Email Tracking

Originally Posted by Russ

You may find many of us will disagree on that point.

Whether many of you disagree or not, it makes no difference, tracking is here to stay. We are dealing with electronic messaging not Carrier Pigeons and to know that a message has been actually opened is a tremendous leap forward into the complex world of communications technology.

Moral issues are not part of the equation.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Wittmann

Oh come off it Hugh, you are grown up, surely you recognise that if is was not legal, it would be stopped.

Asking for a receipt ! ASKING, what and rely on the recipient giving you one ? Jesus, you must be joking. It is not that kind of world.

Just face it, whilst tracking is legal, you will be tracked and so will all the others who are shouting their moral mouths off. That`s life Hugh, some you win and some you lose, sorry chum in this case you`ve lost.

So in the same vein, you are more than happy for off shore/out of area cold callers to ring you multiple times a day? Same principle involved: it is wrong (by consensus) but it is not illegal so they do it.

[qasdfdsaq]

Originally Posted by Wittmann

Asking for a receipt ! ASKING, what and rely on the recipient giving you one ? Jesus, you must be joking. It is not that kind of world.

You really don't understand the concept of "consent" do you?

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

You really don't understand the concept of "consent" do you?

I'm still trying to figure out what a 'moral mouth' is.......

Originally Posted by ianch99

So in the same vein, you are more than happy for off shore/out of area cold callers to ring you multiple times a day? Same principle involved: it is wrong (by consensus) but it is not illegal so they do it.

It is the way of the world we live in, but I fail to see how your analogy has anything to do with electronic mail systems.

I have recently sent several Emails to the CEO of Virgin Media. MSGTAG actually tells them they have been tracked, but nobody has said a word about it and certainly not done anything about it.

I really do not know what all the fuss is about. It is a mystery to me.

Perhaps others don't have your laisser-faire attitude to personal privacy?

[cookie_365]

People aren't stupid. Computers and email have been around long enough that many if not the majority understand why they get those 'for security reasons we've filtered out active content' messages.

I don't know what business the OP is in, but as people get wind of what he's doing, I expect the proportion of people who his spyware confirms have opened his emails dwindles fast as people automatically delete them unread.

Originally Posted by cookie_365

People aren't stupid. Computers and email have been around long enough that many if not the majority understand why they get those 'for security reasons we've filtered out active content' messages.

I don't know what business the OP is in, but as people get wind of what he's doing, I expect the proportion of people who his spyware confirms have opened his emails dwindles fast as people automatically delete them unread.

Just for your personal information, the OP is not a solitary he, a him or a his, who is the only tracking enthusiast in the world - there are millions of them including commercial companies.

Very few anti-tracking paranoid recipients compared to the countless millions engaged in Email activity, have the ability to configure their systems to block tracking. Most probably 90% of Email users do not give a toot at being tracked even if they knew they had been, which they do not.

[heero_yuy]

A receipt from the server when the mail arrives and a receipt from the recipient when he/she reads it is all that's needed. Anything more is too intrusive IMO.

[Russ]

Originally Posted by Wittmann

Whether many of you disagree or not, it makes no difference, tracking is here to stay. We are dealing with electronic messaging not Carrier Pigeons and to know that a message has been actually opened is a tremendous leap forward into the complex world of communications technology.

Moral issues are not part of the equation.

The disagreement was about your assertion that Hugh had 'lost'.

[qasdfdsaq]

Originally Posted by heero_yuy

A receipt from the server when the mail arrives and a receipt from the recipient when he/she reads it is all that's needed. Anything more is too intrusive IMO.

Agreed. Archaic as the system may be.

I would counter though, when Facebook implemented the "message read" feature there was a bit of a fuss earlier on after which people stopped caring.

Originally Posted by Wittmann

Oh come off it Hugh, you are grown up, surely you recognise that if is was not legal, it would be stopped.

Asking for a receipt ! ASKING, what and rely on the recipient giving you one ? Jesus, you must be joking. It is not that kind of world.

Just face it, whilst tracking is legal, you will be tracked and so will all the others who are shouting their moral mouths off. That`s life Hugh, some you win and some you lose, sorry chum in this case you`ve lost.

Having a different opinion from you is not 'losing', it's just having a different opinion - life is not always binary....

btw, you still haven't explained what a "moral mouth" is.....

---------- Post added at 20:13 ---------- Previous post was at 20:13 ----------

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

Agreed. Archaic as the system may be.

I would counter though, when Facebook implemented the "message read" feature there was a bit of a fuss earlier on after which people stopped caring.

[Osem]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Having a different opinion from you is not 'losing', it's just having a different opinion - life is not always binary....

btw, you still haven't explained what a "moral mouth" is.....

---------- Post added at 20:13 ---------- Previous post was at 20:13 ----------

Is it Ann Widdecombe?

I have kept my eye on this thread, read all the posts, find it a stimulating and enthusiastic discussion, but in real terms it is going nowhere. Just round in circles, voicing objections and nitpicking on what posters say here or there.

The bottom line is that unless you have the ability to configure your Email program to block tracking, then you will be tracked and there is nothing you can do about it.

Google and MS do prevent private data from being extracted, but even they cannot stop an opening notification being sent back to the sender.

It may not be just your friends Joe, Sam and Fred who track their mails to you, it could well be a debt collector, bailiff, some other distasteful organisation or even the Police, who you do not particularly want to know that you have opened their Email. But it is a GOTCHA situation and you are helpless to do anything about it.

Regardless of your personal attitude to tracking, it is very much alive and kicking on a global scale, so I am afraid we all have to grin and bear it.

Well, since you are actually part of the problem (as in you are actively using this facility without the recipients' consent), you would say that, wouldn't you?