Mastodon: [Feature Request] Email to inactive users

[m1dor1]

Pitch

Similar to this thread: https://discourse.joinmastodon.org/t/email-to-inactive-users/379

Motivation

Most users quit Mastodon after registration. It might be helpful to send them letters about recent activities in the instance (e.g. new features in Mastodon).

By the way, it seems that digests are useless since almost nobody mentions or follows you if you are inactive...

[Cassolotl]

I can understand the emotional place that this feature request comes from, but I don't think it would have the effect that you hope it would.

If I join a website just to see what it is and then a few weeks later I get an email saying "we noticed you haven't logged in since you joined..." I immediately hate the entire website and everything it stands for. :D (Also I click the unsubscribe button.) People should be able to join a website to see what it is and then immediately leave and never hear from it again. I guess at registration you could be like "check this box if you want a reminder to come back in a few days"? I wonder if anyone would check it.

[m1dor1]

I know this feature request might be controversial, since it might violate users' privacy and laws. You can add some limitations to this feature.

Here are some relative concerns:

1. The retention ratio is incredibly low in my instance. Most (over 70%) users never log in again after the day they registered. Weekly active users account for less than 4% of the total. So I am curious why this happens and want to improve the situation.
2. If an instance nominate new administrator, change its ToS or transfer the ownership to others, it should notify every user via email.
3. After months of work, the instance may have changed significantly and impediments to users may no longer exist.

[Brawaru]

I'd not hate it, that depends how you write it. And checkbox is too unnecessary and will confuse. I'd suggest tho we put one of our good things is that you can delete account instead of unsubscribing. That's a way better. And I'd also skip promotional stuff such as new features.

“Hello, {username}!

If you remember, you have created an account on Mastodon, but unfortunately haven't been active since. We understand that Mastodon may did not fulfill your wishes, or you had some problems, so there a few guesses:

• The server you signed up on is {domain}, it hosts your account. If you registered account on another server, you can migrate your followers there.
• In case you forgot your password because maybe the browser generated some gibberish for you, you can reset it in just seconds — click here.
• Was our site hard to understand? Aw, we're sorry. We have some documentation to help you with it.

Or maybe you felt boring and Mastodon did not work for you? Well that's okay, it may be not for everyone. Can we have a minute of your time to answer a few questions? Then, instead of unsubscribing, you can wipe away all your account data and we won't ever again e-mail you, promise.

Anyways, you are welcome to take as much time as you need!

Your friends at Mastodon <3
Change e-mail settings”

I'm not good at writing, but I hope the idea is clear — just a friendly reminder to help newcomer with common problems.

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I know this feature request might be controversial, since it might violate users' privacy and laws.

How's that? It does not violate any rights, you signed up on the site, allowed it to send you e-mails and e-mails provide way to unsubscribe. Sounds like a very fair deal. What sounds like violation is silently storing even bits of inactive user's data.