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I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

alexanderell.is

261–270 of 366 posts

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#261
While Apple should be able to enforce this at an App Store level, it seems to me there’s a pretty simple heuristic that could be applied as a per-app notification setting:

“Mute notifications if I haven’t used this app in more than 24 hours”

That ought to catch the majority of notification abuse, and to tighten it even further, the inactivity periods could be configurable (24, 8, 2 hours, etc).

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#262
post #23

My rule is: if I get a single notification that I find useless, I'll immediately disable that notification channel (I'm on Android; I'm not sure if iOS has a concept of channel-specific settings) for that app. Even if the channel can include useful notifications, as the article discusses. If the app doesn't bother to categorize its notifications into channels at all, I turn off its notifications entirely, and I won't…

I follow the same rule. But I will also then go one star review it. I will also one-star review any app that prompts me to review it by first asking me if I like it (sneaky sneaky!)

That sounds harsh. I kindly ask if they want to leave a review to support me in my app. What's wrong with that? Haven't received any complaints and I got a lot of nice reviews I presume I wouldn't have gotten otherwise.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#263
post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could stop using Uber and Uber Eats.

You could also be a hermit and live in the woods. Thats not really the point though. For paid services, I think it’s entirely reasonable to say that you don’t want to see ads.

I mean I went with "own a car and pick up food myself" instead of the whole hermitage thing, but to each their own

there have always been ads when I go to the movies, and in the magazines I pay good money for. nothing about paying for a product should give you an expectation of ad free, that's a very slim niche of a business model where they pummel you with ads until you subscribe a la spotify and youtube, but its not the norm at all

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spoiler - they probably know and don't want to destroy their reliable spam channel. I turn them off and either keep the app open when I've ordered a car, or temporarily turn them back on while ubering and turn them back off when I get a trash notification. This definitely strikes me as one of those comments you see on HN that is wildly impractical at scale, but it's what I do.

Which is why strict app store policy enforcement is the only way to really end this.

That won't happen. This is the most significant advantage the app stores have over PWAs.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#266

I highly recommend installing Buzzkill for those on Android. In addition to built-in per-channel settings, Buzzkill allows you to create rules to auto-dismiss or do certain actions depending on the title or description of the notification, using basic matching or regex. It also gives you a nicer view of notification history, with more days and scrubbing across time if you ever want to revisit past notifications. http…

Can't recommend buzzkill enough. I didl't notice how notifications had turned into e-mail until I got this spam filter.

It's also wonderful for letting you bundle notifications (like family group texts) to be delivered every twelve hours.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#267
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been struggling with the Uber app and Uber Eats who has been sending me ads which I found no way to disable. My problem is that I do want notifications for when my driver has arrived.

I deleted the Uber app and stopped using their service specifically because there was no way to turn off only their spammy marketing push notifications, and I didn't want to turn off all push and miss a ride, so there was no way for me to meaningfully use their service. It's ok, I have other options to get a ride.

I found a way to disable marketing notifications but it was buried in their menus. Settings > Privacy > Notifications. Definitely shouldn't be under privacy, that makes no sense.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#268
post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That has absolutely nothing to do with notifications and pop ups.

You’re right, but only if the company wouldn’t track whether you’ve seen or even received that message. So yes, general or even contextual messages would be allowed, but “You haven’t seen X in 9 days” would imply processing personal data for marketing purposes.

With iOS, they send the message to Apple’s servers, Apple sends the message to the user’s device and the device decides whether to display the pop up based on the user’s settings. Neither the third party app nor Apple knows whether the message has been seen unless the user clicks on the message that causes it to open the app.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could also be a hermit and live in the woods. Thats not really the point though. For paid services, I think it’s entirely reasonable to say that you don’t want to see ads.

I mean I went with "own a car and pick up food myself" instead of the whole hermitage thing, but to each their own there have always been ads when I go to the movies, and in the magazines I pay good money for. nothing about paying for a product should give you an expectation of ad free, that's a very slim niche of a business model where they pummel you with ads until you subscribe a la spotify and youtube, but its no…

I would too. But the fees for trying to get my car in checked baggage when I fly for business or vacations are insane.

Re: I only care about the helpful notifications, not the promotional ones

#270
post #260
post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go to account -> settings -> privacy -> notifications and you can turn off all the marketing notifications on iOS too for Uber / Uber Eats.

That turns it off for the whole app, not only marketing stuff.

Settings -> notifications -> Uber.

Turn off Lock Screen, Notifications, Banners.

Leave on “Time Sensitive Notifications”

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