Forum E-mail Notification Practices

[Alex S. Jones]

Howdy everyone!

A couple of forums that I've used in the past utilize a system of e-
mail updates that I've found useful, but different from the norm.
Instead of sending an e-mail every time someone responds to a thread
to which you are subscribed, they send you one e-mail as soon as
someone responds after your post, and in the e-mail they inform you
that you won't receive any more notices until you've returned to the
site to avoid filling your inbox. If you do return to the thread to
catch up, you're added to the queue to receive a notice after the next
response.

As I was experiencing these forums from the user-side, I don't recall
which packages or services had this set up, so I was wondering if
anyone could point me towards a forum or set of forums that follow
this way of doing things.

Thanks!

Alex Jones
www.SilverSpider.com

[Ryan Joy]

I know that Howard Forums do this (http://www.howardforums.com). They
appear to be using a heavily modifed vBulletin system.
(http://vbulletin.com). MediaWiki also uses that system of notification
for pages that you choose to watch.

Personally, I don't like that feature because it forces me to visit the
page/post or be left in the dark on future updates. Sometimes I get the
information I need just from the email, like when I'm only interested in
*who* posted/updated, but I still have to click through and wait for the
page to fully load to ensure that the system registers that I've
returned. I'd much prefer I get updates on a topic until I tell it to stop.

My 2¢, but I hope this helps.

-RYAN JOY
http://atxryan.com

[Holly Fortenberry]

Exactly.

Ryan Joy wrote:
> Personally, I don't like that feature because it forces me to visit the
> page/post or be left in the dark on future updates. Sometimes I get the
> information I need just from the email, like when I'm only interested in
> *who* posted/updated, but I still have to click through and wait for the
> page to fully load to ensure that the system registers that I've
> returned. I'd much prefer I get updates on a topic until I tell it to stop.
>

- Holly

http://www.hollyfortenberry.com

[Warren Cardinal]

http://forums.digitalpoint.com  has this feature also.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Warren Cardinal
www.lucidcrew.com
512.853.9693 | 901.458.5236

--
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Warren Cardinal
www.lucidcrew.com
512.853.9693 | 901.458.5236

--

[Alex S. Jones]

Thanks everyone for the pointers and the feedback. 

Ryan Joy wrote:

Personally, I don't like that feature because it forces me to visit the  page/post or be left in the dark on future updates. Sometimes I get the information I need just from the email, like when I'm only interested in *who* posted/updated, but I still have to click through and wait for the page to fully load to ensure that the system registers that I've returned. I'd much prefer I get updates on a topic until I tell it to stop.

E-mail notifications of forum posts can be a tough nut to crack. On one hand, you want to ensure that people know about activity, without forcing them to constantly return to the site, but if you're running very active forums, you don't want to inundate them with notifications. This is especially important if a single thread starts out slow and then receives a flood of traffic. For people who don't know how to group their mail by threads, set up filters and rules or use other bits of mail automation, having their inbox fill with 50, 100 or more notices during their lunch break or over night could be a major turn off. Digest messages can address part of this, but you lose some of the immediacy and feeling of activity. Plus I think people are more likely to ignore digest e-mails over time, which reduces participation. That last point has absolutely no metrics behind it, and I could be way off base. ;)

Cheers,

Alex Jones

www.SilverSpider.com

[Ryan Joy]

> Plus I think people are more likely to ignore
> digest e-mails over time, which reduces participation.

I believe this to be true as well and, in fact, have observed this
behavior in myself on many lists.

-RYAN JOY
http://atxryan.com

[Paul Menard]

Alex,

I for one agree with your last statement. I'm a member of a few Google groups. Many have overwhelm me with traffic on most days. So I switched to digest mode. Now the problem is I get the email at the end of the day with all the topics discussed. I generally find it too late to respond for some items that were discussed heavily that am. 

P- 

Paul Menard

pa...@codehooligans.com

http://codehooligans.com