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This feature is great. See a grayscale scale image of the envelopes and packages being delivered to your house everyday.

• SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  What decision or choices do you make based on that new data stream? What is the advantage, because I really don’t get the idea. Edit: I see below; that theft awareness and not having to go check the mailbox are the features... ok, I guess. I have trouble believing that this applies to so many people they need to support a public facing service for it.
  • toomuchtodo 8y ago
    Whether I check or ignore the mail on that day. If I could pay the postal service to have a virtual address for me where all mail was opened and scanned, they'd have my business for life (I have to settle with a commercial provider for this service). I'm hopeful this product is a step in that direction.
    • SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
      You want the government to open and log your mail? You and I are surely very different people :)
      • toomuchtodo 8y ago
        The government can already open your non-first class mail without a warrant, and if its first class mail, I'm not convinced it'll be hard to get a warrant. The problem with commercial mail processors is that you can't forward mail out from them like you can with a PO box or other traditional address. So if you get an address from one of them, and then either change providers or they go out of business, you're SOL. That address is now a blackhole for your mail. Hence, why I want the USPS to sanction and operate the service.
        • dontbenebby 8y ago
          >The government can already open your non-first class mail without a warrant, and if its first class mail, I'm not convinced it'll be hard to get a warrant. But IIRC first class mail travels rather quickly. Now you need a warrant for the apartment/house because it was delivered before a warrant could be written. Much harder to get.
          • toomuchtodo 8y ago
            We could argue this all day. Let's not! I'm okay parting with some privacy and security for convenience to avoid losing paper mail, have it returned undeliverable, ease my management of receiving it, etc. It's not for everyone, but for my use cases, I desire it. Provide the service, and I'll be a customer for life. It only takes one lost paper bill or notice to make life painful for a bit.
            • nitrogen 8y ago
              Something like Earth Class Mail might be what you want?
              • toomuchtodo 8y ago
                I use a competitor of theirs, but am still holding out for USPS to provide the service natively.
            • dontbenebby 8y ago
              As long as the service is opt in, I don't have an issue. My problem is eroding constitutional protections for people who don't want to trade liberty for convenience.
              • toomuchtodo 8y ago
                I would never propose it not be opt in.
            • 8y ago
  • briffle 8y ago
    My parents live in a small subdivision in the country. they don't always walk to the end of their long driveway to check their mail. they do every few days. (or when they take the trash down, etc) They have had a rash of people going through mailboxes, looking for money, checks, and CC applications. twice now, the ONLY reason my parents found out their mail was stolen was a neighbor found a bunch of ripped open envelopes in a ditch down the road, with my parents (and many of their neighbors) mail in it. It may have happened more often, but they can't report stolen mail to the postmaster general if they don't know it was stolen. Having the ability to see what mail is coming will allow them to see if there are 'important' things coming, so they can either go get the mail that day, or know if its missing.
  • stetrain 8y ago
    It matters more when you don't have a personal mailbox at your residence and instead have to go to a shared mailbox center for your street / apartment complex. Also many people have P.O. boxes at a separate mail center location where going to check your mail means actually getting in a car and driving across town.
    • abruzzi 8y ago
      Where I live there is no home delivery of mail, so all my mail goes to a PO box, so this is a huge boon to me. The only problem is international mail doesn't show up in the system, so when I'm getting a package from Japan, New Zealand, or elsewhere, I get no notification, and have to revert to the tracking number.
  • sathomasga 8y ago
    Also, if your spouse/partner picks up the mail and then forgets to let you know something arrived for you, you'll have a reminder to ask
    • sct202 8y ago
      Yeah I did this the other day when I was looking for a letter I thought I had given my SO, but apparently didn't. It was pretty helpful to go thru which day certain letters arrived so I could look thru all the potential places I put it.
  • rootusrootus 8y ago
    I have to imagine that at some level this is just a step on a long path of modernization, and we are reaping the benefits with a little bit of convenience. As their technology improves, they will probably start offering some kind of virtualization like virtualpostmail. I've long wondered why the USPS hasn't yet leveraged their unique position in the mail system to do something like this. Certified electronic mail, etc.