Why do I have to follow my own discussions to get notified of replies?

gurjyot

If someone literally mentions me or click on reply text beneath every post then I get notified. But if I started the discussion and somebody replied me generally then I do not get notified at all (something like that happened to me here). Means to get notified of every post on my discussion I'll have to separately follow it? Does it make sense to follow your own discussions separately just to get notified (we basically start discussions to get those replies right?).

Sanguine

There is a setting to do that. But I would agree, it is more intuitive if it was enabled by default.

gurjyot

Sanguine You just replied to me and I still didn't got any notification. And I also checked the settings but couldn't find any setting to follow my own discussions.

Can you point out the setting you are talking about?

Sanguine

Click your icon top-right >> Settings >> Automatically follow discussions that I reply to

gurjyot

Sanguine But that setting is to follow the discussions I have replied to. I am talking about the discussions which I started (not just replied).

Sanguine

Starting a discussion also counts as "reply", apparently.

gurjyot

Sanguine Well that's even more confusing for users I would say. Between thanks for pointing out that, at least I can enable that setting now.

Although if we consider the two scenarios:
1. Follow the discussion I started.
2. Follow the discussion I replied.

I would say these two should be different setting because in the first one the person needs to get notified of the replies since he started the discussion for that. All the replies would be related to his discussion and he would be able to use that information.

In the second case, a person replies to a discussion maybe because he has some information to share. But he doesn't want to get notified of each and every reply that comes in that discussion since he doesn't need that information.

It would make a lot of sense to have these two setting separately.

Sanguine

I understand the confusion, but how often would it happen that people take the time to write a reply but are not interested in any follow up?

gurjyot

Sanguine I would say it happens a lot. Have you ever read all the comments in a Facebook post or have you read all the comments in a YouTube comment section? Even on many other websites, this is the criteria.

But you are also right since not all websites would be social forums. A lot will be informative as well but, in that too I would like to worry only about notifications related to me and not to a complete discussion (which is not stared by me).

I apologise if I sounded rude in any way, that's not my intent. I am just putting forward my point, let's see what other people have to say about it.

Sanguine

gurjyot You didn't come over as rude to me, no worries. I see what you mean, here on this forum I wouldn't want to get notified for another "Word assocation game" post. But in general, I personally would like to see what other people write about a subject that I participated in.

I think this is the same behaviour that Facebook uses by default (auto subscribe on comment). Now, FB has probably done a lot of research on this setting. The question is, did they base their auto-subscribe on the best UX score or the highest user engagement? ?

gurjyot

Sanguine I wouldn't want to get notified for another "Word assocation game" post.

Exactly that's my point, if user want to be notified of a particular discussion then let him follow that discussion (after all follow is there for that purpose).

Sanguine But in general, I personally would like to see what other people write about a subject that I participated in.

I also agree with this as some information related forums do have that kind of engagement and value in them that people just want to read everything to soak in every last bit of knowledge. That's why I said to have two different notifications settings. Let user decide which type of setting he want depending on his interest.