I love the Item Notifications but I don't always need to read them!

[Silverthorn]

I don't always read the Notification emails... because most of the time I don't have to.

*ding* Email from TUJ: "[Heartblossom] on Staghelm Alliance"

I delete the message unread and go, "Great! Heartblossom is now down to 3g, time to stock up!"

My point is, that the subject is all I need to react to and it lets me react more quickly than if I had to read the entire message.

*ding* Email from TUJ: "Market Updates on Staghelm Alliance"

Hmm, now I have to read the whole email. Couldn't we pack a few more details into the subject line? I.e. "[Heartblossom], [Silverleaf], [Peacebloom]... on Staghelm Alliance" or maybe even send out separate email notifications for each one?

> You can receive market and seller notifications via EMail and RSS for the next 1 month, 2 weeks. <

Nope, didn't read it. Gee, I haven't gotten an email from TUJ all weekend, why's that? Oh. My subscription lapsed.

Suggestion: A separate renewal email with a link to the payment option on the site maybe a week before the time runs out.

Other ideas:

How about a hyperlink in the email item notification to cancel that *specific* item notification?

Lastly, how about a link from the email notification to the item on the Remote AH? Even if you don't subscribe, you can sign into Battle.net (if you aren't already) and just look at the item.

* Ding * [Peacebloom] on Staghelm Alliance

Dear Silverthorn, [Peacebloom] on Staghelm Alliance has met your target price. See https://us.battle.net/wow/en/vault/c...&reverse=false for more details.

I guess I would open the message if it had the links to where I wanted to go!


Thanks for your consideration,
Silverthorn

[Erorus]

Thanks for the detailed suggestions. I don't play WoW anymore so I rely on suggestions like this to make the service more useful. I'll take them point by point:

I don't always read the Notification emails... because most of the time I don't have to.

*ding* Email from TUJ: "[Heartblossom] on Staghelm Alliance"

I delete the message unread and go, "Great! Heartblossom is now down to 3g, time to stock up!"

My point is, that the subject is all I need to react to and it lets me react more quickly than if I had to read the entire message.

*ding* Email from TUJ: "Market Updates on Staghelm Alliance"

Hmm, now I have to read the whole email. Couldn't we pack a few more details into the subject line? I.e. "[Heartblossom], [Silverleaf], [Peacebloom]... on Staghelm Alliance" or maybe even send out separate email notifications for each one?

I hear ya. Sometimes I'm concerned about users following too many events, then they might just end up ignoring the notification messages because they aren't useful. I used to have separate notification messages for each item, but then users would just get spammed by dozens of emails and be no better off (and the collection into one message per scan was a suggestion made to me, iirc).

Maybe if I grouped them into item type? Like, when there are multiple items triggered in the same scan, you could get a few emails with the subject "Weapons on Staghelm Alliance" and "Herbs on Staghelm Alliance" and "Recipes on Staghelm Alliance".. that way you have a better clue what to expect. Would that compromise help? I don't think a longer subject line would do many favors because they end up getting cut off on many displays anyway, and I'd like to keep the realm in there because some users watch multiple realms.

> You can receive market and seller notifications via EMail and RSS for the next 1 month, 2 weeks. <

Nope, didn't read it. Gee, I haven't gotten an email from TUJ all weekend, why's that? Oh. My subscription lapsed.

Suggestion: A separate renewal email with a link to the payment option on the site maybe a week before the time runs out.

Yeah, that was suggested a short while ago and I should really get on that.

Other ideas:

How about a hyperlink in the email item notification to cancel that *specific* item notification?

I suppose that could be done, although the item link already goes to the item's page on TUJ, where you could refine all your notifications for that item. Is it the authentication that's getting in the way, there?

Lastly, how about a link from the email notification to the item on the Remote AH? Even if you don't subscribe, you can sign into Battle.net (if you aren't already) and just look at the item.

* Ding * [Peacebloom] on Staghelm Alliance

Dear Silverthorn, [Peacebloom] on Staghelm Alliance has met your target price. See https://us.battle.net/wow/en/vault/c...&reverse=false for more details.

I guess I would open the message if it had the links to where I wanted to go!

I'm concerned about spoof emails that may look like they're from TUJ but actually aren't. I'd hate for someone to click on a link in an email then type in their battle.net credentials and think that's a good idea. A similar suggestion came up for the item pages.

[calianna]

I thought I posted here but it seems to have vanished into the ether (and I mean Diethyl ether - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). At any rate, I actually prefer having the consolidated message. If the email body were somehow divided by category, that's fine, but I wouldn't want additional emails.

[Erorus]

Just wanna pop in to say I'm still thinking about a way to solve this. It'd be an option so users can maintain the current message format/frequency, but others can choose to get messages split by category.

[Silverthorn]

>> How about a hyperlink in the email item notification to cancel that *specific* item notification?
>I suppose that could be done, although the item link already goes to the item's page on TUJ, where you could refine all your notifications for that item. Is it the authentication that's getting in the way, there? <

It's a matter of workflow. If you have a non-trivial set of notifications, you need to a) sign in (it always forgets my credentials), b) search for the item by name (having previously cut it from the source email, then c) keep searching to the right realm/faction, then d) remove the notification you no longer want, and then e) go back to the original email and repeat the process for any other entries. I often simply delete the email, especially if I'm checking my email from my tablet.

Compare this to the hyperlink at the bottom for rejecting all further notifications from TUJ-- a highly unlikely situation considering the message that contains it only comes as part of a paid subscription. Of course, it's possible that if someone were to forward their notification to someone who was unethical, the unethical person could delete all their notifications simply by reading the instructions at the bottom-- no authentication required. It's also very close to the Delete button on my webmail browser (which could be easy to fumble-finger on my table), but I appreciate that one has to also copy/paste a code as well, so I'm not too worried I'll tap it by mistake.

>> Lastly, how about a link from the email notification to the item on the Remote AH? Even if you don't subscribe, you can sign into Battle.net (if you aren't already)
>> I guess I would open the message if it had the links to where I wanted to go!
> I'm concerned about spoof emails that may look like they're from TUJ but actually aren't. I'd hate for someone to click on a link in an email then type in their battle.net credentials and think that's a good idea. A similar suggestion came up for the item pages. <

1) Note the https:// prefix on the original example I used. It's not impossible to spoof, but much, much more unlikely.

2) The first line of the notifications-- for me, "Hello, Silverthorn!" by itself gives me the authenticity of the message. It proves that you know both my handle and my email address, and you also know what I'm looking for and on what server. There's only one place all this information exists and that's TUJ! I don't see how anyone could spoof all these things without hacking TUJ.

3) BTW, This might be a good opportunity to emphasize that one should not forward the email notifications-- not only does it deprive you of potential revenue, but it could open the user (even presently) to spoofing should someone see one of their notifications.

4) How about if the security were increased? What if there was a way to ~programatically~ determine a notification came from TUJ and no one else? Facebook (and I hate Facebook) has an interesting solution to this. I can't say as to whether or not anyone is trying to spoof TUJ, but there certainly are people spoofing Facebook every day and every single one of those bogus messages lands in my spam folder, but the real notifications are not removed from my inbox.

How does this work? Instead of sending my notifications from, say, admin@facebook.com, they come from xyz12345abc@facebook.com. Why is this a good thing? They always use that same string of letters and numbers when they send *me* (and only me) email from Facebook. Each user has their own secret combination of letters and numbers. I simply whitelist that particular sender and reject anything else that purports to come from Facebook without that secret combination.

No security is perfect (ask Verisign!), but there are reasonable risks and unreasonable risks. Maybe you need to add a disclaimer to your service that simply states that reasonable precautions have been taken, but it is up to the user to exercise due diligence when clicking links from email. When in doubt, type in the URL yourself or use a bookmark.

Thanks for your consideration!
Silverthorn

P.S. I wish this forum had some sort of email notification for responses to threads I've posted to...

[Erorus]

This response may sound a bit nasty, but don't take it personally. I'm having one of those days where I hate people.

>> How about a hyperlink in the email item notification to cancel that *specific* item notification?
>I suppose that could be done, although the item link already goes to the item's page on TUJ, where you could refine all your notifications for that item. Is it the authentication that's getting in the way, there? <

It's a matter of workflow. If you have a non-trivial set of notifications, you need to a) sign in (it always forgets my credentials), b) search for the item by name (having previously cut it from the source email, then c) keep searching to the right realm/faction, then d) remove the notification you no longer want, and then e) go back to the original email and repeat the process for any other entries. I often simply delete the email, especially if I'm checking my email from my tablet.

Assuming you're not logged in:

1) click the link to the item in the email
2) load the item's page
3) login via the "login" link at the top of the page (or one of the 4 shortcut icons next to it)
4) click the top link "previous page" in the "navigation history" list to go back to the item's page
5) scroll to and remove/change the notification

For additional items, skip steps 3 and 4.

Compare this to the hyperlink at the bottom for rejecting all further notifications from TUJ-- a highly unlikely situation considering the message that contains it only comes as part of a paid subscription.

That link at the bottom is attached to every email we send, not just notifications. It's there to prevent abuse from people who enter email addresses they don't control.

Of course, it's possible that if someone were to forward their notification to someone who was unethical, the unethical person could delete all their notifications simply by reading the instructions at the bottom-- no authentication required.

That's not what that does. It simply removes that email address from all accounts and puts it on a list so the site never sends an email to that address again. You can't login or edit notifications with that link.

It's also very close to the Delete button on my webmail browser (which could be easy to fumble-finger on my table), but I appreciate that one has to also copy/paste a code as well, so I'm not too worried I'll tap it by mistake.

Sucks that your mail client isn't designed properly.

>> Lastly, how about a link from the email notification to the item on the Remote AH? Even if you don't subscribe, you can sign into Battle.net (if you aren't already)
>> I guess I would open the message if it had the links to where I wanted to go!
> I'm concerned about spoof emails that may look like they're from TUJ but actually aren't. I'd hate for someone to click on a link in an email then type in their battle.net credentials and think that's a good idea. A similar suggestion came up for the item pages. <

1) Note the https:// prefix on the original example I used. It's not impossible to spoof, but much, much more unlikely.

People don't read. They don't care what the URL is. Pretend that visitors don't know what URLs are. (And most don't, judging by how many hits I get from people searching "undermine journal" to get to the site.)

Today, someone says, "My battle.net account was hacked, I clicked a link in a notification email that went to battle.net and I logged in and the next day my toons were naked and I lost all my gold." I'd rather reply, "TUJ doesn't send emails that go to battle.net, ever." instead of "oh, well, did you check that the URL was going to the right place? are you sure?"

2) The first line of the notifications-- for me, "Hello, Silverthorn!" by itself gives me the authenticity of the message. It proves that you know both my handle and my email address, and you also know what I'm looking for and on what server. There's only one place all this information exists and that's TUJ! I don't see how anyone could spoof all these things without hacking TUJ.

That is the purpose of saying hello with the username, another little indication that the email is probably genuine. Still, if that line was missing, most people wouldn't notice.

4) How about if the security were increased? What if there was a way to ~programatically~ determine a notification came from TUJ and no one else? Facebook (and I hate Facebook) has an interesting solution to this. I can't say as to whether or not anyone is trying to spoof TUJ, but there certainly are people spoofing Facebook every day and every single one of those bogus messages lands in my spam folder, but the real notifications are not removed from my inbox.

How does this work? Instead of sending my notifications from, say, admin@facebook.com, they come from xyz12345abc@facebook.com. Why is this a good thing? They always use that same string of letters and numbers when they send *me* (and only me) email from Facebook. Each user has their own secret combination of letters and numbers. I simply whitelist that particular sender and reject anything else that purports to come from Facebook without that secret combination.

That's interesting, and probably doable if I wanted to wade into the postfix config swamp again. Still, most people don't care where the email comes from.

Basically, lose all faith in your users, then cover your ass. They don't care who sent the email (and from is easily spoofed anyway). They care a little bit who it's addressed to. They don't care about the subject, or about minor details in the message. If it looks mostly like other emails they've seen, they'll accept it. And it's not their fault, because how many emails do you read where you examine every header and line with a magnifying glass?

No security is perfect (ask Verisign!), but there are reasonable risks and unreasonable risks. Maybe you need to add a disclaimer to your service that simply states that reasonable precautions have been taken, but it is up to the user to exercise due diligence when clicking links from email. When in doubt, type in the URL yourself or use a bookmark.

All it takes is one well-placed dude to announce on some forums, "I was ripped off and hacked by The Undermine Journal" and the site loses reputation. I'm not even talking customers here, just losing users in general. Unless I have an ironclad response, like "that's impossible, we never have links to battle.net for this very reason," even if I'm right, people will lose trust. And what's the benefit gained from taking that risk? You get a link in an email that goes right to your auction house on battle.net.

Here's a tip.

Bookmark it.

[calianna]

Click on "Thread Tools" at the top, then "Subscribe to this thread...". There is an option to receive emails to the email on record for every update. I haven't tried it before, but I would assume it works.

[Erorus]

I had an idea for this yesterday.. specifically, knowing whether a market notification message (titled "Market Updates on Realmname Faction") is worthy of your immediate attention.

I record when each notification is started, or the last time that notification was sent. What if the notifications you get were broken up into categories based on the last time they fired? So, for example, if you're watching a volatile item, it would go in a regular "Market Updates on Realmname Faction" message. If you were also watching for a somewhat rare item (a companion pet, maybe), if that notification didn't fire in the past week, it'd say "Uncommon! Market Updates on Realmname Faction" in the subject line.

I figure there'd be "Uncommon", "Rare", "Epic", and "Legendary" categories of notifications. That way, when scanning your subject lines, if you see an "Epic! Market Updates" message, you may want to click it because it's something that hasn't happened in quite a while.

If there's just one item for the notification, it would say the item name in the subject line as usual.

Of course, this setup would be optional, so you could skip all this and keep the current notification setup (everything new from each scan goes into 1 email).

Am I on the right track?

[Silverthorn]

I don't want to shoot down any changes towards more flexibility-- it couldn't hurt to add the category, except if that made it even more unlikely that say, the first 20 characters of the first two or three items could be put in the subject instead.

There are two main scenarios for my typical use of TUJ notifications. First being items that meet my price qualifications and the second being items that show up rarely on the AH at any price. Neither situation really favors the item color/rarity as part of the notification. Probably about 80% of my notifications are for white items, with 15% being greens, and the remaining 5% rares/epics. No legendaries. I'd be more excited about Embersilk Cloth meeting my threshold than by a purple item on my list that appears for the first time for 70k.

Overall, my notification usage has gone down as the old ones eventually drop off from lack of use and I haven't been real aggressive about putting them back. So, for me, simply firing individual messages for less than 3 market updates as separate messages would probably be fine.

Thanks,
Silverthorn

[Erorus]

There are two main scenarios for my typical use of TUJ notifications. First being items that meet my price qualifications and the second being items that show up rarely on the AH at any price. Neither situation really favors the item color/rarity as part of the notification. Probably about 80% of my notifications are for white items, with 15% being greens, and the remaining 5% rares/epics. No legendaries. I'd be more excited about Embersilk Cloth meeting my threshold than by a purple item on my list that appears for the first time for 70k.

Perhaps my category names were poorly chosen. "Uncommon", "Rare", "Epic", and "Legendary" categories of notifications refer to how long it's been since the last notification was triggered, not the item quality. I just couldn't think of another short way to say "hey this hasn't happened in 2 weeks" other than "rare", then that got me to thinking about the item quality adjectives that are already familiar.

No prefix: these notifications were started/triggered less than 4 days ago.
Uncommon: these notifications were started/triggered less than 11 days ago.
Rare: these notifications were started/triggered less than 23 days ago.
Epic: these notifications were started/triggered less than 49 days ago.
Legendary: these notifications were started/triggered over 48 days ago.