The key thing to keep in mind is constructive criticism. That is my intent — to point out where BMG could have done better with this project, from the perspective of an advanced computer user who has given much thought to all of the bullet points above.
1. Opt-in vs. opt-out
BMG did opt-out. They defaulted all users to receiving the email, and required each and every one of them to opt-out of receiving it. In general, this is bad form. It’s bad form because it’s jarring, much the same way a door-to-door salesman or a telemarketer is. Instead of the user choosing what he wants and when, someone with a (perhaps) alternative agenda forces the user to deal with this right here, right now, under the terms of the solicitor. Sure, you can just press delete, just like you can just slam the door or hang up the phone. Still, it’s distracting, inconvenient, rude, and just plain unnecessary.
The polite way to handle this would have been opt-in. BMG should have simply created a front page story — or even put an ad in along the margin — prompting the user to ==click here for more info==, and then encouraging the user to opt-in to the email service. This is the appropriate way to do things because it treats the users with respect.
2. RSS vs. email “screenshot”
RSS may not be for everyone, but I have yet to find a single person who prefers daily email updates to an RSS feed once he’s seen and used both. Furthermore, I’d bet many readers of BMG (including EB3) don’t use RSS readers, not because they don’t like them, but because they’ve never heard of them.
What is RSS? Simply put, it is a way to aggregate headlines, news stories, diaries, and other text, and collect all that news into one place. This way, instead of opening up cnn, slashdot, espn, dailykos, bluemassgroup, civilities, greencarcongress, woot!, claimID, and the windfarmblog in separate windows like I used to do, I simply open up my RSS news aggregator, and it collects all of the text, free of margins, ads, logos, and other distractions, and puts them all in one organized application window. Then, I can quickly parse all the news, blowing past the uninteresting stuff and clicking on the good stuff, reading about it either in the RSS client or on the web page that it was posted on. Why is it better? It’s faster, cleaner, more user friendly, more configurable, and allows the user to keep track of what he’s read and what he hasn’t.
Great news! BMG does indeed have an RSS feed; I’ve been using it for many months now. So, where’s the beef? BMG should have explained RSS and given users the opportunity to opt-in to RSS before pushing the daily email. Why? Well, because by and large, RSS is better — so why not provide the best service for readers while also encouraging the adoption of good technology (like firefox)?
3. Text email vs. HTML email
Email wasn’t built for HTML. Including HTML in email is, frankly, bad form. It has allowed criminals an easier time phishing, results in more junk email, crams up inboxes, doesn’t render the same in all email clients, doesn’t render at all in a few, and takes control of the content away from the reader (such as font, font size, etc), which is rather inconsiderate.
I understand that BMG is working on a text version, which is good. I’d claim that they should be working on getting rid of the HTML version — it’s a bad, lazy habit in computerland.
4. Beta testing
A beta version is like a final mock-up. You release it to some adventurous folks who stress test it. They try to find places where it doesn’t work, report back on what they like and don’t like, suggest new features, etc. In this case, BMG might have done well to make a post writing that they’re thinking of rolling this out, and ask for suggestions. I’d bet that the community here would have had a few great ones. Sure, they can roll the suggestions into v.2, but why not open a dialogue with the community before rolling it out, especially if they choose to go opt-out instead of opt-in?
BMG is good people, and are providing a rather valuable service to us folks in Massachusetts. In this particular series of events, however, I believe that they made a series of mistakes. Opt-out is simply bad form. Not encouraging RSS aggregators misses out on a great opportunity to improve the computer lives of their readers. Using HTML email is just bad form for a variety of reasons, and beta testing would have probably resulted in a better product before the full release.
1) No ponies. Where’s my pony already!?
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2) Trying to expand readership among people who signed up but never post. Expanding the reach of Blue Mass. Group will only increase the readership of all MA blogs. Who needs that hassle?
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3) Site does not look good on a cell phone. If I can’t get BMG emails to render properly on every handheld device I own, I say burn the whole thing to the ground.
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4) No way to view my witty comments. Why can’t I subscribe exclusively to my own commentary? I think it would improve my user experience a thousand-fold.
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5) Also, did I mention that I wanted a pony?
How many times have Susan and I had to tell you that you can’t raise a pony on .08 acres! You already have donkey. Don’t you think you are just getting a little greedy.
I’m not sure I’d say they used opt-out. Yes, we all got an e-mail about this new service… but my e-mail, at least, said:
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That sure smells like opt-in to me. OK, sure, you’d argue that we shouldn’t have received that e-mail at all, that there should have been a form on the website that was advertised. To me it’s seven of one, half a dozen of the other. I’m not doing anything with this e-mail, and I’m trusting I won’t receive any more.
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That’s opt-in as far as I’m concerned.
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All your other points are bang on, though. Perhaps I’ll write a post on RSS and other feed formats…. (I favor Atom myself, but I’m hardly a snob about it.)