3 ms·

I wish google now could discern between myself and other 'john' + 'smith''s. I get one johns son's report cards, another john is a hockey coach and they travel

I wish google now could discern between myself and other 'john' + 'smith''s. I get one johns son's report cards, another john is a hockey coach and they travel a lot so my google now is littered with his stuff. Another john is a realtor so I get a lot of his stuff... another john is in a band and places a bass. I shouldn't of registered my real name as my email address on gmail - whilst I was lucky I get so much more iterated in the amount of real mail that was meant for someone else... and since systems like google now and the like use that information my entire experience is ruined.

hammock 9y ago
"I wish Google could track me more perfectly"
syntheticnature 9y ago
With Google Now's design, as soon as emails for other folks are splashing into yours it's game over. I'd have been hyper-aggressive about blocking/fixing all such, and probably still would've given up, given a past experience trying to help a friend with a common first initial-last name combo, and he had a number after that part of the username!
- dguaraglia 9y ago
  Is that a real problem? I guess I have a unique-enough name (but, surprisingly, not completely unique as it turns out there's another guy with exactly the same name in San Francisco) that it's never been a thing for me.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - syntheticnature 9y ago
    The real problem seems to arise not from name confusion, but email confusion; I don't even think the person my friend was having the biggest problem had the same first name, just the same initial. Imagine if, for example, your email was duaraglia57@gmail and there was someone who had duaraglia57@yahoo but kept typing gmail accidentally, and you get the picture. Far too many sites fail to validate a correct email address in all aspects.
    - dguaraglia 9y ago
      Right, that'd make sense. I would imagine once you get a few emails that weren't intended for you, the Google Now map of interests gets all borked. If the problem is common enough, I'm sure the Google Now people would love to know.
  - kraig911 9y ago
    Very real. Problem. We all have very similar email address mrjohnsmith, johnsmith1981, itsjohnsmith people are sending them emails to the right address I'm just getting their messages...
Chaebixi 9y ago
> I wish google now could discern between myself and other 'john' + 'smith''s. I get one johns son's report cards... > I shouldn't of registered my real name as my email address on gmail... Is that Google's problem, or the problem of the people sending you mail? I don't think you can really fault Google for letting people mistakenly send email to your valid address. I managed to grab the first initial + lastname gmail address for my fairly uncommon name. I regularly get a small amount of mail indented for other people, but it's clear it's all the result of typos or other mistakes.
- bigbugbag 9y ago
  Well when I had a gmail address, I received the emails sent to someone else with a different email address for some reasons. I told the person and notified google, this continued for a few years until I left gmail.

hammock 9y ago

"I wish Google could track me more perfectly"

syntheticnature 9y ago

With Google Now's design, as soon as emails for other folks are splashing into yours it's game over. I'd have been hyper-aggressive about blocking/fixing all such, and probably still would've given up, given a past experience trying to help a friend with a common first initial-last name combo, and he had a number after that part of the username!

dguaraglia 9y ago
Is that a real problem? I guess I have a unique-enough name (but, surprisingly, not completely unique as it turns out there's another guy with exactly the same name in San Francisco) that it's never been a thing for me.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- syntheticnature 9y ago
  The real problem seems to arise not from name confusion, but email confusion; I don't even think the person my friend was having the biggest problem had the same first name, just the same initial. Imagine if, for example, your email was duaraglia57@gmail and there was someone who had duaraglia57@yahoo but kept typing gmail accidentally, and you get the picture. Far too many sites fail to validate a correct email address in all aspects.
  - dguaraglia 9y ago
    Right, that'd make sense. I would imagine once you get a few emails that weren't intended for you, the Google Now map of interests gets all borked. If the problem is common enough, I'm sure the Google Now people would love to know.
- kraig911 9y ago
  Very real. Problem. We all have very similar email address mrjohnsmith, johnsmith1981, itsjohnsmith people are sending them emails to the right address I'm just getting their messages...

Chaebixi 9y ago

> I wish google now could discern between myself and other 'john' + 'smith''s. I get one johns son's report cards... > I shouldn't of registered my real name as my email address on gmail... Is that Google's problem, or the problem of the people sending you mail? I don't think you can really fault Google for letting people mistakenly send email to your valid address. I managed to grab the first initial + lastname gmail address for my fairly uncommon name. I regularly get a small amount of mail indented for other people, but it's clear it's all the result of typos or other mistakes.

bigbugbag 9y ago
Well when I had a gmail address, I received the emails sent to someone else with a different email address for some reasons. I told the person and notified google, this continued for a few years until I left gmail.