Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 37 posts

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#21

Post by rlpb »

It is irresponsible to send more than one email to a user-submitted address without verifying it. Otherwise abusers can use you to get emails sent to someone they are targeting.

Since you can only send one email, it has to be the verification email.

You need to send the verification email at registration time, since users are likely to mistake it for spam if you send it at some arbitrary point later.

If, on the other hand, you have no need to send email at all, then there's no need to collect the address and thus no reason to verify it.

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#22

Post by derefr »

ColinWright wrote: post #18
shdon wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In general, I've found that users really are idiots when it comes to typing that in. One of the things my company does is organise events, sometimes free, sometimes paid for. Hundreds of people sign up. In order to be allowed entry, they will need to get an e-ticket (which is emailed to them a week in advance). My boss considers e-mail verification too much of a hassle. The result? Roughly 10% of the users mistype th…

> I've found that users really are idiots > when it comes to typing that in. They're not idiots. It is normal for people not to work at the level of precision that this sort of thing requires. Decades of work on these sorts of things have shown me that it is computer programmers who are not normal. The ability to get thousands, even millions of characters exactly right is extremely unusual, even with extended trainin…

At what rate do people screw up addresses on regular mailing envelopes?

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#23

Post by ColinWright »

derefr wrote: post #22
ColinWright wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've found that users really are idiots > when it comes to typing that in. They're not idiots. It is normal for people not to work at the level of precision that this sort of thing requires. Decades of work on these sorts of things have shown me that it is computer programmers who are not normal. The ability to get thousands, even millions of characters exactly right is extremely unusual, even with extended trainin…

At what rate do people screw up addresses on regular mailing envelopes?

I have no first hand information about overall rates, but there are dead letter offices, teams of people dedicated to finding the right destination for ill-addressed items, and I personally get snail-mail delivered to me, despite having errors in the address.

There is a resilience in snail-mail that has no equivalent in email.

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#24

Post by derefr »

ColinWright wrote: post #19

For reference, about 20 minutes ago this item triggered the flame-war detector circuit and the resulting penalization of the ranking got it dropped off the front page. Just so people know why this has 7 points in quick succession, but is not on the front page: http://hnrankings.info/6405186/

Fascinating. I'd love to see some sort of visual indication of how "flame-y" a thread is (besides just using it as an input on total hotness calculation.) In fact, could HN be alternately sorted by "least flame-y posts today", bypassing hotness? Would that, perhaps, bring all the objective how-to articles up, and push the editorials down?

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#25

Post by Kequc »

rlpb wrote: post #21

It is irresponsible to send more than one email to a user-submitted address without verifying it. Otherwise abusers can use you to get emails sent to someone they are targeting. Since you can only send one email, it has to be the verification email. You need to send the verification email at registration time, since users are likely to mistake it for spam if you send it at some arbitrary point later. If, on the other…

What about sending them a welcome email that gives them the opportunity to verify.

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#26

Post by panarky »

Verifying an address this way is called "double-opt-in". It's the most effective way to ensure the people you're sending mail to actually want to get mail from you.

If you don't do this, you'll have a lot more people marking your mail as spam, increasing your abuse score, and making it more likely that your legitimate mail will get filtered.

Source: http://mailchimp.com/resources/guides/how-to-avoid-spam-filt...

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#27

Post by rlpb »

Kequc wrote: post #25
rlpb wrote: post #21

It is irresponsible to send more than one email to a user-submitted address without verifying it. Otherwise abusers can use you to get emails sent to someone they are targeting. Since you can only send one email, it has to be the verification email. You need to send the verification email at registration time, since users are likely to mistake it for spam if you send it at some arbitrary point later. If, on the other…

What about sending them a welcome email that gives them the opportunity to verify.

Many users will see the first few words of the welcome. Few will read enough to realise they can verify. Even fewer will actually verify.

Later, your users will wonder why they're not receiving emails from you. If you send them out despite not having verification, then you've got the abuse problem again.

Abused (non-)users will just see every email as spam and ignore them, including the first welcome one. If you continue to send emails out, they will continue to be abused.

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#28

Post by rlpb »

panarky wrote: post #26

Verifying an address this way is called "double-opt-in". It's the most effective way to ensure the people you're sending mail to actually want to get mail from you. If you don't do this, you'll have a lot more people marking your mail as spam, increasing your abuse score, and making it more likely that your legitimate mail will get filtered. Source: http://mailchimp.com/resources/guides/how-to-avoid-spam-filt...

It's best to describe this as "confirmed opt-in". The term "double opt-in" can also be used by marketers to describe them having received your email twice. Using "confirmed opt-in" is unambiguous. "Double" could mean anything, and in any case registration and confirmation are two separate steps of a single opt-in.

I'm surprised to see Mailchimp using the "double" term.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opt-in_email

"The term double opt-in has also been co-opted by spammers, diluting its value."

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#29

Post by NateDad »

Uh ok... so if you don't take their email address... how do they reset their password when they (inevitably) forget it? Or do you mean they can put in whatever email they want and you'll accept it? Because if it's the latter, then you've just allowed them to cause you to spam whoever they feel like.

You have to verify email addresses. There's no other way to recover passwords. And if your users value their specific account, then they need to be able to get into that account, even if they forget their password.

Re: Please Stop Verifying My Email Address

#30

Post by Kequc »

rlpb wrote: post #27
Kequc wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about sending them a welcome email that gives them the opportunity to verify.

Many users will see the first few words of the welcome. Few will read enough to realise they can verify. Even fewer will actually verify. Later, your users will wonder why they're not receiving emails from you. If you send them out despite not having verification, then you've got the abuse problem again. Abused (non-)users will just see every email as spam and ignore them, including the first welcome one. If you cont…

Why is it better to force them to verify the email and then just start sending them email as through they confirmed that they wanted to receive any?
Post reply on HN