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Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

talktomel.com

21–30 of 48 posts

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#21
post #10

> Protect your privacy > Just link your name, home address, and phone number for this random company Yeah, no thanks. Edited to clarify for those who may be unfamiliar with the concept of PII.

Well, the spammers sending you junk mail already have all this? Not much to lose here :)

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#22
post #21
post #10

> Protect your privacy > Just link your name, home address, and phone number for this random company Yeah, no thanks. Edited to clarify for those who may be unfamiliar with the concept of PII.

Well, the spammers sending you junk mail already have all this? Not much to lose here :)

Except for a widening of the attack surface... this goes further than "nothing to hide".

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#23

We should all have a personal postal code that would link to our current address. When we change our address we would link the postal code to the new directory. By having this the companies would not know where we live and we would have a place to select the mail we want.

That would be nice. However, the postal service is required to deliver your mail, and they make money by doing so. They have no interest in reducing mail and in fact have been advertising their “Every Door Direct Mail” service which is nearly impossible to opt out of. Look for “EDDM” label on mail and you’ll see what I mean.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#24

I really like the concept of "text this number to perform action". There was a post a few months back about a postcard creation service where you just text a photo.

How do you "text a photo"? Does this imply iMessage or MMS? I'm based in Europe and nobody uses SMS or iMessage here, so genuine question.

In the Messages app, next to the text field, there is a camera icon.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you "text a photo"? Does this imply iMessage or MMS? I'm based in Europe and nobody uses SMS or iMessage here, so genuine question.

In the Messages app, next to the text field, there is a camera icon.

:D well, _that_ implies iMessage and/or MMS I guess.

As I said, nobody in central Europe uses that afaik.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#26
post #21
post #10

> Protect your privacy > Just link your name, home address, and phone number for this random company Yeah, no thanks. Edited to clarify for those who may be unfamiliar with the concept of PII.

Well, the spammers sending you junk mail already have all this? Not much to lose here :)

Spammer mail takes the shotgun approach, it isn't targeted at all except very roughly by zip code (restaurant coupons work this way). Everybody in my building gets the same junk mail.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#27
post #10

> Protect your privacy > Just link your name, home address, and phone number for this random company Yeah, no thanks. Edited to clarify for those who may be unfamiliar with the concept of PII.

Totally understand the privacy concern. If it helps, I'm a person, not a company—and I put my photo and personal links right on the homepage so folks can decide if they would like to trust me with this sensitive information.

It's not 2004 anymore, people may need a bit more than your photo and links in exchange for what you're asking.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#28

Unrelated to the project, I'm excited for AI-generated art to get better or decline in popularity. The art on the homepage and its Stripe checkout pages give me the heebie-jeebies for some reason.

> for some reason

That reason has two names: Dribbble and Behance. That's where all this 'AI' website art and assets come from.

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#29
post #11
post #10

> Protect your privacy > Just link your name, home address, and phone number for this random company Yeah, no thanks. Edited to clarify for those who may be unfamiliar with the concept of PII.

Do you really consider your address private information?

There's a big difference between having one's name and address appear on a public land registry database, vs just handing it to an SF tech startup. At some point that data will monetized. Remember unroll.me? [0]

If this organization registers as a nonprofit, that's one thing. Outside of that, I wouldn't trust such services any further than I could throw a pitch deck claiming to make the world a better place, with your PII.

[0] https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/17/21027159/unroll-me-email...

Re: Show HN: Mel – The missing unsubscribe button for physical mail

#30
post #28

Unrelated to the project, I'm excited for AI-generated art to get better or decline in popularity. The art on the homepage and its Stripe checkout pages give me the heebie-jeebies for some reason.

> for some reason That reason has two names: Dribbble and Behance. That's where all this 'AI' website art and assets come from.

The image with the bird and the mailbox I generated directly from DALL•E. The asset on the Stripe checkout page for the Assistant plan I generated using Midjourney. All of these assets are placeholders while my partner is working on drawing a custom mascot to represent Mel.
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