Ask HN: What about email alerts on a per-thread basis?

[owkaye]

Will HN ever support email notices to people who start threads or post to threads ... to alert them that new messages have been posted?

If not, what about supporting individual RSS feeds for each thread we want to track or intend to participate in?

Does anyone else see the value in features like these, or is it just me?

[owkaye]

I just received my first email notice from notifo and it's still not clear to me when I will (and will not) receive email notices at HN:

Will I get them ONLY when someone replies to a specific post I've made?

Will I get them when someone posts a reply in a thread I've created, even though the reply is to someone else's post instead of to mine?

Will I get them when someone posts a reply to someone else in a thread that someone else has created?

These are just a few of the questions that remain unanswered until I do some more testing ... but my current suspicion is that notifo cannot notify me unless the post is a direct reply to one of my posts.

If this is true it means I will NOT get a notice -- even in a thread I created -- when a reply is made to someone else's post.

And if this is the case it will fail to notify me of all the HN activity I want to be notified about.

:(

[pasbesoin]

Have a look at the Notifo field in your profile. Then do something like:

https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site%3Anews....

You will received notifications of replies -- to your comments, at least; I presume also to posts/threads that you start.

EDIT: I should add that there is an email notification option (as opposed to IM, SMS, or whatever). You may have to look a bit on the Notifo site to find it, IIRC.

[owkaye]

Well, I didn't have any idea what that "notifo" term meant ... and in fact I still don't.

So you're suggesting that the blank notifo field in my profile, with no explanation of how to use it or what it does, might actually send me an email if I enter the proper URL and make the appropriate changes on the notifo website?

For starters the "notifo" label on the blank field might be better as a link to the notifo website. At least then we would have a clue about where to begin to possibly learn enough to enable simple notifications for the threads we start or want to follow.

I hate to say it but this is about the worst implementation of a notification system I have ever seen in my life. Why not just put a 'notices' link at the top or bottom of every thread page when a visitor is logged in? Then when I click it, take me to a page that allows me to manage my notification subscriptions in a simple, straightforward and OBVIOUS manner?

[pasbesoin]

Well, I didn't make it. :-)

pg -- in my anecdotal observation -- tends to like to use YC companies' technology where he can. It's a bit of promotion, and it saves him from doing the work himself -- while keeping HN as minimal/core-function as possible.

At the time Notifo was added, there were a bunch of threads. I think that, since that time, there's a bit of "you should be able to figure this out" involved.

What I provided was essentially a pointer to relevant search terms.

I agree, it's not the clearest thing in the world. Again, it's not my baby.

EDIT: I should add that I'm just not up to a lengthier explanation / set of instructions, right now. Old threads have some. So, I hope the bit of a reply that I could cobble together, helps.

[owkaye]

"Well, I didn't make it. :-)"

I know, I wasn't complaining about anything you've done. I just think the lack of information on its availability is lame-brained, and the fact that no information is available on this site which explains how to use it is short-sighted ... and the actual steps required before you can enable it are also overly demanding and unnecessary.

But that's just my opinion ... :)

"pg -- in my anecdotal observation -- tends to like to use YC companies' technology where he can."

Makes sense "IF" the feature is documented in an obvious place here on the HN site so we will AT LEAST know that it exists. In this case not only is the feature undocumented but it is also far more time-consuming to implement than it should be.

What's more troublesome for me is the fact that it apparently offers no option to "unsubscribe" from threads after you're no longer interested in them -- which means you'll continue receiving emails on threads you're done with.

Either that, or you only receive emails when someone replies to your specific posts, and maybe you won't get any email notices when people reply to other posts in the thread you want to monitor.

All in all the notifo service is still unclear to me, but from what I read so far I have a feeling that it is too limited to do what I actually want, which is to get notices on any THREAD I want to monitor -- not just get notices when someone replies to specific posts of mine.

" At the time Notifo was added, there were a bunch of threads. I think that, since that time, there's a bit of "you should be able to figure this out" involved. "

If this is the case then in my opinion it is not only an ignorant but also an arrogant attitude. Why should I be expected to think that such a feature exists when nowhere is it explained properly?

" What I provided was essentially a pointer to relevant search terms. "

I know, but at least you got me started. HN didn't even to that much -- but they certainly could have -- simply by adding a sentence to the profile page stating that push notices are available on a limited basis at notifo.com.

" I agree, it's not the clearest thing in the world. "

I know it's not your idea of a good software implementation, but for the life of me I cannot understand why a company/service like HN -- which anyone might expect to provide clear and concise information on important features -- has not posted a simple explanation that (1) notification is available, and (2) here's how to get it.

[pasbesoin]

Yep. Except that, HN was created primarily for the YC (or, YC and friends) community. It was open, and became increasingly popular, but, probably, still: It exists to do what it wants to do. I.e., it serves its own interests.

In that sense, pg has been quite -- perhaps incredibly -- accommodating. The world came and "spammed" his cool, informative, high signal/noise site.

He's tweaked and beaten back the worst of the, erm, "side effects" of this. I don't know him, but in my therefore somewhat uninformed impression, this is work he is willing to do, perhaps because it preserves the value he and parties he's concerned about find in the site.

But... He's not trying to sell you anything -- well, not anything about HN, per se. So, if a bunch of UI and instructions don't drive his own needs and goals, you can forget about them.

If people don't track and respond to comments, well, that also means a lot of... "defensive" comments that don't get made and therefore don't have to be policed. (I'm just... not even speculating, I'm making up one hypothetical result.)

I'm not writing this to defend the decisions, overly. Rather, to explain a bit of my own perspective on HN and perhaps how it might help a reader of this comment better relate to the site.

Sometimes, too, I find myself more in favor of such apparent decisions after I've observed for a while. When HN is not too accommodating, it may discourage some of those participants who make other sites increasingly into crapfests.

[owkaye]

So you're saying that by NOT giving people an easy notification system HN avoids dealing with some of the folks who might be more tempted to ruin it, right?

That makes sense ... I guess. I'm not convinced that it's a good approach to avoiding the bad guys, but it's easy.