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AMP for email is bad

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Re: AMP for email is bad

#141

Post by Dylan16807 »

magnusss wrote: post #140
Dylan16807 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't object to some scripting, I object to emails that can change their contents between views.

Any email with an img tag can change its contents between views. AMP is not required to do that. The img content is retrieved from a server (or a proxy) every time the email is opened, and that content can change between opens.

Also bad, but gmail at least tries a bit to anonymize and cache.

But sure, what they should be doing with amp is fixing that, not making it worse.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#142

Post by jvolkman »

landryraccoon wrote: post #132
jchw wrote: post #48

Every thread about AMP on Hacker News goes exactly the same way. It’s annoying, repetitive. But here’s the thing: while I get criticisms about AMP for web, pretty much none of them apply to AMP for email. The author of this article keeps bringing up points about AMP for web as if they have anything to do with AMP for email. AMP for email basically does one thing: it enables interactive emails without allowing arbitra…

Web pages don't have any expectation of durable persistence between views. If I go to Hackernews or Facebook or Google, I expect that the front page will not look the same as it did yesterday. Email does have an expectation of durable persistence; in fact I would argue that that is a critical feature of email - If you send me an email I can always return to my email inbox and if I open the email I will always see the…

Or, maybe Amazon will helpfully add an alert to your order receipt when the shipment is unexpectedly delayed?

At any rate, the other MIME parts aren't gone. In gmail you can just click "show HTML message".

Re: AMP for email is bad

#143

Post by javagram »

eikenberry wrote: post #118
javagram wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that html email is used because it works a lot better (i.e. people DO want it) Try sending your marketing campaign as plain text and then try sending it as carefully crafted HTML mail. Unless your target is a specific small segment of users who love text/plain, HTML will do better and make you more money.

If your argument for HTML email is spam, then I think you just defeated yourself.

“Spam” is unwanted mail, plenty of people opt into marketing emails for whatever reason. Just because you personally don’t like it doesn’t mean no one does.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#144

Post by hn23 »

jchw wrote: post #122
hn23 wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only MUA where reply is complicated is Outlook because it is still not possible to quote easily. Plaintext mail should not just continue to function. A plain text mail should be default.

>The only MUA where reply is complicated is Outlook because it is still not possible to quote easily. No, there’s certainly complications regardless of client. For example, verifying the reply email is actually from the user, handling top posting vs inline replies, etc. Lots of these systems work around issues by adding things like “REPLY BELOW THIS LINE” and instead of CCing multiple users, sending individual emails…

Seems you try using mail for a purpose it was not invented for? I think mail should be what it is: an electronic analogon for real mails. If you send "real" mail you have no control how/when/if I am going to reply or even read it. If you want this type of control, use another tool. I guess this is why Jehovah's Witness ring the door but do not send mail;)

>> Plaintext mail should not just continue to function. A plain text mail should be default.

> Well, I just do not agree with that.

I referred to the fact that you mean it "should" work for a foreseeable future. I mean it should work with plaintext for ever without require a user to parse $scriptLanguageOfTheYear relying on framework $fancyShitOfTheYear. We have been there - remember IE6.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#145

Post by cromwellian »

josteink wrote: post #119
cromwellian wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Email already has HTML in it and has for decades, hell, there were startups dedicated to it like Zaplets et al. AMP doesn't enable HTML email, it was already enabled by Outlook 97.

But not HTML applications . JavaScript is banned. Dynamic content is banned. This is good. We should aim to keep it this way.

Actually, you're wrong. Zaplets made this work somehow, and were funded to the tune of $90+ million in VC money. Perhaps they just used an iframe or , but never the less, Zaplets offered interactive HTML forms inside of mail that worked in Outlook. (https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2000/0612/6514218a.html#224241...) AMP Email is largely following what the Outlook 97 client was capable of.

There's no apriori reason why a federated messaging system needs to be non-interactive. It's possible to support both immutability and dynamism. You're making assertions that something should be a certain way without actually justifying it.

You could at least provide some formal justification, like you want Email to be an immutable ledger or something. But the idea that Email can't evolve and change and should stay exactly the way it was, pretty much assures its death in the dust bin of history, the same way we lost USENET, LISTSERV, or even XMPP. Old standards didn't evolve quickly, users wanted silly features while neckbeards said don't violate purity of my abstraction.

And today, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, WeChat, iMessage, et al, are the predominant messaging platforms, and email is for spam, receipts, and grand parents.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#146

Post by gopkarthik »

jvolkman wrote: post #142
landryraccoon wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Web pages don't have any expectation of durable persistence between views. If I go to Hackernews or Facebook or Google, I expect that the front page will not look the same as it did yesterday. Email does have an expectation of durable persistence; in fact I would argue that that is a critical feature of email - If you send me an email I can always return to my email inbox and if I open the email I will always see the…

Or, maybe Amazon will helpfully add an alert to your order receipt when the shipment is unexpectedly delayed? At any rate, the other MIME parts aren't gone. In gmail you can just click "show HTML message".

> maybe Amazon will helpfully add an alert to your order receipt when the shipment is unexpectedly delayed?

Alternatively Amazon could send a followup email. This way the sequence of events is preserved and not dependent on the sender.

I currently use email as a immutable list of events that have occurred in my life but with this I can no longer continue to do so.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#147

Post by vxNsr »

magnusss wrote: post #140
Dylan16807 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't object to some scripting, I object to emails that can change their contents between views.

Any email with an img tag can change its contents between views. AMP is not required to do that. The img content is retrieved from a server (or a proxy) every time the email is opened, and that content can change between opens.

To add to this, citi recently starting using this to notify you when you reached your spending bonus after signing up for a new card. I've seen it used to load gifs that are countdown timers that once the final time is reached will always display 00:00:00.

I dislike this immensely if only because as others have said it ruins the immutability of email. But it does already exist.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#148

Post by landryraccoon »

jvolkman wrote: post #142
landryraccoon wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Web pages don't have any expectation of durable persistence between views. If I go to Hackernews or Facebook or Google, I expect that the front page will not look the same as it did yesterday. Email does have an expectation of durable persistence; in fact I would argue that that is a critical feature of email - If you send me an email I can always return to my email inbox and if I open the email I will always see the…

Or, maybe Amazon will helpfully add an alert to your order receipt when the shipment is unexpectedly delayed? At any rate, the other MIME parts aren't gone. In gmail you can just click "show HTML message".

> At any rate, the other MIME parts aren't gone. In gmail you can just click "show HTML message"

If dynamically loaded content becomes widely supported, why would that mime part continue to exist? The web already doesn’t work without javascript. Why wouldn’t email quickly follow suit as well?

Re: AMP for email is bad

#149

Post by hexo »

WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #54
ori_b wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You cant do more than basic html like displaying text and pictures. Embedding videos? Slideshows for products? Interactivity like forms? Display realtime information? EVERYTHING IS NOT POSSIBLE! But it will be with amp4email. Alright, you've convinced me: AMP for email needs to be killed.

> Embedding videos? Let me open this email... oh noes, it's autoplay video. > Slideshows for products? Yes, more marketing garbage! > Interactivity like forms? Your password is about to expire, change it below or some garbage that will only make shit more insecure. > Display realtime information Blow me.

Exactly. Couldn't have been said better. Kill AMP completely and don't even think about touching email with that.

Re: AMP for email is bad

#150

Post by dngray »

landryraccoon wrote: post #132
jchw wrote: post #48

Every thread about AMP on Hacker News goes exactly the same way. It’s annoying, repetitive. But here’s the thing: while I get criticisms about AMP for web, pretty much none of them apply to AMP for email. The author of this article keeps bringing up points about AMP for web as if they have anything to do with AMP for email. AMP for email basically does one thing: it enables interactive emails without allowing arbitra…

Web pages don't have any expectation of durable persistence between views. If I go to Hackernews or Facebook or Google, I expect that the front page will not look the same as it did yesterday. Email does have an expectation of durable persistence; in fact I would argue that that is a critical feature of email - If you send me an email I can always return to my email inbox and if I open the email I will always see the…

What I am curious to know is what stops someone using this to get around spam filtering.

Ie send something that gets through the spam filter then change it later.

Also on another note I'm pretty sure google marks your emails as spam if you say things like "getting off gmail" or "switching provider".

I have been sending emails to my mother for ages from my own domain (and email server), none of them have ever been marked as spam. One day I sent her an email about switching provider with a mention of some of the good ones on privacytools.io.

That email remarkably got marked as spam. It is a good thing she checks her spam box, but now I think I have all the evidence I need to get her to switch. Also, none of the subsequent emails I ever sent her got marked as spam.

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