it's a conversation about companies managing customer contact responsibly, and customers responding responsibly to the contact, which in some cases means not overreacting.
> There's a pretty simple test for your situation, really: if you want to send people marketing messages but aren't willing to ask their permission explicitly because you think they'll say no, your messages are probably spam and you're probably a spammer.
But that's begging the question, since you already put the reasoning in place. What if it's as simple as testing shows that customers will overwhelmingly opt-out initially, but then there's a steady influx of evidence that customers would benefit from some level of contact (i.e. support requests that say as much, forum posts, etc), such as noting when a previously charged for service is now free, when service outages are scheduled to happen, etc.
In the end, is it really so hard to see how a company acts in it's correspondence before vilifying it?
Sure it is, but some things are the wrong side of that line for most users. That's why there are laws against them.
Does that mean everyone needs to deal with no email communication by default just because a few people feel it's too hard to find a (legally required) opt-out link in the first email they receive?
As I said, if you're worried enough that you aren't willing to ask people to opt in instead, you're probably a spammer.
"Dealing with no email communication by default" is not what we're talking about. No-one here is saying you shouldn't send e-mails for the purpose that someone actually gave you their address, for example.
If you actually meant "dealing with no marketing email communication by default" then I'm pretty sure most people would "deal with" that just fine. When was the last time you heard someone complain that they didn't get spammed enough today, or their browsing experience was suffering from not having enough ads cluttering the pages they wanted to read?
This isn't a conversation about "SPAM"
I'm pretty sure it is. It's right there in the quote from the article in the first post of this thread, and in numerous further posts between there and here.
But that's begging the question
No, it wasn't. If I'd written "If you want to send people marketing messages that they don't want, you're a spammer", that would indeed have been a tautology. But I left you another option, finding out whether they want them or not by asking first.
In the end, is it really so hard to see how a company acts in it's correspondence before vilifying it?
No, but that's not what we're talking about. We're talking about a company that specialises in sending bulk e-mail discussing the possibility of actively circumventing measures intended to stop users having to read marketing mails they don't want. Again, it's right there in the quotation at the top of this thread.
(Your other examples weren't unreasonable, but they also clearly weren't marketing mail assuming they related to people actually using the service you were sending the information about.)
Make each bit opt-in. Problem solved. These emails really should be off by default.
Why should I have to? Promotional mail is not like banner ads that a site may be depending on for most of its revenue (and many people are comfortable filtering those out despite that); it's just an annoying extra, which can always be opted out of with a few clicks anyway. But if I don't want to do that for whatever reason - perhaps I do want to receive the mail but not clutter up my regular inbox with it, perhaps I'm just lazy - as a user, I am perfectly within my rights to automatically classify it into its own section.
Of course you are. That was meant as a call to arms. If people want less commercial email, supporting businesses that make that a priority is the first step.
Complaining publicly about unwanted behavior in commercial companies and then continuing to use the services of those companies when alternatives exist (which they may not always) is hypocritical. OTOH, complaining to the companies about those practices is beneficial.
You usually only find out they are spammers after you sign up though? At which point, even if I leave the service, I still have to deal with the spam.
In short, stop using SPAM to mean "unwanted promotional email from a company I signed up with and have or have had in the recent past a business relationship with." They aren't the same thing, and don't deserve the same response.
It doesn't matter if I have a business relationship with the company. A 'business relationship' is what keeps them from violating the laws related to spam, but it's still spam.
Only when I purposefully and explicitly tell a company to put me on a mailing list is it not spam. If I'm making an account for other purposes it's not the same thing. If I make a purchase it's definitely not the same thing.
The CAN-SPAM Act defines commercial messages as those
that primarily advertise or promote a commercial product or
service. The FCC’s ban does not cover “transactional or
relationship” messages -- that is, notices to facilitate a
transaction you have already agreed to -- for example,
messages that provide information about your existing
account or warranty information about a product you’ve
purchased.
If you don't want that, opt out.
If you don't like how they handled the email process, complain to the company.
If you still don't like it, stop using the service.
Anything else just means that they have no way of notifying you about anything unless you visit their site. In some cases, I sure as hell want to know if they are offering free services or other promotions. In others, I opt out.
>If you have an account with them, and it's informational, even if it's just about a new service you can take advantage on that account you already have, they can contact you about it.
They can but they shouldn't unless I asked.
> If you don't want that, opt out.
If it's opt-out then the company loses a lot of points.
> If you don't like how they handled the email process, complain to the company.
Even better, I can warn potential customers about the way the company acts.
> If you still don't like it, stop using the service.
See above.
> Anything else just means that they have no way of notifying you about anything unless you visit their site. In some cases, I sure as hell want to know if they are offering free services or other promotions. In others, I opt out.
They can notify me all they want about the actual transactions I am performing with them, monetary or other. But when it comes to solicitation they should have a very explicit opt-in process.
The truth is I think we are probably that far apart in what we believe is acceptable. I think that having all communications not specifically pertaining to an actual transaction on an existing account be opt-in explicitly is unworkable, but only slightly. I think it's great in theory, but that it breaks down in the face of reality and what people find they really want and find acceptable.
Really my point here is to fight back against people re-labeling "unwanted commercial emails from companies I do business with" as spam, as unwanted is not the same as unsolicited.
I've fought the real battle here; I was an admin at an ISP and maintained mail servers, dealt with spam filters, deployed new spam solutions, and had to deal with the constant misuse of the system to send spam through compromised accounts. Having people use the label of spam just to pull along the emotional reaction of the reader really seems to get me worked up.
Just because its hidden in the fine print instead of explicitly disclosed at the point of collecting the email address does not make it "okay."
It might make it legal but that's not at all the same thing - a defense that falls back on legality means they have an adversarial relationship with that customer which generally means they've lost any future business from them. That's the last place a smart company wants their customer relationship to end up.
It's certainly not OK. Why not just have pop-ups all over your page, like the more old-school "advertising-based" websites did?
Somehow everyone decided that even though companies were being annoying they would put up with it to get the service, and here we are.
My point is that complaining publicly while not changing your behavior is pointless. If enough people actually DID choose a social network that wasn't as aggressive in it's emails, not only would there then be more people on those networks, but the others would change as well.
> It's certainly not OK. Why not just have pop-ups all over your page, like the more old-school "advertising-based" websites did?
And what happened with that? People took action, and either avoided those sites or used blockers so they were ineffective. If it still worked we would see more of it.
Tracking image loads and clicks would be a much more effective method of determining that an address is valid for both legitimate mass emails and spam.
How many people do you think load images versus click Report Spam on an ISP with a feedback loop? And which group do you think would be a better target for future messages?
There are laws regulating e-mail solicitations. People can be sued for SPAM, and incur criminal charges. Basically, if any mail provider notices that lots of its users complain about SPAM, they have legal standing to bring that person before a judge. Sending out a warning of possible legal repercussions is the first step.
Presumably, the spammer is contacted via e-mail with a strongly worded message, since it's very clear that they have the ability to interact via e-mail.
In theory, you as an individual, could run your own mail server, and if you received spam, you could threaten to sue or press charges. At some point before you actually do that though, you'd probably try to contact the person first. When cmwelsh uses the word "ping", that's just a euphemism for making contact, and not a specific technical term of any kind.
Among the consumer-grade ESPs, Mailchimp has a reputation for being extremely strict about anti-spam enforcement.
I can easily figure out who's spamming me, and who's sold my email address to others (or, perhaps, has been compromised and my passwords should be changed -- or the existence of the account rethought).
Anything gmail can do to keep all manner of commercial solicitations out of my inbox is welcomed. I actually disabled the visibility of the "promotions/spam" tab, but kept the filter, and will happily never have to look at that crap again.
My Gmail spambox already contains 40-50% legitimate emails that I have to rescue manually, so I already know I can't rely on Google filtering things properly...
I don't think I've had the same issue with MailChimp, but if I do, I'll do the same with them.
Unfortunately not all companies are as virtuous as MailChimp. What I've found is that despite unsubscribing various things happen like the unsubscribe link takes you to a 404 or 500 or the company doesn't actually unsubscribe you.
Why does it take "up to a week" for some companies to unsubscribe you anyway? Are the batch processes that long for something like unsubscribing? There should be some kind of global business rule that suppresses emails to non-subscribers instantly.
If I had been more diligent about setting up folders and email filters, of course, I would've filed these kinds of mails into their own folder already, like I already do with mailing lists. But they crop up often enough (every time you do business with a new company) that it's tedious to keep up. So I like that Google is helping me out in helping to auto-sort them.
It's the same with the Updates tab. I get that Facebook and Twitter are really noisy. But I want the updates I'm currently getting to go in my inbox. That's why I haven't unsubscribed from them.
It's all filters I could have set up myself, but the default filtering pretty closely aligns with my preferences, so for me at least it's working. And so far, Google has actually never moved out of my Inbox any email where I've opted in to receive the email. The only things getting filtered are things I never asked for.
Most of the time when checking email, I only want to know if something urgent and personal has come up. I can read the mailing lists and newsletters once a week when bored.