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Reply to newsletter emails via email
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Description

Overview

Allow readers who subscribe to a blog via email to reply directly to an email they receive.

Background

A minimally-viable commenting system.

Design

Requirement: this is an opt-in feature to enable replies via email.

Goal: ideally, we'd provide a proxy / relay email address (e.g. matt@writeasletters.com or matt+secret-subscriber-token@writeasletters.com) that would keep the author's true email address private.

We then have two options, depending on how much privacy correspondents need / abuse we anticipate:

High privacy:

The author could then reply to a proxy / relay address (e.g. secret-subscriber-token@reply.writeasletters.com), which would forward to the original commenter's true email address. Both parties would have their real email address hidden.

Lower privacy:

The author can reply directly to the commenter. (Note: This probably makes the most sense. We mostly want to protect the author from unwanted abuse; but if they reply, they're choosing to engage, and we can assume all is good.)

Implementation

  • Add a new option when enabling email subscribers: Enable replies via email
    • Include help documentation / tutorials on this
  • When enabled, include a Reply-To header, pointing to a special email address that is connected to the individual subscriber
    • This enables potentially invalidating the email address via Write.as platform for abusive subscribers (in the future)
  • The special email address should:
    • Receive replies
    • Validate the address, check against anti-abuse lists (future)
    • Send the message to the email address on the post author's account, with Reply-To set to the commenter's actual email address

Revisions and Commits

Event Timeline

matt triaged this task as Low priority.Sep 28 2020, 1:24 PM
matt created this task.
matt moved this task from Far Future to Soon on the Remark.as board.
matt moved this task from Future to Q1 2021 - Jan-Mar on the Roadmap board.
matt raised the priority of this task from Low to Normal.

Currently investigating what it would take to allow replies on @writeasletters.com addresses. Implementation will receive an email, verify subscriber token, possibly append a footer ("Replying to this message will reveal your actual email address."), and then send the full reply to the author.

matt raised the priority of this task from Normal to Medium-High.Feb 26 2021, 2:41 PM
matt added a project: Restricted Project.

As suggested by one Pro user, a more minimally viable solution would be to include a "Reply-To" header with an email that the author chooses. If they fill out this field, replies will go there; otherwise they'll go nowhere as they do today. I think we'll go that route first.

matt moved this task from Restricted Project Column to Restricted Project Column on the Restricted Project board.Feb 26 2021, 2:41 PM
matt closed this task as Resolved by committing Restricted Diffusion Commit.May 4 2021, 9:05 PM
matt added a commit: Restricted Diffusion Commit.
matt added a commit: Restricted Diffusion Commit.May 6 2021, 1:38 PM