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> I unsubscribe to everything I do not absolutely need. This right here is one of the greatest quality-of-life improvements I ever adopted. Every single email

> I unsubscribe to everything I do not absolutely need. This right here is one of the greatest quality-of-life improvements I ever adopted. Every single email you get, if you don’t absolutely want it, find and click the unsubscribe link in the footer. (Standard disclaimer, don’t click links in spam. Only do this for senders who got your address through some kind of legitimate purchase or account sign-up.) Each time you buy something, and they send you that first “hey why not buy something else too?“ message, unsubscribe. It takes a bit of discipline, but it pays dividends. It is possible to get to a point where you hardly receive any mail. You can get to inbox zero doing this. It’s genuinely refreshing. Sometimes I catch a glimpse of other people’s inboxes and, my god, I can’t imagine going back to that life.

warner25 2y ago
Agreed on all points. A step further, which I haven't personally tried but I've been thinking about, is to set up a filter rule that just automatically deletes anything with "unsubscribe" or "manage your preferences" in it. If you're already at a zero inbox and getting very few emails per day, this just isn't necessary, but I'd recommend it for someone who has a dumpster fire of an inbox that's getting hundreds of marketing or automatic notification emails per day.
tennisflyi 2y ago
Absolutely. That's been my MO for years. Inbox zero across multiple different emails. It makes things really easy
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago
  I don't know how you guys do it. I have extensive filters, but I still get dozens of low priority emails every day. Stuff I should actually deal with but just generally don't care quite enough to on most days.
tczMUFlmoNk 2y ago
I do something similar, but: if I buy something and get a "why not buy something else?" email, I don't just unsubscribe; I mark it as spam. I am careful to never opt in to messages like that, so if I am receiving them then they are my address beyond the consent that I provided, so I want Gmail to downrank their trust. I agree that either of these approaches pays dividends. I feel great about it.
- exe34 2y ago
  I do this too - if you're sending me unsolicited emails, and you're not specifically a human reaching out for a genuine human relationship free of me paying you, then your email is spam.
- 1123581321 2y ago
  It’s a fun button/shortcut to push, but it just helps Google get better at downweighting false reports if it’s not used on the conventional definition of spam.
  - tczMUFlmoNk 2y ago
    I don't think that these reports are false in any sense. The emails being flagged are unsolicited messages sent in bulk. That's spam.
sshine 2y ago
I have 4 filters: 1) I have a 10% membership discount to the local pet store. They have a weekly newsletter that I really don't care about. I once tried unsubscribe, and their dumb system deleted my account. So now I mark as read + archive their newsletter. It's the cost of cheap pet food. 2) I get some spam emails with recurring themes that my spam filter somehow fails to learn after dozens of manual labellings. So I've made filters to mark those as spam. 3) I set up DKIM for my domain, but I really don't care. So all my DKIM reports end up in a subdirectory I never look at. 4) I forward deductible receipts to receipts@mydomain so that I can send myself emails for later when I do accounting. I don't need to check this inbox regularly, because I'm the only one using it. It's a bit crude, but I have certain accounts in certain stores that won't let me change my email address (who seriously still uses email address as primary key?) so I forward those emails automatically to my receipts@ email. Other than that, my inbox is for PERSONAL EMAIL. I LOVE when I get letters! They're either genuinely interesting, or they contain an "unsubscribe" link at the bottom. The only newsletters I've enjoyed for more than a few months is Haskell Weekly and This Week in Rust. I don't always read them, but they're sort of my "membership magazines".
- accoil 2y ago
  re 3: are you talking about DMARC reports? I was under the impression those were opt in by adding rua=mailto:<email address> in the DNS record. If you remove that you should not be getting them.
  - sshine 2y ago
    Yes, I meant DMARC!
- scarface_74 2y ago
  > Other than that, my inbox is for PERSONAL EMAIL. I LOVE when I get letters People you know send you email? The only time I get one on one email from people is when they are forwarding email as an FYI. Depending on the relationship, they send me a message via text, LinkedIn, or Facebook Messenger.
endofreach 2y ago
If you send me an unwanted newsletter or marketing-email, you'll receive multiple AI generated fake support tickets from various email addresses, every couple of days.
- HelenePhisher 2y ago
  I want that! How does it work? Did you automate that?
  - TeMPOraL 2y ago
    More importantly, does it work on forwarded marketing spam, and what is your e-mail I can forward my spam to? :)
10729287 2y ago
My main rule is moving any email containing « unsubscribe » in /newsletter. Life changing.
- AbstractH24 2y ago
  That is genius
  - 10729287 2y ago
    The only issue (not a small one) so far have been for my pro email when receiving events asking for RSVP through a service… having such a unsubscribe link in it. Always be careful with rules and don’t forget to check folders regularly.
- mediumsmart 2y ago
  thank you thank you thank you - told procmail too
AbstractH24 2y ago
While I love unsubscribing to everything, the problem is it compounds the problem of being siloed. I’m moving towards a world where I don’t unsubscribe, but I rely on AI to provide me a daily summary of everything I don’t absolutely need. It’s not perfect, but it’s a balance. Shockingly there I’ve yet to find a off the shelf tool for this.
- pavel_lishin 2y ago
  I'm not sure if rejecting marketing emails from every dingdong I purchased a widget from counts as siloing.
  - AbstractH24 2y ago
    Most of my emails are either newsletters or marketing related to events I might actually be interested in if I knew about them. Don’t get all that many widgets marketing emails. The few I do I unsubscribe right away (and if I’m honest, most of my widget buying is through one large company called Amazon). Maybe i’m atypical though.

warner25 2y ago

Agreed on all points. A step further, which I haven't personally tried but I've been thinking about, is to set up a filter rule that just automatically deletes anything with "unsubscribe" or "manage your preferences" in it. If you're already at a zero inbox and getting very few emails per day, this just isn't necessary, but I'd recommend it for someone who has a dumpster fire of an inbox that's getting hundreds of marketing or automatic notification emails per day.

tennisflyi 2y ago

Absolutely. That's been my MO for years. Inbox zero across multiple different emails. It makes things really easy

8n4vidtmkvmk 2y ago
I don't know how you guys do it. I have extensive filters, but I still get dozens of low priority emails every day. Stuff I should actually deal with but just generally don't care quite enough to on most days.

tczMUFlmoNk 2y ago

I do something similar, but: if I buy something and get a "why not buy something else?" email, I don't just unsubscribe; I mark it as spam. I am careful to never opt in to messages like that, so if I am receiving them then they are my address beyond the consent that I provided, so I want Gmail to downrank their trust. I agree that either of these approaches pays dividends. I feel great about it.

exe34 2y ago
I do this too - if you're sending me unsolicited emails, and you're not specifically a human reaching out for a genuine human relationship free of me paying you, then your email is spam.
1123581321 2y ago
It’s a fun button/shortcut to push, but it just helps Google get better at downweighting false reports if it’s not used on the conventional definition of spam.
- tczMUFlmoNk 2y ago
  I don't think that these reports are false in any sense. The emails being flagged are unsolicited messages sent in bulk. That's spam.

sshine 2y ago

I have 4 filters: 1) I have a 10% membership discount to the local pet store. They have a weekly newsletter that I really don't care about. I once tried unsubscribe, and their dumb system deleted my account. So now I mark as read + archive their newsletter. It's the cost of cheap pet food. 2) I get some spam emails with recurring themes that my spam filter somehow fails to learn after dozens of manual labellings. So I've made filters to mark those as spam. 3) I set up DKIM for my domain, but I really don't care. So all my DKIM reports end up in a subdirectory I never look at. 4) I forward deductible receipts to receipts@mydomain so that I can send myself emails for later when I do accounting. I don't need to check this inbox regularly, because I'm the only one using it. It's a bit crude, but I have certain accounts in certain stores that won't let me change my email address (who seriously still uses email address as primary key?) so I forward those emails automatically to my receipts@ email. Other than that, my inbox is for PERSONAL EMAIL. I LOVE when I get letters! They're either genuinely interesting, or they contain an "unsubscribe" link at the bottom. The only newsletters I've enjoyed for more than a few months is Haskell Weekly and This Week in Rust. I don't always read them, but they're sort of my "membership magazines".

accoil 2y ago
re 3: are you talking about DMARC reports? I was under the impression those were opt in by adding rua=mailto:<email address> in the DNS record. If you remove that you should not be getting them.
- sshine 2y ago
  Yes, I meant DMARC!
scarface_74 2y ago
> Other than that, my inbox is for PERSONAL EMAIL. I LOVE when I get letters People you know send you email? The only time I get one on one email from people is when they are forwarding email as an FYI. Depending on the relationship, they send me a message via text, LinkedIn, or Facebook Messenger.

endofreach 2y ago

If you send me an unwanted newsletter or marketing-email, you'll receive multiple AI generated fake support tickets from various email addresses, every couple of days.

HelenePhisher 2y ago
I want that! How does it work? Did you automate that?
- TeMPOraL 2y ago
  More importantly, does it work on forwarded marketing spam, and what is your e-mail I can forward my spam to? :)

10729287 2y ago

My main rule is moving any email containing « unsubscribe » in /newsletter. Life changing.

AbstractH24 2y ago
That is genius
- 10729287 2y ago
  The only issue (not a small one) so far have been for my pro email when receiving events asking for RSVP through a service… having such a unsubscribe link in it. Always be careful with rules and don’t forget to check folders regularly.
mediumsmart 2y ago
thank you thank you thank you - told procmail too

AbstractH24 2y ago

While I love unsubscribing to everything, the problem is it compounds the problem of being siloed. I’m moving towards a world where I don’t unsubscribe, but I rely on AI to provide me a daily summary of everything I don’t absolutely need. It’s not perfect, but it’s a balance. Shockingly there I’ve yet to find a off the shelf tool for this.

pavel_lishin 2y ago
I'm not sure if rejecting marketing emails from every dingdong I purchased a widget from counts as siloing.
- AbstractH24 2y ago
  Most of my emails are either newsletters or marketing related to events I might actually be interested in if I knew about them. Don’t get all that many widgets marketing emails. The few I do I unsubscribe right away (and if I’m honest, most of my widget buying is through one large company called Amazon). Maybe i’m atypical though.