Products · Pattern or everyday thing
Mailing lists
Raised as a usability problem by 55 people on Hacker News over 15 years (2011–2025), in 49 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads in the last 5 years.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Can't unsubscribe when someone else signed up with your addressUnreviewed
20112026- Unsubscribe link fails to find the user's address when it contains a plus sign2022-09-01
- Unsubscribing becomes nearly impossible when someone else signed up with your address2020-11-07
- Unsubscribing requires a phone call, and online login needs an unsent generated password2013-01-31
Unsubscribing from each mailing list takes separate clicksUnreviewed
20112026- Must unsubscribe from each slightly different mailing list separately, more than one click2024-03-03
- Unsubscribe-all checkbox clears individual list ticks, confusing layout2024-01-29
- Makes it difficult to unsubscribe from mailing lists2015-09-23
Must click through archive threads one by one to find revisionsUnreviewed
20112026- Hard to search or discover past discussions without downloading all archives2025-07-15
- Archives lack search and it's unclear how to reply to old threads2025-05-13
- Has to manually click through archives thread by thread to find past revisions and comments2019-04-29
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Hard to tell who a message responds to; tree changes while navigating2025-09-26
- New subscribers have no searchable history and archive browsing UI is very hard to use2025-09-26
- Hard to search or discover past discussions without downloading all archives2025-07-15
- Users are auto-opted into mailing lists and new categories without explicit consent2025-06-15
- Archives lack search and it's unclear how to reply to old threads2025-05-13
- Email-based contribution is much worse to use than GitHub's web interface2024-03-12
- Must unsubscribe from each slightly different mailing list separately, more than one click2024-03-03
- Mailing lists have terrible user experience for collaboration2024-02-05
- Patches get buried in email volume and split across threads, hard to track2024-01-31
- Unsubscribe-all checkbox clears individual list ticks, confusing layout2024-01-29
- Mailing lists are a poor experience for reporting bugs compared to trackers2023-11-02
- Can't subscribe to only certain threads; must hand-build complex email filters to get notified2023-10-13
- Subscribing to the project mailing list was difficult for the commenter2023-10-12
- Using mailing lists is so frustrating the commenter wants to cry2023-09-23
- Mailing lists are clunky and hard to use, making filtering difficult2023-05-13
- Unsubscribe link fails to find the user's address when it contains a plus sign2022-09-01
- Hard to track comment replies, and submitting patches over email is a chore2022-01-04
- Code shared as attachments or inline gets mangled or lost in archives2021-12-28
- Can't find definitive documentation and accidentally emailed a person directly instead2021-12-28
- Shows only one email per page, which the commenter finds hard to read and navigate2021-09-17
- Mailing list interfaces are poor to use compared with chat apps like Discord and Slack2021-09-16
- Couldn't figure out how to add the email to the thread2021-09-16
- Setting up email clients for mailing lists is undocumented and not intuitive2021-09-16
- Web interfaces for mailing lists are painful to use without subscribing2021-06-10
- Next-message link is buried in dense text; prev and parent links are confusing2021-04-21
- Deeply nested threads are hard to parse, making mailing lists low signal and awkward to read2021-03-30
- Mailing list archives are hard to index, follow, and format; discussion branches become unfollowable2020-12-26
- Unsubscribing becomes nearly impossible when someone else signed up with your address2020-11-07
- Unclear whether replies go to the list or the person, leading to a wrong-recipient email2020-10-29
- Mail thread pages lack an h1, so heading-key navigation to the first mail fails2020-08-31
- Signup shows 'forgot to type your email' error even after an email is entered2020-07-21
- No way to edit or delete a sent email, so mistakes become permanent2020-07-01
- Mailing list archives are hard to search and hard to follow conversations in2020-06-07
- Messages get no visible response and you can't tell if they were filtered or ignored2019-11-16
- Email archive software is slow, cluttered and hard to use, lacking organization features2019-05-27
- Has to manually click through archives thread by thread to find past revisions and comments2019-04-29
- Drive-by contributors must subscribe, set up filters, and unsubscribe through several steps2018-09-14
- Hard to tell who wrote which text in quoted replies2018-01-22
- Cannot locate the original email being replied to; thread and date sorting don't reveal it2018-01-22
- Mailing list interfaces are frustrating to navigate and explore2017-06-19
- Mailing list history is separate from where people read, so context is hard to find2017-04-16
- Pricing requires a phone call and the displayed price tiers are unclear2017-03-01
- Mailing list archives aren't readable in a sane, forum-thread style way2017-02-12
- Must click through many pages with little content on each2017-02-12
- Submitting patches by email is hard: joining lists is broken, formatting and sending is confusing2017-02-12
- Hard to join lists, format patches and submit contributions via email2017-02-12
- Threaded conversation interfaces in email clients are almost always terrible2017-01-20
- No easy way to subscribe or unsubscribe to a single thread2017-01-20
- Popup escalates from small banner to full-page overlay as you scroll2016-11-19
- Modal dialog to subscribe to mailing list interrupts and annoys the visitor2016-08-26