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I feel like the whole "notification summary" use case addresses the wrong problem. It's true that a lot of people are innundated in notifications of varying lev

I feel like the whole "notification summary" use case addresses the wrong problem. It's true that a lot of people are innundated in notifications of varying levels of importance. But I don't think the solution is to condense those diverse notifications and lose a lot of context in the process. A better solution is to reduce notifications altogether, so that the problem remains human-scaled and leaves the user in charge. Maybe an AI (or even a simple statistical model) can suggest group chats to suppress notifications for, based on how frequently the user actually reads and engages with them. Maybe the notifications system can be overhauled altogether so that non-DM uses are severely restricted by default (e.g., a news app can only display one notification at a time). The problem with too many notifications is too many notifications, not the user wishing they had the motivation to read all of them.

ninkendo 2y ago
I think I basically agree. My policy is basically: people can contact me, computers can’t. The only notifications I allow are for apps that are a proxy for human communication: messages, email (with a heavily curated inbox in which I dutifully unsubscribe from everything that’s not something I want), and very little else. The only time I want a notification is if some human being thought to themself “I need to talk to ninkendo right now, and I want him to be notified”. No automated systems, no mass communications. I’ve never found any system to be of any help with this other than just disabling notifications for every single thing other than these 2-3 apps. No “focus modes”, no auto-summaries, etc. None of them are as effective as just not having the notifications in the first place.
- 1123581321 2y ago
  Focus modes are still nice for letting different groups of people contact you, though.

ninkendo 2y ago

I think I basically agree. My policy is basically: people can contact me, computers can’t. The only notifications I allow are for apps that are a proxy for human communication: messages, email (with a heavily curated inbox in which I dutifully unsubscribe from everything that’s not something I want), and very little else. The only time I want a notification is if some human being thought to themself “I need to talk to ninkendo right now, and I want him to be notified”. No automated systems, no mass communications. I’ve never found any system to be of any help with this other than just disabling notifications for every single thing other than these 2-3 apps. No “focus modes”, no auto-summaries, etc. None of them are as effective as just not having the notifications in the first place.

1123581321 2y ago
Focus modes are still nice for letting different groups of people contact you, though.