this post was submitted on 06 Nov 2023
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[–] [email protected] 86 points 1 year ago (5 children)

The message at the bottom sounds like pretty shitty move.

[–] [email protected] 98 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Message at the bottom sounds like someone trying to distance themselves from reddit and Twitter. It's an excellent move that I support completely. It's free, the content gets delivered to you directly upon it being uploaded, and a newsletter doesn't want any extra data out of you other than an email address to send your letters to.

Also the comics will probably end up posted here anyway, since it doesn't ask you not to repost them, so why does it matter?

[–] [email protected] 70 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why not just post the comics on the website like every other comic author does. Even this comic is normally posted on the workchronicles.com website, but for some reason, the author added this to the website:

📣 ANNOUNCING

NEWSLETTER NOVEMBER!

For the entire month of November, the comics will be posted only on my Email Newsletter.

Join now. It’s free!

Stopping posting on website and posting only in newsletter, which many people including me find extremely annoying and not the right tool for the job, can't be excused by distancing from twitter or reddit.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago

at least posting on website means it shows up in my RSS reader …

[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (1 children)

newsletters can have trackers and shit built right in, and this is especially true when using a service to do the mailing. this is, of course, on top of the contact info and anything else requested at 'signup'. none of which needs to be 'required' when reading a web site or an author-submitted post somewhere. there's basically two reasons to lock content behind a 'newsletter': a paid sub is coming, or selling readers' data.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Just because they CAN have trackers doesn't make them all bad. You do not know this mailing list does, so it is blatant fear mongering.

You may as well be complaining about how web cookies can be used for bad things. Is it true? Yes. Is it true everywhere? NO! And writing rules around it so ignorantly is how you get the GDPR clause where EVERYONE has a cookie warning popup and hides the tracking cookie options a couple pages in, so they STILL use tracking cookies, and now with legally "informed" consent!

The fear mongering made the situation WORSE because ignorant fucks were more afraid than informed.

Stop being an ignorant fearmonger.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Doesn't sound like you've been paying attention the last 20 years if you think this highly of tech companies

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

My opinion is about email, not tech companies. If they're tracking you, it's most likely not through email.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

...tech companies use email all day long to link digital data together. Most people who manage a newsletter do not write their own newsletter software. In fact practically none of them do. Ergo, you get tracked via newsletter also.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

"They don't use their own service" is not the same as, "this is evidence they do in fact track via email."

What you don't seem to realize is, the signup ITSELF is the data they want, and click through rates. You being on a mailing list is already ample tracking compared to what most people are bitching about... You're GIVING them the info, then whining about them having it...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What a weird hill to die on.

No one is whining about being put on an email list at their own request. Which you obviously know. People were making the point that newsletters aren't magically immune to data tracking.

You can bet your ass the MailChimp is sharing a fuckton of data with advertising partners in order to maximize sales to you. It's not supposed to be controversial. I first just assumed this was something you hadn't thought about. Sadly you seem hostile to information you hadn't considered.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There is no hill to die on. You're just too stupid to know how it actually works, so you assume it's bad.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Moron opts for ignorance, convinced it's enlightenment

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You are the cave man screaming about how fire is hot instead of learning how to cook. I hope you're proud of being the smartest moron.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

What a great analogy. You just be really proud of your vast knowledge which includes: there exist tech companies who could easily sell your data but suddenly decided not to.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Note: They ALREADY HAVE YOUR DATA in this scenario. You're like the fucking stupid soldier who wants to go back out there while they're currently bleeding out... You've already lost by the point we're talking about. They have your email. They have your interests. You've already visited their site and gotten their cookies to sign up...

If you even remotely want to see the email, they're already tracking you far, FAR more than they'd be able to with email. Click on a link in there? Congratulations: It DOESN'T MATTER what's in the email at that point. You're back in their entire environment and you've signaled email helped get you there. Regardless of what was in the email.

You're complaining about someone stealing food from your fridge and conveniently ignoring that they have to have access to your house to even try it in the first place...

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago

GDPR requires companies to offer a "only neccessary cookies" option that is easily accessible. Anytime you find a site that works as you've described you can and should report them.

Also, there are plenty of options for blocking those popups and/or auto selecting only neccessary.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago

other than an email address to send your letters to.

No big deal! Totally not key to your digital identity or anything.

Also click tracking is a thing so this perceived boost in privacy isn't even real.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

Glad I’m not the only one that saw that, seems like a super terrible move unless you have a huge audience on your newsletter anyways

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not really, as the Oatmeal put in their comic.

The newsletter means you are not behold to the almighty algorithm and have to pay money to a corporation to encourage your content to be promoted to followers.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Please see my response to similar comment. They specifically stopped posting to their website to force people to sign up for the newsletter.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

It's their content, they can do anything they like with it. The "shitty move" is demanding someone else's effort be delivered to to for free in exactly the way you define, and insulting them for not doing so.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

I was going to disagree with you, then I realized this author has a full website. So yeah, I agree.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

Why?

If I put work into making entertaining material, it's 100% within my rights to publish it where I want to publish it. It's mine, I made it, if I only want to post it on my personal website or newsletter who are you to say I cannot?

Calling that a shitty move is in itself an entitled, shitty move.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

Please see my responses to the responses to my comment. I agree it's 100% within the author's rights, but that doesn't mean it can't be a shitty move.