Suggestion regarding Dmail

Hey Terry/Dave,

I was just wondering if there is anyway that we could have something implimented to know if a dmail has been opened by the recipient? I know that dmail is a private thing, but just thought I would ask anyway.

To give you an example of what I mean;....I always like to send 'Welcome to DG' dmails to people in my area and many times I never hear back from them and wondered if they even opened my email.

Thanks,
Donna

53 and not one reply? I promise I did take a shower this morning....lol

Dear Heart....you smell just fine to me...and I wonder the same thing sometimes...Did they get it?? Jo

I read it, but I'm not the programmer....

As the sender, I'd like to know if/when someone has seen my message, but as the receiver, I like my privacy, too ;o)

That's the trouble - it's a privacy issue. I think (speaking as the sender) it's a wonderful idea, and easily implemented, but as the receiver I don't want people to know I've read it...

Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Would anyone complain loudly if I implemented this?

Dave

Umm, I agree about the privacy. Could it be optional, on both sides, with a message stating so-and-so has chosen not to use this feature?

This message was edited Dec 29, 2006 11:09 AM

Many commercial email programs (Lotus Notes, etc) have this option to let you receive a message back when the recipient has opened the message. This is very useful in a business setting where you need to know if a person is just ignoring your message or if they haven't received it yet, but I think in a more social setting like DG it's not really necessary and could cause hard feelings if people send a message and know it's been read but they didn't receive a response. I'm sure some people are just curious whether a message has been read or not and wouldn't be upset if the person didn't respond, but I think some people might get upset about it. So I'd vote for privacy.

I think alot of new users don't know they have mail. Is mail automatically a "watched" item on one's DG home page? Many times I have walked new users thru where to click to see their mail. Perhaps that is something that could be made atuomatic or at least more intuitive?
carol

Carol,

Dave has an email system that notifies recipients in their regular email, that there is a D-mail waiting for them at Dave's. Not sure of the lag time, might be 24 or 48 hours.

I too have mixed feelings about the "been read by recipient" option. I think I have pretty thick skin, but on a weak day, I might have my feelings hurt if I thought I was being ignored.

Molly
:^)))

Are you two aware of this recently added feature?

http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/667100/

Yes. Thanks Nap. I've seen that feature and like it. It is still a mystery to me thought why sometimes new users don't know about dmail though. In any case, I've found that eventually they answer.
carol

On the home page, I think the default (until you figure out how to rearrange things yourself) is that the new mail watch shows up on your home page above your favorite forums so you really can't miss it, plus the new feature just mentioned which puts it right in the menu bar where the link to your mail is. And then you get the email 24-48 hrs later, so I have to think even someone who's new and not very good with computers will stumble across their mail through one of those three alerts--I don't know what more Dave could do to make it easier!

Phew!! Glad you all understand what I was asking about.

Just for the record....what is 'so' bad about knowing if someone opened their email? The only thing I can think of is if someone was sending 'a hateful' email. The recipient can always ignore it; hence, letting the sender know they didn't open it or it can they can put it in their dmail trash bin.

Thanks for at least talking about it. :-)

Donna

edited to simplify.

I wouldn't like to see this feature implemented for a couple of reasons, privacy of recipients and avoiding hurt feelings of senders. If it is I'd prefer it to be optional :)

This message was edited Dec 29, 2006 7:15 PM

I wouldn't care for this feature on DG; however, it's extremely helpful in business situations. Here's an couple of examples of why I wouldn't care for it here: (1) I need to think for a while about how to respond to the dmail; (2) the dmail is very long, and I'm just not up to responding to it for a few days. In both cases if the person doesn't know I've read it it's no problem. However, if they do know I've read it they could be wondering why I haven't responded, might think I'm ignoring them, and might get their feelings hurt. I want the leeway to respond when I choose without causing any ill will between myself and the other person.

Marilyn

As a person who does not use the internet a whole lot I offer my perspective. I've been a subscriber here for a couple years. The first d-mail I received made me very uncomfortable. I was not expecting or particularly interested at that time in receiving personal contacts from strangers. D-mail is a lot like e-mail and I kinda worried I was being spammed. I understand now that this is not the case.

If a person gets a d-mail and does not feel comfortable they might prefer to feel "safe" that the person sending the d-mail has no clue about their feelings on the matter either way.

By the way SoCal, I think it is great that you make the effort to welcome the folks in your area. Maybe you could try to catch those persons in one of their threads to start an initial contact.

Not having this feature doesn't bother me. At some point, the sender must realize that the dmail has been read. As far as receiving no replies, well, that's the prerogative of the recipient not to reply, and I respect that.

A dmail feature I'd really like to have, however, is the ability to delete old messages.

Hi. Here are my 2 cents worth on the subject.

I know that many Big Brand E-main programs give you the opportunity to check if the recipient has opened your e-mail. I have a friend who regularly gets mad at me for not agreeing to send her a "receipt" when I open her e-mail. It's not her business if I open a piece of E-mail or not. She sends mostly sappy, preachy PowerPoint presentations, which I flush as fast as I get them. She knows I can't stand those things but she sends them anyway.She has a right to send them, I don't have to look at them or let her know that I don't open the attachments.

I agree that in a business environment, the "Message read by recipient at 12:35PM" may have its advantages but Dave's Garden is not a business environment, is it? What's next? Are we going to get Message Blocking features to shield us from those people we choose to ignore for some reason or another?

The way I look at this is pretty much the same way I look at answering machines. If you have a message on your answering machine, you have a moral obligation to get back to the caller as soon as possible, specially if the message was: "Hi, it's John... call me". If there's no answering machine, it's not my problem and John cancall back when he feels like it.

Sylvain.

The notification of opened d-mail would be helpful in some ways, but I would prefer not to have it, and preserve a bit of privacy.

Actually--they are easy to get around on all email programs too. You can still read them and not have the sender know you did--even if they have that "read" tag on them. Anyone on a large network knows how to get around them.

I would prefer that this isn't implemented. Whether I read a Dmail or respond is my business. I've had this happen to me on numerous occasions. I feel that's my business. Sometimes I'm just not comfortable ansering a Dmail. It depends on the circumstance. :-)

I corresponded with someone through my Outlook Express program and they always requested a read receipt. Then I felt like I had to respond to the message, even though I didn't really have time at the moment. Then I would just hit "do not send receipt confirmation" After a while it started getting on my nerves always having to respond to even the confirmation to not send one. LOL
I don't know, it just bugged me havign to take that extra time to hit the button. LOL
The messages were personal and had nothing to do with Davesgarden members. The messages were even friendly, I just didn't have the time to respond when received and felt guilty that I might hurt someone's feelings by not sending a reply even though they knew I read it.
My opinion, I guess, is to have the option to either click that it was read or to click not to have it recorded read.

Sometimes , after working a 12 hour shift, I may read my dmails, but not feel like typing a response.
I wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings into thinking they were being ignored, when in all honesty, it
is just me being tired and lazy. Sometimes it's nice to know that noone knows I have read it, in case I
didn't reply.
:o)
just my two cents.
Janet

When I choose not to answer my phone, I sure wouldn't want the caller to be able to see that I am choosing to ignore them. Same for d-mail. My only question is, how do we know that the message was successfully transmitted? If a problem occurs in my regular e-mail account, it is returned to me as a failed transmission. Is there ever such a problem with d-mail or should we assume that if we sent it to a member, they got it? And if they chose not to respond, then maybe we need that shower that SoCal said she took. Patti

IMHO, I don't think responses are always necessary. If a person is receiving 20 dmails to welcome them, that's a little overwhelming. And during the peak seed trading season, it's hard to keep up plus deal with dmail that doesn't require a specific response. I would be in favor of a response back that indicted message delivery failure, but I don't think it is necessary to see if someone is reading their mail or not.

You also need to remember that many people are leery of online contacts due to the possibility of online predators. I just received a lecture yesterday from my sister about this. While I believe DG is a very safe forum, mainly because Dave and Co. should be able to trace back questionable activity to the owner of such, I'm sure there are some people who just do not want to expose themselves to possible problems.

SoCal happy belated birthday. I use the notification if a message has been read at work. To be honest I really don't like it on my personal emails, just like somebody stated above you get the message for the request to let the sender know you read it or you can not let them know. I feel this takes out of my time to read my emails should I decide to respond is my decision. I don't want something telling me I need to or I will feel guilty. Just a for instance I get emails requesting trades for things I have entered in PF. Subscribed members I respond to others I may not, that's my decision. I don't need something to let the other person know I read the email and decided not to answer. On the other hand I read allot of d-mails from work and won't answer them there. I will answer them, when I get home if I don't forget. The person that sent the email thinks I blew them off and didn't care about what they asked me even if I answered them later. I think we have become to involved in everything must me done right now and are not taking the time to consider the person on the other end of the email has a life and demands as well and may not be able to get back to you right that second.

Happy New Year

Let's try it!

Don't think we have that many people sending private D-mails to welcome people. People like SoCal who generates so much "Good Will" for DG need all the help they can get.

I would like to be able to send a mass email (undisclosed recipients) when issuing an invitation to a mini round-up; at this time I do about two per year when I am at my home in Southern California. This morning it took me 3 hours to D mail the invitations for my January garden party.

As to Donna catching new people in forums where they post . . . that would take a horendous amount of time. Quite frankly, many people I have privately emailed a warm welcome to were impressed and emailed me back with questions about DG. It helps them get their feet wet at DG.

I presume that when our Dmail is forwarded to someone, if it bounces, Dave quits sending to that email addy. Actually I think it is automatic. There was a time period when AOL was bouncing a lot of mail on active accounts.

Please, lets try it for a while and see if it helps. It isn't going to give you the answer as to "why" someone did not read it or respond but it might save others from wasting their time on those who don't wish to communicate.
Everyone has their personal opinion about the urgency to answer email or "not" to. I respect those opinions and don't get upset if I don't hear back

SoCal I am glad to hear someone else Welcomes new members in there area. I do the very same thing. Whenever I see a new member from Kansas I like to send them an E-Mail Welcoming them. I don't know how many I have done this to, or how many I have missed. But I think it is kinda a nice little jester. I also have wondered a few times if they have been read or not.

You know there really isn't anything private about Dave's Garden especially if you read and enter anything into the threads. I do think it could be a option, I also don't consider DG members as being strangers but as being friends. All SoCal is wanting to know is if someone read the d-mail she mailed to a new member. It never bothers me one way or the other if they don't respond back to my emails, but it is nice to know that they at lease read it. If they don't want to read it they can just close it up and don't read it. I would like to see it implemented I think everyone on here has a regular email, and gets mail from a lot of different people. You either read it or you don't.

This is only my own opinion.

Linda

2pugdogs said, and I quote

"You know there really isn't anything private about Dave's Garden especially if you read and enter anything into the threads."

I disagree, you only know what someone is prepared to tell you and only if you assume everything said here is the absolute truth, and we all know where assumption can lead to. It can be easy to mistake something. This is said by someone whose gender, age and personal circumstance has often been misinterpreted and I'm not the only one. Even long term members can retain a small air of mystery and make mistakes about each other *G*.

For those of you who aren't worried if you know someone has read but not answered, begs the question why would you want this feature in the first place it doesn't bother you either way? If it's purely to save time then why would you continue to write to someone who doesn't answer whatever the reason?

Saving time in one way or another is important in all aspects of my life. Due to life's circumstances people make take the time to read an email but not respond right away.
In advertising, they say a person must see something several times before they act on it.
If I thought they at least read it I would be encouraged to send them an invite to the next garden party I had. These get-togethers are so informational and fun, I wouldn't want to cut anyone from the opportunity to attend, even if it takes them a while to warm up to the idea. The feature would help me a great deal.

Baa is right in that DGers are as private as they choose to be or as public as they would have you think; certainly there are people who never post and use DG strictly as a resource tool. When you have never been on a forum where there is interaction, you feel kind of timid at first . . . but you either get over that or pass on the opportunity. Also, you don't even have to turn a computer to encounter people who appear to be one thing on the surface and have a hidden agenda. In everyday life, I tend to avoid those types as well as on DG.

IMHO
arlene

Why assume people who appear to be one thing but are really another all doing it intentionally, some are some aren't? I certainly don't intend to deceive anyone but people still mistake me for other than I am, that's not my fault. Still that's another thread for another board.

We're not going to agree on this, I know :) I still don't see why sending a d-mail has to be anything more than it is now, if you were doing it from your own email address to another ISP, unless you had the software, you wouldn't know if it was read, dumped, lost, etc anyway. The ability to send mass d-mail is another subject but again one I would rather was optional if implemented just to prevent the level of spam it might attract.

I vote for leave it as it is. :)

So do I.

I have always been happy with Dave's rules here; they protect us a lot; and if a challenge crops up he meets it gallantly. I, too, would not want my email spammed.

We don't have to agree on anything; we are just here to give our input and reasons for it.

I do agree with you, that even when you feel you are being an honest and straightforward person people can misunderstand, as they can only perceive you in relationship to their own reality and experiences; that too applies in real face-to-face life as well as here. And of course having different opinions occurs in both scenarios. How dull life would be if there were only one way to look at a thing. On reading different opinions on the threads here at DG it opens up better insight for me to see the different ways people think about a given subject and many times changes my opinion. I try to be open minded but do think it is human nature for many of us not to be; it is something to be worked at.

Regards,

I'm afraid I must vote for leave as-is, as well (even though I could argue/rationalize a "business need" in my role here. Putting the shoe on the other foot, I'd rather not feel pressured to reply to each dmail I receive, even though I do at least glance at them all.)

If Dave chooses to pursue this, I hope it will include the ability to not send a confirmation.

I can sympathise with Baa - I'm often mistaken for a "he" because of the way I (rebelliously) chose to spell my parent's nickname for me. (In retrospect, my Mom did know best, *chuckle*)

And I have one of those gender neutral names so everyone can keep guessing (except people I've exchanged dmail with--I usually sign those with my real name which makes it pretty obvious!)

I think the mass dmail idea would be nice for people who are organizing Roundups or coops--but I definitely think if that feature were implemented it should be limited to subscribers only to limit opportunities for spam. Although I wonder how many spammers would pay for subscriptions if it allowed them to send mass messages? I wonder if there's a way to limit it to subscribers who have been around for a while and are regular participants in at least a forum or two? I think if you could limit it to those people you'd get rid of all the spammers because they're not going to participate on the forums.

And on the original subject of notification of dmail being read--based on the discussion earlier in this thread about all the different ways that you get notified when you have a message, I think it's safe to assume that the vast majority of people who you send messages to have seen them, so I would assume that 99% of your messages have either been read or the person saw the message and chose not to open it, and base your decisions about sending future messages on that assumption. Yes, there may be one or two people who are totally clueless and can't find their way to dmail even with all the notifications, but I think they would be in the minority. Although if there was an opt-out option where you could choose not to send a confirmation back to the sender (and make it something that pops up automatically or something so people don't have to go looking for it) then I think it's fine to include it.

Terry/Dave,

I would like to let this die out. I was only asking a question, like many other people have done, and I understood from the very beginning that it would be a privacy issue. (see my original post)

Thank you for just letting us to be able to ask questions of this wonderful site. I just celebrated my 6th anniversary here and I am as happy as a clam to be able to make great friends and learn about gardening from all over the world.

I am leaving shortly to go nursery hopping with Jasperdale, whom I met here at DG....what could be any better?

Here's to a great 2007 for the best garden site on the web!! :-)))))

Donna

Well, I can see that it would take a bunch of time to send a lot of invites all at once. Still there is typing the one message and putting it 'copied' in edit and then you'd only hafta pick each person out.... nope that is still a lot of time.

unh oh so having that system would be about the same as what I just said. you would hafta access each id anyway and just hitting edit and send. hmmm Hope I'm not aggravating anyone by thinking out loud

Hi Donna, looks like this has turned into a wandering thread. With so many people in this group of Dave's it's not a wonder this happens as often as not. original question was - to know if msg was opened or not. I don't have any strong feelings on this one, my skin is of the thick variety.

On the other hand, I do find that life [the one that is physically in front of me] might interfere with prompt answer and my tendency to forget almost any little thing - might mean I never got back to answering a message. With no thought nor intention either way.

As an aside - When I was a newbie there were lots of welcomers on the Welcome forum. Now I see there are both a Welcome Home forum and a Welcome Mat and hafta admit that I have slacked off in that area. BUT I just went and looked and it appears these are rather underused as means of welcoming folks - so I guess I'm not the only one.

I wonder if folks have gotten in the habit of only welcoming members from their forum area // as in Northeast Gardening ers having welcome thread within their forum... ?? only using NE as a hypothetical - coulda said Rcky Mtn Gard or any other. Just WONDERING if that is a trend. we have become diversified // or do I mean divided?

I'm gonna resort to my favorite advice. DG is one of the almost perfect sites on the web, and amazingly it works... and works well. Aint broke don't fix it.
I too would worry a bit about the spamming aspect. So then what? Do we ask Dave to police one more aspect of our membership.?

Ramble finished. ~~Blooms

Since we've wandered a bit, could I please wander back to the possibility of being able to delete old dmails?

Why not just create a folder called "old mail" and transfer them to that, leaving your inbox relatively incluttered? Just an idea, worked for me.