

Instapaper’s (anti-)social network - siglesias
http://www.marco.org/2011/09/14/instapapers-antisocial-network

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thristian
_I’d view that as an inappropriate cross-contamination of your privacy.
Instead, Instapaper only shows people the “name” for you that they already
knew through whichever method they used to find you._

I wish Google+ took this particular leaf out of Instapaper's book. Presenting
people by the name you know them by is considerate and friendly, and all
social software should work that way.

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revorad
Really glad to see Marco consciously making these choices. One of my favourite
features of Instapaper is that I _never_ get any email from them. The only
time I've had email contact with Instapaper is when I emailed Marco.

Note to startups: make a product worth using and you won't need to spam your
users' inbox. They will email you!

~~~
ed209
> _Note to startups: make a product worth using and you won't need to spam
> your users' inbox. They will email you!_

I don't think that sites sending emails is always spam. There are some things
that I want in my inbox. I like fan page updates from facebook, my unfollows
on twitter, updates on people and companies I follow on AngelList etc

Of course I do prefer opt-in and links in the emails to unsubscribe without
having to log in. But email is just fine for me - gmail knows what I like.

~~~
revorad
Yes, some email is ok if you want to hear about certain things. But I'm
honestly tired of the typical email dance that starts with signing up for a
new app.

First there's the confirmation email, then the congratulatory email for
confirming.

Now if this is one of those Launchrock type fake signups, then you get
reminder emails about spreading the word to skip the queues, which is probably
lies anyway. But let's assume you got in.

Then the notifications start (StrangerX is now following you on
YetAnotherApp). Turning off these notifications involves finding the settings
page on the app, then unchecking fifteen checkboxes. At this point, I'd rather
delete my account, but of course that feature's not built yet (it's an MVP
duh)!

Then constant emails from the founders: "We noticed you signed up for our
awesome app three minutes ago but you haven't started loving our app yet. Why
not? Feel free to ask any questions if you have doubts about loving our app."

Then feature updates. And as was pointed out in a post couple of days ago,
they don't even bother to remind you who the hell they are.

To top it all, a lot of startups still use DO NOT REPLY email addresses.
W.T.F. Even Joel Spolsky's new Trello app did it! (Hello Joel! How about going
back and reading some of those Joel on Software articles?)

Many don't have an unsubscribe link in their emails. Some do, but that takes
you to "manage subscriptions". The only ones which have a proper 1-click
unsubscribe link are the nice ones I don't mind hearing from.

Boy that's a long rant. I should start blogging.

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freshlog
I love the convenience of saving and sharing links via a bookmarklet or a
Chrome extension like Instapaper, but I feel that I can only feel more free to
express myself under 2 conditions:

1\. I know exactly who will read my links and corresponding comments

2\. It is unlikely to come back and haunt me

Hence I like sharing links exclusively via email. They're simple,
comparatively private compared to social networks and conversations can just
simply start from a reply-to-all.

Shameless plug but I'd thought I'd share what I made:

<http://handpick.me>

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d_rwin
<http://marco.org/2011/09/14/instapapers-antisocial-network> gives a clear
account of instapaper's alignment with curating. Traditional curation topics
doesn't work with instapaper; personal curation. Pulling others steams does
not serve any purpose, at all.

Breaking away from the convention social structure seems very appropriate,
<http://twitter.com/radar_tty/status/114214633656692737>

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mlapida
I've been using Instapaper for at least two years, and I've been following a
handful of people since Twitter integration was implemented, but to this day I
very rarely check the social sharing of articles on the service. There are
already sites for sharing articles. Does anyone use the sharing features?

~~~
sant0sk1
I follow a handful of people on Instapaper and check the friends list for new
content now and again, but rarely do I see anything there.

It's like I'm the only one who regularly "likes" the best articles I'm
reading. I wish this weren't the case.

~~~
ghiculescu
Same here. I'm following everyone Instapaper could find in my contacts (six
people, if I recall) but I've never seen any of them like an article.

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nknight
A question pops to mind. And keep in mind that I don't actually use
Instapaper, so I might have missed some obvious detail.

Let's say I find John Smith on Facebook, and somerandomguy on twitter. I have
no reason to believe that these are the same person, and he doesn't intend for
it to be known.

Is Instapaper going to show me that everything John Smith likes, somerandomguy
also likes? Is it going to pick one or the other? What happens?

