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> I immediately mark them as "spam". Ahh yes, the feel-good response that Google gives you without doing anything substantial to prevent spam from reaching you

> I immediately mark them as "spam". Ahh yes, the feel-good response that Google gives you without doing anything substantial to prevent spam from reaching you in the future.

armada651 2y ago
If you were using self-hosted e-mail everywhere, then it would be quite obvious that large providers like Google do massively benefit from those user reports when filtering spam.
kemitche 2y ago
What makes you say that? In my experience, the spam button works fantastically. There is a gym of some kind that has me on their mailing list, refuses to honor unsubscribe, and sends me probably 2-6 emails a month. They've been doing this for years, but Google correctly gets every single one into spam because I marked one (several?) as spam years ago. Most, if not all, political junk email also ends up in my spam folder after judicious use of the spam button a few years ago.
- inetknght 2y ago
  > They've been doing this for years, but Google correctly gets every single one into spam because I marked one (several?) as spam years ago. I've had numerous "businesses" that I've reported spam end up back in my gmail inbox after years. I've stopped using gmail because of it not iterating on spam blocking capabilities.
maccard 2y ago
My experience with the spam button is 1) they never ever go into my inbox again if they do keep sending, and 2) as someone who has had emails marked as spam (from people who actively clicked the sign up to my newsletter button) your ability to send email gets neutered pretty quickly. What is your experience?
- inetknght 2y ago
  > What is your experience? Reporting spam does not block the email from being received by my client -- it only blocks the mail from being seen in the inbox, but it still shows up in the spam box. I don't send mail that gets reported as spam in the first place. Or, if it does, then I haven't been meaningfully affected because I can still send and receive the email I want to.
  - maccard 2y ago
    I’m not sure what you expect to happen? > I don't send mail that gets reported as spam in the first place. I ran a newsletter where people had to opt in to receiving it. It was announce news for a video game. You only ended up on this list if you entered your email, clicked join list, and then clicked the link in the email we sent to you to confirm subscription. We had a big unsubscribe button at the very top of the email. We still regularly got people who hit report spam on us, presumably as a way of saying g they didn’t want the email anymore.
    - jacobgkau 2y ago
      > I’m not sure what you expect to happen? They're probably expecting their email provider to take that info and use it somewhere upstream of their own individual account. Which, as you've pointed out, does happen. Maybe they don't believe that it happens often enough or something, but the thresholds do need to be reasonably high since, as you pointed out, some people hit the button whether it's justified or not. If the threshold for email provider action was too low, you'd end up not being able to send to anyone with Gmail because one guy forgot he signed up to a list (or signed up and immediately reported it as spam to spite the sender). The person you replied to also sounds like they may be using an offline or third-party email client, though. There's a difference between a "Report Spam" button somewhere your email provider controls, and a "Mark as Spam" button in your third-party email client. I'd assume there's some kind of protocol that could potentially allow third-party clients to report it back to the email provider, but would also assume it may not be as reliable as first-party interfaces.
1shooner 2y ago
User-reported spam in gmail is actually very efficacious. Aside from the logic gmail applies to your inbox specifically, Google's current violation threshold for those reports is .03%. Beyond that, those reports start to pull down sender IP and domain reputation, which impacts overall deliverablity to anyone's gmail inbox.
- MiddleEndian 2y ago
  This is why I am quick to report spam, even if they are a "legitimate" business. Utility company / paypal / whoever wants to send me spam? I sincerely hope they are impeded from sending email to anybody.

> I immediately mark them as "spam". Ahh yes, the feel-good response that Google gives you without doing anything substantial to prevent spam from reaching you in the future.

armada651 2y ago

If you were using self-hosted e-mail everywhere, then it would be quite obvious that large providers like Google do massively benefit from those user reports when filtering spam.

kemitche 2y ago

What makes you say that? In my experience, the spam button works fantastically. There is a gym of some kind that has me on their mailing list, refuses to honor unsubscribe, and sends me probably 2-6 emails a month. They've been doing this for years, but Google correctly gets every single one into spam because I marked one (several?) as spam years ago. Most, if not all, political junk email also ends up in my spam folder after judicious use of the spam button a few years ago.

inetknght 2y ago
> They've been doing this for years, but Google correctly gets every single one into spam because I marked one (several?) as spam years ago. I've had numerous "businesses" that I've reported spam end up back in my gmail inbox after years. I've stopped using gmail because of it not iterating on spam blocking capabilities.

maccard 2y ago

My experience with the spam button is 1) they never ever go into my inbox again if they do keep sending, and 2) as someone who has had emails marked as spam (from people who actively clicked the sign up to my newsletter button) your ability to send email gets neutered pretty quickly. What is your experience?

inetknght 2y ago
> What is your experience? Reporting spam does not block the email from being received by my client -- it only blocks the mail from being seen in the inbox, but it still shows up in the spam box. I don't send mail that gets reported as spam in the first place. Or, if it does, then I haven't been meaningfully affected because I can still send and receive the email I want to.
- maccard 2y ago
  I’m not sure what you expect to happen? > I don't send mail that gets reported as spam in the first place. I ran a newsletter where people had to opt in to receiving it. It was announce news for a video game. You only ended up on this list if you entered your email, clicked join list, and then clicked the link in the email we sent to you to confirm subscription. We had a big unsubscribe button at the very top of the email. We still regularly got people who hit report spam on us, presumably as a way of saying g they didn’t want the email anymore.
  - jacobgkau 2y ago
    > I’m not sure what you expect to happen? They're probably expecting their email provider to take that info and use it somewhere upstream of their own individual account. Which, as you've pointed out, does happen. Maybe they don't believe that it happens often enough or something, but the thresholds do need to be reasonably high since, as you pointed out, some people hit the button whether it's justified or not. If the threshold for email provider action was too low, you'd end up not being able to send to anyone with Gmail because one guy forgot he signed up to a list (or signed up and immediately reported it as spam to spite the sender). The person you replied to also sounds like they may be using an offline or third-party email client, though. There's a difference between a "Report Spam" button somewhere your email provider controls, and a "Mark as Spam" button in your third-party email client. I'd assume there's some kind of protocol that could potentially allow third-party clients to report it back to the email provider, but would also assume it may not be as reliable as first-party interfaces.

1shooner 2y ago

User-reported spam in gmail is actually very efficacious. Aside from the logic gmail applies to your inbox specifically, Google's current violation threshold for those reports is .03%. Beyond that, those reports start to pull down sender IP and domain reputation, which impacts overall deliverablity to anyone's gmail inbox.

MiddleEndian 2y ago
This is why I am quick to report spam, even if they are a "legitimate" business. Utility company / paypal / whoever wants to send me spam? I sincerely hope they are impeded from sending email to anybody.