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The USPS shut down Outbox for this same service. https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-launches-exactly-the-same-digital-service-it-killed

The USPS shut down Outbox for this same service. https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-launches-exactly-the-same-digital-service-it-killed-in-startup-outbox/#7ac9c6954622 https://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/12/08/usps-l... Still, though, I would really like this service. I travel quite a bit and I would hate to miss important pieces of mail.

ghaff 10y ago
I guess. I travel quite a bit as well. But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. I suppose I can construct scenarios where I'm waiting for something and want to see if I need to chase it down while I'm away for a couple weeks but that's sort of contrived. If they're storing them anyway, it probably makes sense that people should have access to stored information about them though.
- hueving 10y ago
  >But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. Any notice from government offices comes this way. And usually the important notices are ones that weren't expected. :(
  - ghaff 10y ago
    Fair enough. But if I'm traveling and see I received mail from the IRS or whoever, it's not like there's much I can do about it until I get home. (Yes, I can call someone and ask them to get my mail and tell me what it is but if it's something serious I probably don't want a random neighbor reading it anyway.)
    - paulsutter 10y ago
      If you got an IRS notice you could call the IRS
      - ghaff 10y ago
        I'm pretty sure it could wait until I got home. If it was that urgent I doubt if they'd have just sent it as a letter.
        james-skemp 10y ago
        Wait. I thought they do use the postal service and want the general public to 'ignore' callers who say they're from the IRS?
        ghaff 10y ago
        What I meant was that I might expect registered mail or something along those lines if something really needed to be dealt with right now. But maybe not. In any case, my basic point was just that there are very few things that show up in your mailbox unexpectedly that can't wait until you come back from a trip.
        hueving 10y ago
        >If it was that urgent I doubt if they'd have just sent it as a letter. This is the only way the IRS contacts you.
  - tyingq 10y ago
    Could be good way to dodge registered mail you have to sign for, but don't want to...If you knew the source. The picture of the envelope would give you more info on what it was, who sent it, etc, than the current green slips do.
chrischen 10y ago
Doesn't seem like the USPS shut them down. "Ultimately, management concluded that Outbox’s business model was flawed – a conclusion that the market appears to have affirmed."
- swamp40 10y ago
  postal management concluded...
- tyingq 10y ago
  There's direct quotes from Outbox that confirm your opinion, here: https://techcrunch.com/2014/01/21/outbox-shuts-down/ https://techcrunch.com/2014/01/21/outbox-shuts-down/ "After several months of testing and refining, we reasonably concluded that we were executing well and collecting good data—it told us that there wasn’t enough demand to support the cost model."
- gmisra 10y ago
  From https://www.wired.com/2013/08/outbox/ https://www.wired.com/2013/08/outbox/ "Part of the trick was that the service could automatically weed out junk mail, and when U.S. Postmaster General Pat Donahoe got wind of this, he wasn’t happy — at least according to Baehr." "Donahoe summoned Outbox to his office, and Baehr made his pitch, arguing that the company was just a few smart guys with $2 million in financing who wanted to spend the next few years learning about Donahoe’s customers and even sending him data about what these customers needed. Donahoe responded by saying that the customers of U.S. Postal Service were not the general public. Its customers, he said, were a few hundred bulk mailers."
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
ghaff 10y ago
Not the same service as Outbox though. The USPS is not opening the mail. It's just scanning the envelope. You know who has sent you something but not the contents.
- saurik 10y ago
  Other services scan the contents or your mail as well. Outbox was just really weird about the whole thing, particularly as it related to how they got the mail in the first place. For more information I recommend the analysis I gave back around when this was a story. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7667942 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7667942

ghaff 10y ago

I guess. I travel quite a bit as well. But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. I suppose I can construct scenarios where I'm waiting for something and want to see if I need to chase it down while I'm away for a couple weeks but that's sort of contrived. If they're storing them anyway, it probably makes sense that people should have access to stored information about them though.

hueving 10y ago
>But anything that's genuinely important probably isn't going to come unexpectedly through USPS. Any notice from government offices comes this way. And usually the important notices are ones that weren't expected. :(
- ghaff 10y ago
  Fair enough. But if I'm traveling and see I received mail from the IRS or whoever, it's not like there's much I can do about it until I get home. (Yes, I can call someone and ask them to get my mail and tell me what it is but if it's something serious I probably don't want a random neighbor reading it anyway.)
  - paulsutter 10y ago
    If you got an IRS notice you could call the IRS
    - ghaff 10y ago
      I'm pretty sure it could wait until I got home. If it was that urgent I doubt if they'd have just sent it as a letter.
      - james-skemp 10y ago
        Wait. I thought they do use the postal service and want the general public to 'ignore' callers who say they're from the IRS?
        ghaff 10y ago
        What I meant was that I might expect registered mail or something along those lines if something really needed to be dealt with right now. But maybe not. In any case, my basic point was just that there are very few things that show up in your mailbox unexpectedly that can't wait until you come back from a trip.
      - hueving 10y ago
        >If it was that urgent I doubt if they'd have just sent it as a letter. This is the only way the IRS contacts you.
- tyingq 10y ago
  Could be good way to dodge registered mail you have to sign for, but don't want to...If you knew the source. The picture of the envelope would give you more info on what it was, who sent it, etc, than the current green slips do.

chrischen 10y ago

Doesn't seem like the USPS shut them down. "Ultimately, management concluded that Outbox’s business model was flawed – a conclusion that the market appears to have affirmed."

swamp40 10y ago
postal management concluded...
tyingq 10y ago
There's direct quotes from Outbox that confirm your opinion, here: https://techcrunch.com/2014/01/21/outbox-shuts-down/ https://techcrunch.com/2014/01/21/outbox-shuts-down/ "After several months of testing and refining, we reasonably concluded that we were executing well and collecting good data—it told us that there wasn’t enough demand to support the cost model."
gmisra 10y ago
From https://www.wired.com/2013/08/outbox/ https://www.wired.com/2013/08/outbox/ "Part of the trick was that the service could automatically weed out junk mail, and when U.S. Postmaster General Pat Donahoe got wind of this, he wasn’t happy — at least according to Baehr." "Donahoe summoned Outbox to his office, and Baehr made his pitch, arguing that the company was just a few smart guys with $2 million in financing who wanted to spend the next few years learning about Donahoe’s customers and even sending him data about what these customers needed. Donahoe responded by saying that the customers of U.S. Postal Service were not the general public. Its customers, he said, were a few hundred bulk mailers."
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

ghaff 10y ago

Not the same service as Outbox though. The USPS is not opening the mail. It's just scanning the envelope. You know who has sent you something but not the contents.

saurik 10y ago
Other services scan the contents or your mail as well. Outbox was just really weird about the whole thing, particularly as it related to how they got the mail in the first place. For more information I recommend the analysis I gave back around when this was a story. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7667942 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7667942