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Why would you want to track whether an email is read? That's creepy and obnoxious. Part of the social contract with mail is that it shouldn't matter if you have

Why would you want to track whether an email is read? That's creepy and obnoxious. Part of the social contract with mail is that it shouldn't matter if you haven't read it yet or if you read it and decide to answer later. Mail is an asyncronous medium and you should respect that and not micromanage your customers IMHO.

GhostVII 6y ago
Because if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam (even if they signed up for the emails in the first place), and then you will start getting blocked as spam by Gmail. Also it's generally useful to know if a particular email is read so you can test out different formats and whatnot.
- forgetfulness 6y ago
  > Because if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam (even if they signed up for the emails in the first place), and then you will start getting blocked as spam by Gmail. Probably because those email newsletters are spam sent to people who interacted with a form once.
- inetknght 6y ago
  > if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam That's because you're spamming them. > even if they signed up for the emails in the first place Users can change their mind. Clicking anything in an email leads to susceptibility of phishing. So they shouldn't need to click an unsubscribe link to do so. Reporting you for spam is the safest option from their perspective. And I would argue that most users didn't sign up for the emails. They were conned into giving their email and usually for a completely different purpose. > Also it's generally useful to know if a particular email is read so you can test out different formats and whatnot. That's a very dubious assertion. Formats are in the content of the email. Different formats won't tell you why one email was opened while another was not.
  - GhostVII 6y ago
    That's a very dubious assertion. Formats are in the content of the email. Different formats won't tell you why one email was opened while another was not. Formats can include different titles and descriptions, which can make a huge difference in how often users open your emails. Also just different kinds of emails you might want to send (maybe you send some users an email with a coupon, and some with a new product notification). Maybe you don't see the value in having people know whether you read their email, which is fine, but there are clearly tonnes of legitimate use cases for having that kind of information. If I know a segment of users on my email list never open a particular type of email, it is better to just not send them that kind of email, both for the sender and recipient. Regardless, I think Gmail killed tracking pixels by loading images through their servers anyways.
    - TheCoelacanth 6y ago
      There are legitimate uses for knowing if someone read their email. Those use cases are the ones where the user consents to you knowing it and are covered by read receipts. Google did not kill tracking personalized tracking pixels. All they blocked is the ability to determine the user's IP because you will get a connection from Google's proxy instead of directly from the user.
      - inetknght 6y ago
        > There are legitimate uses for knowing if someone read their email. Those use cases are generally few and far between. They are the exception.
- kenny11 6y ago
  But the problem with relying on tracking pixels to flag whether a message is read is that not everyone loads them. I've had my mail clients (and Gmail) set for years to not load external images, and occasionally get "we notice you haven't been reading our messages so we're going to stop sending them to you" emails from mailing lists that I do actually read.
qwerty456127 6y ago
> Why would you want to track whether an email is read? That's creepy and obnoxious. Indeed it is! Yet messengers like WhatsApp and Telegram always mark the messages that have been read. And I really hate this. Given the fact the actual messengers still are pretty good and very useful, I would pay them a premium if they could hide when have I been online and what messages have I read.
- Tomte 6y ago
  There is an option in WhatsApp to do exactly that.
- Spivak 6y ago
  I think most other messengers, iMessage, FB Messenger get this right that you can disable read receipts but then you won't get to see other people's either. I really really enjoy having them. They make me feel less anxious about messages.
  - IgorPartola 6y ago
    I love when others have this feature turned on, and I'll never turn it on for myself :)
    - Spivak 6y ago
      But that's the point of having two-party consent. If either of you turns them off then neither of you see them.
      - IgorPartola 6y ago
        iMessage has them as one-sided, I believe.
  - Denvercoder9 6y ago
    WhatsApp also has that option.
- 6y ago
Spivak 6y ago
I mean I think you know the answer to this question. Because these emails aren't "communication" but marketing campaigns that companies want to track the effectiveness of. Your inbox is nothing to these companies but another vector to put their brand in front of your eyeballs.
legohead 6y ago
Think in terms of a mailing list for a business, like a newsletter. It costs money to send out emails. If 50% of your users aren't reading them, you can trim the list of those who don't open the email.
- nullserver 6y ago
  The direct cost is near zero. Staying on the good side of spam blockers is a much bigger deal.
  - legohead 6y ago
    Cost depends on the setup. Not everyone is taking the most cost effective approach. Spam reduction is definitely a big consideration. However at the last place I worked we would get notifications when people marked the emails as spam, and so we could specifically remove those people from the email list. I don't even know how that part is done - we used one of the big emailer/newsletter websites.
- Nextgrid 6y ago
  If you're asking yourself whether someone would read an email it's probably time to reconsider sending that email in the first place?
alisonkisk 6y ago
When done properly (as the article describes), it's a courtesy feature under the control of the recipient.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

GhostVII 6y ago

Because if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam (even if they signed up for the emails in the first place), and then you will start getting blocked as spam by Gmail. Also it's generally useful to know if a particular email is read so you can test out different formats and whatnot.

forgetfulness 6y ago
> Because if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam (even if they signed up for the emails in the first place), and then you will start getting blocked as spam by Gmail. Probably because those email newsletters are spam sent to people who interacted with a form once.
inetknght 6y ago
> if you send emails to people who don't read them, eventually they will flag you as spam That's because you're spamming them. > even if they signed up for the emails in the first place Users can change their mind. Clicking anything in an email leads to susceptibility of phishing. So they shouldn't need to click an unsubscribe link to do so. Reporting you for spam is the safest option from their perspective. And I would argue that most users didn't sign up for the emails. They were conned into giving their email and usually for a completely different purpose. > Also it's generally useful to know if a particular email is read so you can test out different formats and whatnot. That's a very dubious assertion. Formats are in the content of the email. Different formats won't tell you why one email was opened while another was not.
- GhostVII 6y ago
  That's a very dubious assertion. Formats are in the content of the email. Different formats won't tell you why one email was opened while another was not. Formats can include different titles and descriptions, which can make a huge difference in how often users open your emails. Also just different kinds of emails you might want to send (maybe you send some users an email with a coupon, and some with a new product notification). Maybe you don't see the value in having people know whether you read their email, which is fine, but there are clearly tonnes of legitimate use cases for having that kind of information. If I know a segment of users on my email list never open a particular type of email, it is better to just not send them that kind of email, both for the sender and recipient. Regardless, I think Gmail killed tracking pixels by loading images through their servers anyways.
  - TheCoelacanth 6y ago
    There are legitimate uses for knowing if someone read their email. Those use cases are the ones where the user consents to you knowing it and are covered by read receipts. Google did not kill tracking personalized tracking pixels. All they blocked is the ability to determine the user's IP because you will get a connection from Google's proxy instead of directly from the user.
    - inetknght 6y ago
      > There are legitimate uses for knowing if someone read their email. Those use cases are generally few and far between. They are the exception.
kenny11 6y ago
But the problem with relying on tracking pixels to flag whether a message is read is that not everyone loads them. I've had my mail clients (and Gmail) set for years to not load external images, and occasionally get "we notice you haven't been reading our messages so we're going to stop sending them to you" emails from mailing lists that I do actually read.

qwerty456127 6y ago

> Why would you want to track whether an email is read? That's creepy and obnoxious. Indeed it is! Yet messengers like WhatsApp and Telegram always mark the messages that have been read. And I really hate this. Given the fact the actual messengers still are pretty good and very useful, I would pay them a premium if they could hide when have I been online and what messages have I read.

Tomte 6y ago
There is an option in WhatsApp to do exactly that.
Spivak 6y ago
I think most other messengers, iMessage, FB Messenger get this right that you can disable read receipts but then you won't get to see other people's either. I really really enjoy having them. They make me feel less anxious about messages.
- IgorPartola 6y ago
  I love when others have this feature turned on, and I'll never turn it on for myself :)
  - Spivak 6y ago
    But that's the point of having two-party consent. If either of you turns them off then neither of you see them.
    - IgorPartola 6y ago
      iMessage has them as one-sided, I believe.
- Denvercoder9 6y ago
  WhatsApp also has that option.
6y ago

Spivak 6y ago

I mean I think you know the answer to this question. Because these emails aren't "communication" but marketing campaigns that companies want to track the effectiveness of. Your inbox is nothing to these companies but another vector to put their brand in front of your eyeballs.

legohead 6y ago

Think in terms of a mailing list for a business, like a newsletter. It costs money to send out emails. If 50% of your users aren't reading them, you can trim the list of those who don't open the email.

nullserver 6y ago
The direct cost is near zero. Staying on the good side of spam blockers is a much bigger deal.
- legohead 6y ago
  Cost depends on the setup. Not everyone is taking the most cost effective approach. Spam reduction is definitely a big consideration. However at the last place I worked we would get notifications when people marked the emails as spam, and so we could specifically remove those people from the email list. I don't even know how that part is done - we used one of the big emailer/newsletter websites.
Nextgrid 6y ago
If you're asking yourself whether someone would read an email it's probably time to reconsider sending that email in the first place?

alisonkisk 6y ago

When done properly (as the article describes), it's a courtesy feature under the control of the recipient.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]