6 ms·

Nylas Mail Basic does NOT store your mail data in the cloud. It still uses a cloud service for some features (like read receipts), but all the data is local on

by e0m 10y ago

Nylas Mail Basic does NOT store your mail data in the cloud. It still uses a cloud service for some features (like read receipts), but all the data is local on your disk and auth credentials stored in your native OS keychain. Nylas Pro currently syncs in the cloud to enable some of the pro features not currently offered in Nylas Mail Basic and to provide a much easier to use modern API wrapper around mail data. The cloud syncing infrastructure is open source and you can run it yourself and inspect the code. All editions (both Basic and Pro) need a Nylas ID. This lets us manage subscriptions for those who want to upgrade. The code is open source on GitHub (nylas/N1). You can fork & run yourself without a Nylas ID. You just won't get any cloud-enabled features. We never send mail, contact, or calendar data to 3rd parties. We do, however, use 3rd parties for basic usage and performance statistics and self-host as much reporting infrastructure (like Sentry) as possible. (I build Nylas Mail)

maglavaitss 10y ago
So we need a cloud service for "read receipts"? Interesting.
- timdorr 10y ago
  Since those are accomplished via a tracking pixel in the email and you need to serve that image from a public server, then yes, you'll need a cloud service to run that. As stated before, you can choose to run that server yourself if you don't trust Nylas with that kind of data.
  - frik 10y ago
    Neither MS Outlook nor GMail use a tracking pixel. Such pixel are only used by newsletter or shaddy spam senders.
    - davecap1 10y ago
      There are other mail clients that use tracking pixels, like Polymail and Canary.
      - thedaniel 10y ago
        The parent mentioned probably the two biggest mail clients in the world, and you mentioned 2 that I haven't heard of despite 20 years of sending email and toying around with new software.. I'm not sure it's an effective rebuttal.
    - treehau5 10y ago
      Tracking pixels are ubiquitous, and used in virtually almost every situation where you want to know if a person opened your email, which equates to virtually all ecommerce in my experience.
      - frik 10y ago
        As you said, in newsletter/spam business. But common mail apps don't do that - there is already a defacto standard for that. It's clear that Nylas business is around tracking and collecting data. It's like Win10, the user is the product and everything gets collected. Good that Outlook and other mail apps blocks third party pictures by default.
  - jcranmer 10y ago
    Or you could implement RFC 3798, an update of RFC 2298. It's not like these things haven't been standardized for almost 2 decades.
    - karim 10y ago
      Unfortunately, standardization != widespread use. Tracking pixels are still the most reliable way to know whether a recipient (or many) opened your message.
      - jcranmer 10y ago
        Unless your recipients use email clients that don't load remote http images except on demand. I can think of one email client with ~15 million users that does that.
        thatcat 10y ago
        Which client blocks remote images by default? Is it a cli or gui?
        deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
        JelteF 10y ago
        I think he meant Gmail
        mericsson 10y ago
        https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/gmail-now-has-more-than-1b-monthly-active-users/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/gmail-now-has-more-than-1b...
        carussell 10y ago
        More like http://quetzalcoatal.blogspot.com/search/label/mailnews http://quetzalcoatal.blogspot.com/search/label/mailnews
  - ascom 10y ago
    I haven't been able to find the tracking pixel server on GitHub.
  - hota_mazi 10y ago
    So this won't work with emails coming from Gmail (and probably other providers) since these services cache these images on their server as soon as they receive them (and not when recipients open them) precisely to defeat this kind of tracking. And of course, a lot of email clients only open such images on demand anyway.
    - iancarroll 10y ago
      I don't believe this is correct. Gmail will only request an image to proxy once you've opened the email, according to MailChimp, so this would only prevent tracking multiple opens. http://blog.mailchimp.com/how-gmails-image-caching-affects-open-tracking/ http://blog.mailchimp.com/how-gmails-image-caching-affects-o...
      - hota_mazi 10y ago
        It's actually hard to track down exactly when these images are cached. I don't really trust MailChimp to be truthful about this but I also can't find any specific from Google themselves about whether that caching happens when their SMTP receives the email or when the user actually opens the message. Since Google's goal with this was clearly to defeat tracking, I would strongly expect the former, but I can't back this up.
kuschku 10y ago
Do you still ship the open source engine with no authentication system at all? That was a massive problem last time I checked. Sure, you mentioned it, but many didn’t read that before setting it up.
yoasif_ 10y ago
I understand the desire to have a seamless flow from free to paid, but you can easily move this flow later in the app (a la progressive disclosure). You can even build this into the existing flow where users currently go to upgrade, by prompting the user to create a Nylas ID at that point (if they haven't already). There's a reason that e-commerce sites allow buyers to add items to a cart without sign up, and to "checkout as guest" instead of forcing users to sign up for a Staples (or whatever) login -- you get more conversions. Even if you prefer the approach of trying to get the information up front, adding a "skip" option that allows users to use the app without cloud sync, etc., then allowing a user to "go pro" later on at least allows people to try the app without a commitment. It's not possible to convert someone who isn't a user because they got scared away by the registration requirement -- better imo, to have a non-registered user, than no user at all. The only reason I could think of for not wanting to allow this is related to the third party data sharing -- perhaps you plan to sell (obfuscated) user data to data brokers. If that's not in the cards, and you do not plan to monetize your free tier (aside from up-selling to pro), I see no downside to allowing users to use the app without cloud sync in the free tier, with upgrades available within the app. Updating the privacy policy to be explicit about what data is used for ("basic usage and performance statistics") would do a lot to allay the idea that this data is being sold to data brokers (and not simply to make the app better).
- nopzor 10y ago
  It's a lot harder to monetize free->paid if you don't even know who your free users are. Requiring the creation of a Nylas ID for the free tier addresses this. Your ecommerce example doesn't fit the situation here; the ecommerce business wants the order $$ at the expense of the account, and their UX reflects that.
  - yoasif_ 10y ago
    I remember a few years back after I got my first decent Android phone looking at "top 10" lists of the best apps out there. One of those apps was Lumosity, and I installed it. The first step was setting up an account. I promptly uninstalled the app, and to this day, I have no idea whether it is any good. It felt odd to me that for a game with no multiplayer component would require me to sign up for an account, and I'm not interested in leaderboards or cloud based backup either. I have the same feeling about email clients, especially when Thunderbird exists and is mostly decent. Giving up an email account for a free "app" (and not a service) continues to feel odd to me. It almost feels wrong to call it "free", especially since it is unclear to me how my email is used.
ksec 10y ago
OK, You will Need to Point this out in BIG BOLD 16 Fonts somewhere. Because I have skim read through Nylas multiple times and wherever it said it requires Nylas Cloud i just bypass it right away, thinking I have to store all my Keys and Important Data in yet another third party Cloud.
lewisl9029 10y ago
Thank you for making the sync engine work client-side! It's a huge step towards making Nylas a viable choice for privacy sensitive folks like myself. The next step would be to make features like "read receipts" that necessitate signing into a cloud optional. Being able to use the app without having to sign into a cloud platform would be a much more valuable feature for me than any feature such a cloud platform could enable. Aside: as mentioned elsewhere in the thread, tracking pixel based read receipts in particular, is overwhelmingly only used in spam and newsletters and I personally consider it to be a liability rather than a feature.
- zeromantic 10y ago
  Privacy concerns are very valid. You do have the option, however, of disabling those features in preferences, so you never have to use them (or the cloud platform) if you don't want to. (I work at Nylas)

by e0m 10y ago

maglavaitss 10y ago

So we need a cloud service for "read receipts"? Interesting.

timdorr 10y ago
Since those are accomplished via a tracking pixel in the email and you need to serve that image from a public server, then yes, you'll need a cloud service to run that. As stated before, you can choose to run that server yourself if you don't trust Nylas with that kind of data.
- frik 10y ago
  Neither MS Outlook nor GMail use a tracking pixel. Such pixel are only used by newsletter or shaddy spam senders.
  - davecap1 10y ago
    There are other mail clients that use tracking pixels, like Polymail and Canary.
    - thedaniel 10y ago
      The parent mentioned probably the two biggest mail clients in the world, and you mentioned 2 that I haven't heard of despite 20 years of sending email and toying around with new software.. I'm not sure it's an effective rebuttal.
  - treehau5 10y ago
    Tracking pixels are ubiquitous, and used in virtually almost every situation where you want to know if a person opened your email, which equates to virtually all ecommerce in my experience.
    - frik 10y ago
      As you said, in newsletter/spam business. But common mail apps don't do that - there is already a defacto standard for that. It's clear that Nylas business is around tracking and collecting data. It's like Win10, the user is the product and everything gets collected. Good that Outlook and other mail apps blocks third party pictures by default.
- jcranmer 10y ago
  Or you could implement RFC 3798, an update of RFC 2298. It's not like these things haven't been standardized for almost 2 decades.
  - karim 10y ago
    Unfortunately, standardization != widespread use. Tracking pixels are still the most reliable way to know whether a recipient (or many) opened your message.
    - jcranmer 10y ago
      Unless your recipients use email clients that don't load remote http images except on demand. I can think of one email client with ~15 million users that does that.
      - thatcat 10y ago
        Which client blocks remote images by default? Is it a cli or gui?
        deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
        JelteF 10y ago
        I think he meant Gmail
        mericsson 10y ago
        https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/gmail-now-has-more-than-1b-monthly-active-users/ https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/gmail-now-has-more-than-1b...
        carussell 10y ago
        More like http://quetzalcoatal.blogspot.com/search/label/mailnews http://quetzalcoatal.blogspot.com/search/label/mailnews
- ascom 10y ago
  I haven't been able to find the tracking pixel server on GitHub.
- hota_mazi 10y ago
  So this won't work with emails coming from Gmail (and probably other providers) since these services cache these images on their server as soon as they receive them (and not when recipients open them) precisely to defeat this kind of tracking. And of course, a lot of email clients only open such images on demand anyway.
  - iancarroll 10y ago
    I don't believe this is correct. Gmail will only request an image to proxy once you've opened the email, according to MailChimp, so this would only prevent tracking multiple opens. http://blog.mailchimp.com/how-gmails-image-caching-affects-open-tracking/ http://blog.mailchimp.com/how-gmails-image-caching-affects-o...
    - hota_mazi 10y ago
      It's actually hard to track down exactly when these images are cached. I don't really trust MailChimp to be truthful about this but I also can't find any specific from Google themselves about whether that caching happens when their SMTP receives the email or when the user actually opens the message. Since Google's goal with this was clearly to defeat tracking, I would strongly expect the former, but I can't back this up.

kuschku 10y ago

Do you still ship the open source engine with no authentication system at all? That was a massive problem last time I checked. Sure, you mentioned it, but many didn’t read that before setting it up.

yoasif_ 10y ago

I understand the desire to have a seamless flow from free to paid, but you can easily move this flow later in the app (a la progressive disclosure). You can even build this into the existing flow where users currently go to upgrade, by prompting the user to create a Nylas ID at that point (if they haven't already). There's a reason that e-commerce sites allow buyers to add items to a cart without sign up, and to "checkout as guest" instead of forcing users to sign up for a Staples (or whatever) login -- you get more conversions. Even if you prefer the approach of trying to get the information up front, adding a "skip" option that allows users to use the app without cloud sync, etc., then allowing a user to "go pro" later on at least allows people to try the app without a commitment. It's not possible to convert someone who isn't a user because they got scared away by the registration requirement -- better imo, to have a non-registered user, than no user at all. The only reason I could think of for not wanting to allow this is related to the third party data sharing -- perhaps you plan to sell (obfuscated) user data to data brokers. If that's not in the cards, and you do not plan to monetize your free tier (aside from up-selling to pro), I see no downside to allowing users to use the app without cloud sync in the free tier, with upgrades available within the app. Updating the privacy policy to be explicit about what data is used for ("basic usage and performance statistics") would do a lot to allay the idea that this data is being sold to data brokers (and not simply to make the app better).

nopzor 10y ago
It's a lot harder to monetize free->paid if you don't even know who your free users are. Requiring the creation of a Nylas ID for the free tier addresses this. Your ecommerce example doesn't fit the situation here; the ecommerce business wants the order $$ at the expense of the account, and their UX reflects that.
- yoasif_ 10y ago
  I remember a few years back after I got my first decent Android phone looking at "top 10" lists of the best apps out there. One of those apps was Lumosity, and I installed it. The first step was setting up an account. I promptly uninstalled the app, and to this day, I have no idea whether it is any good. It felt odd to me that for a game with no multiplayer component would require me to sign up for an account, and I'm not interested in leaderboards or cloud based backup either. I have the same feeling about email clients, especially when Thunderbird exists and is mostly decent. Giving up an email account for a free "app" (and not a service) continues to feel odd to me. It almost feels wrong to call it "free", especially since it is unclear to me how my email is used.

ksec 10y ago

OK, You will Need to Point this out in BIG BOLD 16 Fonts somewhere. Because I have skim read through Nylas multiple times and wherever it said it requires Nylas Cloud i just bypass it right away, thinking I have to store all my Keys and Important Data in yet another third party Cloud.

lewisl9029 10y ago

Thank you for making the sync engine work client-side! It's a huge step towards making Nylas a viable choice for privacy sensitive folks like myself. The next step would be to make features like "read receipts" that necessitate signing into a cloud optional. Being able to use the app without having to sign into a cloud platform would be a much more valuable feature for me than any feature such a cloud platform could enable. Aside: as mentioned elsewhere in the thread, tracking pixel based read receipts in particular, is overwhelmingly only used in spam and newsletters and I personally consider it to be a liability rather than a feature.

zeromantic 10y ago
Privacy concerns are very valid. You do have the option, however, of disabling those features in preferences, so you never have to use them (or the cloud platform) if you don't want to. (I work at Nylas)