Private messaging...

If Wisconsin gets a hurricane, Ohio will be under water and I'll be dead. I won't need message notification, in such case. LOL

LOL GW!

Yea but if KY can get an earthquake, like I just heard in the Chat Room...*anything* IS possible! (So if we don't hear from you we'll know what happened! :-D)

~julie~

I am always somewhat hesitant to answer email from people I don't know.
This is a great feature!
Thank you Dave!

I use to simply go to their member page and send them an email from there....that way they recieved my email 'promptly' without revealing my email address.

Actually, the old way DID reveal your email address to the recipient. The new way does not.

dave

I stand corrected.....
At least the old way didn't rely on the recipient having to be logged onto Dave's to get mail.
I'm sure I will adjust....or not :-)

I know this thread is kind of dropping off here, but ...

The new system actually works in such a manner that the recipient doesn't even have to login to read the mail. They just click ONE link and they are logged in and taken directly to your email. Not bad!

dave

Dave
Last month my PC was giving problem then I went to Cyber cafe, there I opened DG and my yahoo account. On next day I again went there and try to open my Yahoo account, after a lot tries I came to know some one hacked my mailing account, Software of yahoo hacking is available in the market.
But now my account is safe with new messaging style. I faced this problem and want to share with others, I think now our mailing accounts are safe.
Thanks

Whether they are 'logged' in or not they must still visit some portion of Dave's Garden to read email....
To bad there is not a way around some of your "Not Bad"...ummmm improvments.....................

Marc,

We can keep the email addresses we have already received. And if we frequently email people, we can "request" them to send their email address. Noone else will see it except those involved, as it's not on a thread.

:-) Karrie

Rikerbear, I know change is difficult, but help me understand: is this a matter of urgency/timeliness or privacy? I'm guessng it has to be one of those two things (or it's just that change is difficult - more for some than others.)

In the course of a day's work, I email DG members all the time (my email volume is probably among the top ten users.) Before this system was implemented, often the replies I received excluded what I sent them, making it nearly impossible for me to put their response into context (my memory isn't what it used to be ;o) Or they wouldn't give their DG username, which meant I had to go look up their email address to figure out who they were. That was a royal pain in the rump, but at least I *could* figure it out - heaven help the ordinary member who doesn't have access to the administrative tools I do. Now that problem has been resolved - the conversation thread remains intact, and I can see at a glance who I'm conversing with. Those are both huge positives over the old system.

I've yet to experience a problem with delays in the new system (at least not anything more than I experienced when the message went to their inbox.)

If the issue is keeping your conversations private, please trust me when I say we have a lot better things to do than monitor people's email. If you really don't want to run the risk of an administrator reading your messages, then you need to consider snail mail, phone or face-to-face meetings. (Seriously - your email administrators *can* read your email, although - like us - it's highly unlikely they're going to waste their time snooping.)

But if you're more comfortable using your own email account, then once you've established a basis for communicating with someone (in the forums, in the chatroom or via a few messages), then you can "opt out" of the system by exchanging email addresses. This is really not much different than how it was before: under the old system, your initial email was through our system; after that, you and the correspondent could continue to use the system or email each other direct to your personal inboxes. The only real difference is now there is a conscious choice if you wish to take your conversation outside of DG.

If I've still not hit the nail on the head, then please help me to understand why this is such a thorny issue for you instead of muttering about it - taking potshots at our efforts to improve the site aren't likely going to solve anything, ;o)

It is a matter of expediency....if I wish to contact a new member or non-subscriber I'd rather not have to wait for the next time they log on to or visit Dave's to get a reply to my email/member mail. This has nothing to do with my not accepting change....change is a fact of life. One either learns to adapt or one becomes a dinosaur and disappears.
I am not taking pot shots at you call it at you, Dave or anyone.......
I'm sorry if some have chosen to see it that way.
My initial question was whether one could by-pass this new feature or not. I now know I can not.
I would be curious however as to why this change was made. Improvements are ususally the result of some failure of a previous way of doing things. Change simply for change sake is not always a good thing. I will work with the system as Dave sees fit....................

Enough said.

edited for typos



This message was edited Sep 28, 2004 2:54 PM

I'm sorry - I guess I misunderstood the tone and the words.

Why did this change come about? Dave can give you the specifics, but as far as I know, it's an idea he'd been looking at from several angles for several months, maybe a year. There are arguably some privacy concerns with revealing your email address. From time to time that issue had come up, and it was seen as an impediment to communicating outside the forums.

Member-to-member messaging (or personal messaging) resolves that problem - it lets people communicate without worrying about their email address winding up on some spammer's list.

Is that a huge risk or issue? Well, not to me personally, but to some people it is. In fact a few days before the new system was rolled out, a member expressed a lot of anxiety over the fact that people could email her when she posted a picture to the PDB and she felt it was an invasion of her privacy.

That particular thread has since been removed, but suffice it to say, it generated as much discussion and onlookers as this one. (We really can't win for losing on some of these issues, it would seem...) Did we implement this system because of this one request? No. But the issues that were brought forward were indicative of the concerns Dave had about the old system; hence the new one.

Terry, I think most people are really, really pleased with the Personal Message System. It is not unlike the personal message system on a plumeria forum that I belong to. Please don't feel like you and Dave are not appreciated greatly for the work that you do because you both are, and you both are very patient when patience is called for.

Marc, I believe Dave included a feature which emails a member to tell them that they have a Personal Message waiting for them and provides a link to that message. This feature is activated if the member does not sign in for a few days. That should solve the problem of expediency.

I *really* like how the messages appear in a thread, complete with photos. That's really cool.

Thank you Clare for your opinion. I agree the admin of DG does a great job, and certainly not one I'd want.
I did not intend my questioning of this new feature to be taken as criticism of Dave and Terry. I voiced my opinion and dislike of the feature, not the administration.
I just don't see a possible 2 day delay in email delivery/notification as expedient , and certainly not an improvement.
But honestly enough is enough......I will live with the new feature, and will make more personal contact as I can, with those that I need to, and those that wish to.

I like it this way also. I am here most days and I LOVE being able to track an email conversation all the way through on a thread. Helps me out when my memory lacks, which is getting more often all the time.

I've been using it for the last few days. I'm like Poppysue, I keep all of my trades in a special folder in my outlook e-mail program. For future trades I will have to (remember to) request that my fellow trader give me their e-mail address so we can expidite the trades outside of Dave's via private e-mail.

I guess in my future posts for plant or seed trades, I can include my e-mail address in the public post so people can e-mail me directly. I'm still thinking that one through.....................

I wondered what happened to that old thread, went looking for it today but couldn't find it.

Sue, don't do it! You'd be inviting trouble and it defeats the purpose of Dave's hard work with the new system.
What's the big deal with exchanging addresses privately with your trading buddies?

Hi Ulrich, it's not a big deal, I'm just trying to eliminate steps I guess. If my e-mail address is there I will get the mail faster and can expedite my answer. If I understand correctly, this was to eliminate Spam for members who did not wish to receive private e-mail via Dave's Garden old system. I don't mind getting e-mail directly to my inbox. :)

You leave yourself open to becoming a victim of those malicious creeps out there who will send viruses at random and do all sorts of nasty things to your computer. You are very trusting, so TRUST ME!
LOL

I'm with Ulrich, Sue, I don't think it's a good idea to post your e-mail address, spammers have software that can search the site for e-mail links, then send spam and/or sell the address to other spammers. In fact, it might be nice for Dave to say somewhere not to post your e-mail address, so that people will know.

However, if you post your email address as “something @ something .com” with spaces like that, people will know what you mean, but the spammers software probably can’t find it.

-Paul-

This message was edited Sep 29, 2004 7:40 PM

I understand both of your points and appreciate your feedback, thanks!