Warning for MeMail to disabled accounts

April 7, 2013 2:11 PM

If a user has a disabled account, the user's profile page lacks a link to send MeFi Mail, effectively preventing us from sending that user MeMail. But most of the MeMails I send are via replies. When I reply, there is no warning if the user has disabled the account. It can be a little surprising to realize that one has been sending messages essentially into the ether, although I presume the messages are preserved for the user's return. Can we get a warning when sending a MeMail to a user with a disabled account?
posted by grouse to Feature Requests at 2:11 PM (29 comments total)

Huh. Interesting. Yeah, that seems like a darned good idea, at least to me anyway.
posted by koeselitz at 2:36 PM on April 7, 2013

Agreed. This seems wise. I know that MeMail is not designed to be a full-fledged email system, but an alert that your message might have hit the bit bucket seems worth having.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 2:41 PM on April 7, 2013

Huh, that's definitely a use case we should take a look at.
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 2:46 PM on April 7, 2013 [4 favorites]

We could charge $1 to send a mail to their IRL email.

*ducks *
posted by arcticseal at 3:19 PM on April 7, 2013 [13 favorites]

$5 obviously. What are we, chumps?
posted by leotrotsky at 3:28 PM on April 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

Good catch, grouse!
posted by anotherpanacea at 3:49 PM on April 7, 2013

Useful pony!
posted by mintcake! at 3:56 PM on April 7, 2013

I presume the messages are preserved for the user's return.

Yes, the messages are stored and would be available when they get back. There's no way to know when/if someone is coming back though, so we should probably do something different there. We'll give it some thought and make a decision at some point this next week. Thanks for the heads up.
posted by pb (staff) at 4:09 PM on April 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

we should probably do something different there

Markov chain auto-reply.
posted by ryanrs at 4:16 PM on April 7, 2013 [10 favorites]

your message might have hit the bit bucket

hit the bit bucket!
hit the bit bucket!
mail don't come back?
never mind, fuck it!
it's all a buncha corn
so go ahead shuck it!
hit the bit bucket!
hit the bit bucket!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:19 PM on April 7, 2013 [1 favorite]

I thought it was $20? But I haven't been paying attention.
posted by trip and a half at 4:39 PM on April 7, 2013

Can you get The MetaFilter on a CD-ROM? Asking for a friend.
posted by Wordshore at 4:57 PM on April 7, 2013 [5 favorites]

Useful pony!

This pony helps deliver mail. Where have I heard of that before?
posted by benito.strauss at 4:59 PM on April 7, 2013 [4 favorites]

Can you get The MetaFilter on a CD-ROM? Asking for a friend.

I tried but I got back all these Roger Waters bootlegs and a MAME set from 1999.
posted by griphus at 6:00 PM on April 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

I hear radio waves in my head.
posted by mintcake! at 6:57 PM on April 7, 2013

I hear Talking Heads on my radio.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:29 PM on April 7, 2013

I hear Radiohead while I'm talking.

Somebody turn that stereo down.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:17 PM on April 7, 2013

I'm on a Mexican, whoa-oh, radio!
posted by ChuraChura at 8:17 PM on April 7, 2013 [2 favorites]

Radio Radio
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:18 PM on April 7, 2013

Radio play my favorite song
posted by John Cohen at 9:03 PM on April 7, 2013

We listened to it twice 'cause the DJ was asleep.
posted by ApathyGirl at 9:31 PM on April 7, 2013 [6 favorites]

People would still get the messages if they have MeMail forwarding messages to their e-mail address, I assume, so at least some of those people are getting the messages. Probably.
posted by dg at 10:25 PM on April 7, 2013

On the Radio, oh whoa-oh-oh-oh, on the radio
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:46 AM on April 8, 2013 [1 favorite]

Can you get The MetaFilter on a CD-ROM? Asking for a friend

Surely you'd need at least a DVD-R.
posted by double block and bleed at 5:49 AM on April 8, 2013

The Selecter On My Radio
posted by vacapinta at 8:03 AM on April 8, 2013

People would still get the messages if they have MeMail forwarding messages to their e-mail address,

I don't think this is the case, actually. A ways back, I disabled my account for almost a year (thanks for noticing, jerks), and upon my return discovered several very old mefi mail messages in my inbox, none of which had been forwarded.

So that's a thing that happened.
posted by dersins at 10:12 AM on April 8, 2013

Sorry about the hassle, dersins. We don't send MeFi Mail alerts to disabled accounts. Often when people have a disabled account they don't want any contact from MetaFilter.

I just updated MeFi Mail so that it's no longer an option to Reply to someone when their account is disabled.
posted by pb (staff) at 10:36 AM on April 8, 2013 [3 favorites]

Oh, not a hassle at all. In fact, I think it was a feature not a bug. I mean, I disabled my account because I had neither the time for mefi nor the willpower to stay away, so not getting those notifications was for the best.
posted by dersins at 11:37 AM on April 8, 2013

Well shit. Now I'm torn between wanting to know if anyone has been emailing my old account and not wanting to open it back up just to find out that I have been sitting at the Dweeb Table in this cyber-cafeteria all along...
posted by jph at 3:07 PM on April 8, 2013 [1 favorite]