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United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

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Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#71

Post by tsotha »

timbre wrote: post #48
fishtoaster wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, to receive USPS mail you need an address. Permanent travelers, the homeless, people in the process of moving, moving- these people are difficult or impossible to reach by mail, but any time they pop into a library or internet cafe, they have an email address. I would say that /that/ is the great equalizer, more than remote people with mailboxes in this day and age.

Permanent travelers, the homeless, etc. can receive mail at the post office by general delivery. (Letters addressed to J. Doe GENERAL DELIVERY Anytown, Anystate 12345 are held for pickup at the post office for 30 days.) This was once common knowledge, but seems to be less so these days.

Wow. I didn't know they still did that.

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#72

Post by ericd »

jdthomas wrote: post #67

If the USPS wants more usage, rather than marketing, they need to "innovate" just a tad. There is a value-add service that I really wish the USPS would provide. It is very simple too... I would like an abstraction layer for my address. I am still fairly young and move semi-frequently -- every few years. I want a static address that I can give to my bank, DMV, anything that needs to mail me things. This address will a…

Earth Class Mail does this, but I agree, it would be really nice if that was a standard option.

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#73

Post by tsotha »

hammerdr wrote: post #16

This is something that is very close to my family so I have a bit of experience with how the Postal Service is going. The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii. In this, physical mail is the big equalizer. The USPS is also required to deliver mail to even the most re…

>The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii.

That's not a big sell if you're sending a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I don't see any reason for rates not to reflect costs - why am I subsidizing other people every time I send a letter?

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#74

Post by yesimahuman »

Duff wrote: post #53
extension wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly all my mail ends up at addresses from my past. If it wasn't for e-bills, I would never receive (my own) bills. And I have received mountains of mail from countless former tenants at every place I've lived, mail they will never see. The post doesn't seem very reliable to me.

That's kind of your problem. If you used an old email address, you wouldn't get e-bills either.

The difference is I don't change my email once every year or so.

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#75

Post by pork »

jdthomas wrote: post #67

If the USPS wants more usage, rather than marketing, they need to "innovate" just a tad. There is a value-add service that I really wish the USPS would provide. It is very simple too... I would like an abstraction layer for my address. I am still fairly young and move semi-frequently -- every few years. I want a static address that I can give to my bank, DMV, anything that needs to mail me things. This address will a…

Hey, while we're on USPS feature requests, this one is a bit overdue: SPAM FILTERING.

Allow me to blacklist certain senders, that's all.

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#76

Post by freehunter »

tsotha wrote: post #73
hammerdr wrote: post #16

This is something that is very close to my family so I have a bit of experience with how the Postal Service is going. The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii. In this, physical mail is the big equalizer. The USPS is also required to deliver mail to even the most re…

>The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii. That's not a big sell if you're sending a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I don't see any reason for rates not to reflect costs - why am I subsidizing other people every time I send a letter?

1. You always know how much a standard letter will cost, no matter where it's going. If you're mailing 100 letters to 100 locations, they all cost the same. Standard exemptions apply for rate changes every few years and for heavy items.

2. Based on the cash flow of the USPS, you're not subsidizing anyone by buying stamps :)

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#77

Post by rubidium »

tsotha wrote: post #73
hammerdr wrote: post #16

This is something that is very close to my family so I have a bit of experience with how the Postal Service is going. The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii. In this, physical mail is the big equalizer. The USPS is also required to deliver mail to even the most re…

>The big sell of the postal service is that it costs the same amount to send a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles as it does to send a letter from the bayou in Louisiana to Honolulu, Hawaii. That's not a big sell if you're sending a letter from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I don't see any reason for rates not to reflect costs - why am I subsidizing other people every time I send a letter?

Because, in theory, you care that they can vote and mail in their taxes at a reasonable price, even from places that are economically unfeasible to have a mail delivery system. Whether you actually care is up to you, but the US government has decided US citizens care.

It's similar to the gov't money that was paid to run telephone lines to rural areas (ref: freeconference.com article from the other day).

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#78

Post by freehunter »

timbre wrote: post #48
fishtoaster wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, to receive USPS mail you need an address. Permanent travelers, the homeless, people in the process of moving, moving- these people are difficult or impossible to reach by mail, but any time they pop into a library or internet cafe, they have an email address. I would say that /that/ is the great equalizer, more than remote people with mailboxes in this day and age.

Permanent travelers, the homeless, etc. can receive mail at the post office by general delivery. (Letters addressed to J. Doe GENERAL DELIVERY Anytown, Anystate 12345 are held for pickup at the post office for 30 days.) This was once common knowledge, but seems to be less so these days.

So just by writing GENERAL DELIVERY instead of a street address, it gets held? I suppose the kick here is that the person needs to know they're getting mail. Do they need an ID to pick it up?

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#79

Post by ojilles »

jdthomas wrote: post #67

If the USPS wants more usage, rather than marketing, they need to "innovate" just a tad. There is a value-add service that I really wish the USPS would provide. It is very simple too... I would like an abstraction layer for my address. I am still fairly young and move semi-frequently -- every few years. I want a static address that I can give to my bank, DMV, anything that needs to mail me things. This address will a…

Man, I've been searching for this (but I live in Europe, so across country borders, there is no hope unfortunately).

Instead what USPS could do is actually scan all this stuff and email me a PDF. 80% of the snail mail I receive I don't need to have physically anyways. For those pieces that need physical delivery -> check a checkbox and USPS could send it to my current address. (Notice how that also solves the addressing indirection?)

Re: United States Postal Service tries to compete with Google using fear

#80

Post by nate »

jdthomas wrote: post #67

If the USPS wants more usage, rather than marketing, they need to "innovate" just a tad. There is a value-add service that I really wish the USPS would provide. It is very simple too... I would like an abstraction layer for my address. I am still fairly young and move semi-frequently -- every few years. I want a static address that I can give to my bank, DMV, anything that needs to mail me things. This address will a…

Absolutely! I could have kept adding more and more too. But yes, this is a perfect one that they could turn on and I bet everyone would pay something per year to get a virtual address. And what's great is that it's a virtual address that the government knows about. So they can still serve me papers and collect taxes and all that government stuff. But I don't have to worry about some guy coming over to my house because I pissed him accidentally on Yelp and he found my address from some email footer I sent.
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