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MeMail
MeMail
Background
MetaFilter has an internal email system that is available only to logged-in members, which is known colloquially as "MeMail." Members can use the system to send messages to each other. MeMail was launched and announced on October 19, 2007.
When you are logged into the site, your inbox can be accessed through the envelope icon at the upper right corner of your screen, between your username and the logout link. Image.
Preferences
When a user edits their profile, there is a section devoted to MeMail: Contact Information
Here, you can add an alternate email address and choose whether it is visible in your profile to other members. You can choose whether you would like site notifications sent to you by memail, ask to have any memails you receive forwarded to your alternate email address, or opt out of the system entirely.
Functionality
The system is kept deliberately simple. MeMail is sent in plain text. HTML markup is not supported and you cannot attach files.
"It's mainly supposed to be a member-messaging system for people who don't want to be contactable in other ways and we use it for a very small number of admin things [notification of local IRL events and notification that a post you've made has gone live with a link to it]. And yeah there isn't a way to MeMail people without either going to the MeMail page: http://www.metafilter.com/contribute/messages.mefi and replying to a message, or clicking a link from a user's profile pages. People can opt out of MeMail entirely so some people aren't contactable in this way. You can also opt to have MeMail sent to the email address that is in your profile page, though you do have to go into the MeMail system to reply. We've resisted making it more functional [reinventing the email wheel basically] so it's likely going to stay a small type of thing, though we might build more notification-type stuff into it in the future."
There is no way to send a MeMail to someone who has disabled their account.
Functionality Pony Requests
From time to time, members ask for additional functionality to be added to the MeMail system:
- "Keep unread"
- Search MeMail
- basic html
- "Sent Mail" Forwarding
- The ability to send MeMail to more than one person simultaneously
- Auto-Save Function
- Put delete button at top and bottom of list
Additional requests can be seen by searching the "MeMail" tag in MetaTalk.
Privacy and Etiquette
MeMails you send and receive are essentially, but not completely private. They can be accessed by staff member pb (see: Moderators) if an extraordinary need arises.
"Your memails are private unless someone comes to us claiming you're harassing them in which case we can get access to them [pb can, I can't do this as a regular thing for example]. We will not do this unless there's some serious accusation of harassment or spam and even then we'll ask you for the MeMails before we'd go get them on our own and we'd only check out the exchanges that were complained about. This is last-resort stuff I can only think of 2-3 times we've ever done this."
Harassment over MeMail is a timeout-worthy or bannable offense. If someone is harassing you over MeMail, contact the mods. They will look into the situation and take action.
Do not repost private messages (email, memail, chat) on Metafilter without permission.
