I never signed up for facebook; in the end, it was mostly because they kept making you dance to preserve your intended privacy. Google used to be better, which was why I signed on to Google+. More evidence that we’re headed downhill.

John Hardy

OK so I had that completely wrong. This is a step backwards, Google.

If images are now loaded via a proxy server cache, then Google should pre-load the proxy’s cache before delivering the mail. That way the sender won’t be able to know when or even if their email was opened by the recipient.

Unless this is fixed, I would recommend people switch off automatic image loading to return things to the old way.

With the New Gmail, People Will Know When You Open That Message | Wired Business | Wired.com

Daniel Veillard December 14, 2013 07:46

Well if they actually also report ‘user trashed it without opening’ or ‘user marked as spam without opening’ then maybe I will have to do it less over time. But overall it sucks indeed :-\

David Megginson December 14, 2013 11:01

-2 - images open by default now, alerting senders to when you’ve read a message.

+1 - you can still disable that in settings and go back to the old behaviour.

The move from opt-in to opt-out is a step back from Google, but at least it’s not no-option (yet).

H. Peter Anvin December 14, 2013 12:58

I will be keeping own mail server a bit long, I guess.

Derrick Devine December 14, 2013 13:16

+H. Peter Anvin I wish it was more cost effective for everyone to do that…

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