Earth to Pluto ... assuming the received e-mail is a classic plain-text e-mail, that's impossible. Either the recipient is running a Pluto-compliant client, in which case the claim is true, or the recipient is not running a Pluto-compliant client, in which case the claim is false.
The only way this could work is if the received e-mail has content linked to Pluto's site (example would be an HTML e-mail containing an iframe with hosted content), where the real e-mail is located. So ... they should be honest and say that.
A very remarkable hack! Especially since Gmail caches images on their own proxy servers. I wonder how long until Google finds a way to prevent this?
Here's some background information about the founders. One is a CS grad from Stanford, and former Google employee-- http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2014/4/2/law-school-email-...
I don't think they cache. It's more an issue of privacy, HTTPS assets, malware checking, etc.
http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2013/12/images-now-showing.htm...
It's extremely useful to be able to go back in time and have full conversation history, including associated resources.
It would be nice if a Dropbox link included a hash of the file, functioning more as a magnet link than a URL (emphasis on the "L - Locator" in "URL").
Either way, you're trusting them with the contents of a message that, by definition, you kinda wanted to keep private.
In short, there is no free lunch, but this seems like a decent solution as you only have to trust one entity. Its up to us (potential users) to decide to trust them or not.
" You use this crappy service either because:
- You didn't spend enough time thinking about that email because you either want to edit it later, or delete it from my mail box
- You expect me to answer by some specific date, which implies you want me to be on your schedule.
- You want to violate my privacy by tracking if and when I read your email.
You also require me to use a third-party service to read your email as a text. That's unacceptable.
Remember you're trying to contact me, no the other way around. Send it plain text or don't send it at all. "
1. As a recipient my privacy is violated: a signal is sent automatically to the sender without my consent to signal when I open the message. A co-founder argues "the feature exists with other systems already": the difference is, these other systems are opt-in: as a recipient, I agree explicitly to read acknowledgements when I choose to download the alternative messaging client. As an e-mail recipient, I do not agree to this "service" and it is unethical to force it upon me.
2. The "expire" feature breaks the workflow of most e-mail users I know, including myself. Most users will first open an e-mail, quickly scan it, then mark it for later in-depth processing. If the expire timer starts at the first open, chances are the e-mail will have disappeared by the time the recipient re-opens it later.
3. The service breaks search: with Pluto mail stored at Pluto's servers, it is not possible to search across both Pluto and non-Pluto e-mails in one query.
4. The strategy to "provide e-mail client plugins" is not scalable obviously, due to the wide diversity of clients actually used. (Did the founders make a market study of which clients are actually used? On mobile, my own analysis shows there are at least 6 different apps in wide use. On desktop, at least 4. The development overhead of providing plugins to all is huge.)
1. Most email open tracking services do not alert the recipient (or require opt-in). Tracking email opens is basically standard practice these days. We don’t have numbers but I bet the majority of marketing emails track opens. Also, many new services such as Streak, Yesware, and ToutApp track opens without opt-out ability or downloads. The only similar service that we know of that has a time-limited opt-out option is Boomerang.
2/3. Pluto’s goal is to change the way people think about email. If an email is going to expire in a few minutes/hours does search matter? Pluto may not make sense for your business emails and that is ok. We are providing an option for people to use for emails that they don’t want to follow them for the rest of their life.
4. It is a big task and we’re working on ways to make Pluto as accessible and easy to use as possible.
David Gobaud Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail
David and I hate the fact that, as soon as we hit send, we lose control of who can access the content and for how long the content can be accessed. We know that Pluto may not make sense for all emails but we believe there is a large set of emails for which it does. We also know there is a niche of users (like ourselves) who want most of our emails to expire.
If you all have any more questions, please email me @ lindsay@plutohq.com. Thanks :)
Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail
However, we are working on email client plugins that will enable inline reply/copy/paste and search to improve the Pluto experience.
David Gobaud, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail
Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail
If you need expiring emails, you also need some way to expire people’s memories and I’d rather not communicate with you in that case.
David and I are both concerned about privacy, however, so we may implement an option to obscure tracking details in the future.
Lindsay, Co-Founder @ Pluto Mail
