mccJan 16, 2023

Random meta: I have always disliked the "Mute this conversation" feature on both Twitter and Mastodon. The problem is it mutes an ENTIRE thread, all the way from the root (I think??), whereas when I want to use this feature it's usually because a sub-thread (IE, one reply and its sub-replies) has gotten out of hand.

The feature winds up being a weird trade: "I'll stop bothering you about this asshole's reply thread if you'll agree to mute notifications on this other thread you made on purpose"

MatemannJan 18, 2023
Show threadjwz
@mcc There's a particular developer brain cancer that I have been screaming about since like 1995 which goes something like: "I understand that message replies are arranged in a tree, but I absolutely insist on presenting them as a flat list". From this original sin, all others follow.
Jan 16, 2023 at 9:22pmWeb
Show threadmxkJan 16, 2023
@jwz @mcc this failure is also known as "Outlook"
Show threadIan K TindaleJan 16, 2023
@jwz @mcc network more like, which is completely incompatible with our human brains it would seem
Show threadRichard BarrellJan 17, 2023
@jwz @mcc Just because inventing new probably-bad ideas is fun, I'm going to suggest that it might be funny to make messaging software even more strange by having it understand replies as forming an arbitrary DAG rather than just a tree.
Show threadneutronwranglerJan 18, 2023

@jwz
I blame Microsoft. When every email has a message ID, why thread by subject?
@mcc @rixx

Edited after autocorrected ID

Show threadjwzJan 18, 2023
@neutronwrangler @mcc @rixx Hard to go wrong by blaming MICROS~1 on just about any topic.
Show threadneutronwranglerJan 19, 2023
@jwz
True.
Have you hidden the extension on that filename?@mcc @rixx
Show threadTim PantonJan 18, 2023

@jwz @mcc If I remember right Google's Wave had a message tree view - with the ability to 'replay' the tree in temporal order.

It really was the only messenger that groked time zones - unsurprising given the devs were in Oz and the management in California.