E-mail Notifications

Hi SG, you might have noticed e-mail notifications are now live. I'll explain how they work, because you'll likely have a few questions.

To start, there's a new Notifications section available on the account page. You'll be able to enable or disable any type of e-mail we send using that page. As well, every e-mail that's sent out will have an unsubscribe link at the bottom, and this functions similar to the Notifications page, where you can manage your e-mail settings.

At the moment there are three types of e-mails being sent.

1. When you register on the site, you'll receive a welcome e-mail which thanks you for signing up. At the same time, the e-mail recommends a few of the top giveaways that are available for you to join.

2. When your giveaways end, you'll receive an e-mail mentioning they have ended, which acts as a general reminder. However, it's common for users to run multiple giveaways ending at once, or ending at a similar time, so the e-mail system is configured to group these giveaways into a single e-mail. Right now, when a giveaway ends, the site will check if you have other giveaways ending in the next 20 minutes, and if so, it will wait for those giveaways to finish before sending an e-mail. For example, if you have 500 giveaways ending within the next 16 minutes, then you'll receive one e-mail in 16 minutes mentioning 500 of your giveaways have ended, and the e-mail body will list the first 10, followed by, "... and 490 more".

3. When you win a game (excluding rerolls for the time being), you'll receive an e-mail. This should help to reduce the chance of a user going missing after they win a gift. Similar to the above, these e-mails are grouped when there's a high chance you're going to win another game in the next 20 minutes. For example, if you win a game, and there's a low probability you're going to win another game soon, then you'll instantly receive an e-mail. If you win a game, and you're entered into a giveaway that's ending in 13 minutes, where you have a 50% chance of winning, then the site will wait for that giveaway to end, and if you win, then you'll receive a single e-mail mentioning you won 2 new games. Keys for games are never listed in e-mails, the messages simply list the name of the game you won, with a link to SteamGifts.

Notes

• E-mails are queued in the database, and sent at a rate of 1,500 per minute. This means if a developer giveaway for 15,000 copies comes to an end, there could be up to a 10 minute delay for these to be processed. These type of giveaways are set to lower priority, so they do not delay other e-mails being sent.

• The status of every e-mail is logged in the database. If your e-mail address permanently bounces, then your e-mail address is excluded from receiving e-mails. If your e-mail address temporarily bounces (for example, if your inbox is full, or if you configured an "out of office" or vacation autoresponder), the site will wait 5 days before attempting to send you e-mail again.

• If you change your e-mail notification settings, there might be a delay of up to 20 minutes for the change to take place.

• All e-mails include both HTML and plain text versions.

If you have any other questions, feel free to ask.