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Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Fri Jun 16, 2023 11:54 pm
by Brian Stevenson
If anyone ordered tickets using a Gmail account can you let me know if the email you received was clipped - i.e only the first part of your email was displayed as it may have cut off the ticket number, rider name, QR code, etc.

It happened to one club member and from what I can gather it appears that Google changed their algorithm on Tuesday night. There has been a lot of complaints on the support forums. This would mainly be visible in the Gmail web portal. If you are using a thick client like Microsoft Outlook or Thunderbird with Gmail it should be fine.

if you had an issue I can send you another email or a pdf, or you can simply forward the original email to a non gmail account. It seems as though it’s limited to a subset of their customers. I have 4 Gmail accounts and they are all fine

Ping me at vrraweb@gmail.com if you have problems. Just check your email and if it has a QR code you are good.

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sat Jun 17, 2023 7:19 am
by Pascal B.
I have purchased tickets on the 15th but have not yet received them by email. No spam either.

Is that normal?

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sat Jun 17, 2023 12:15 pm
by Brian Stevenson
No Its not. Let me resend them. Just check your junk as well.

7 of them right?

It did report delivered but not opened. Normally Gmail will return a "Hard Bounce" if it fails on their server.

I suspect with 7 tickets Gmail may not like it, but I can PDF it and sent it to you. For Mosport I'm just going to do everything PDF.

Google has an unusual problem where they limit of size of text that can be in a single email and this limit refers to the actual HTML, CSS and Text. The limit was recently changed to 102Kb which is nothing. Gmail also combines or “Threads” emails with the same subject line into a single email in their inbox which can lead to the message becoming so “large” that it is clipped. There is no way in the Gmail client to stop “Threading” and they only do this to cheap out by conserving bandwidth and storage.

The problem with Gmail is that Google provide it as a free service that they use to generate First party data for Advertising to you based on the content of your emails. Its not a real supported email service for them. Its just a way of getting your personal data. Same with Facebook. There is massive value in that data as they can sell it to all the ad platforms.

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sat Jun 17, 2023 1:37 pm
by Pascal B.
I have received them all.

Thank you!

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sat Jun 17, 2023 2:57 pm
by Brian Stevenson
You're welcome.

Just curious, do you use the Gmail web interface or an email client like Outlook or Thunderbird?

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sat Jun 17, 2023 9:26 pm
by Pascal B.
Gmail web interface.

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sun Jun 18, 2023 8:05 am
by Ravo74
I have also properly rec'd the email, using GMail web interface.

Re: Google Clipping Algorithm for Gmail

PostPosted: Sun Jun 18, 2023 9:15 am
by Brian Stevenson
Thanks Guys. That's really good to know. It may not be a huge issue after all

I know at least one person is only seeing half the email with 3 dots that you have to click on to get the rest of the email and the QR code.

I think we'll maybe look at changing it for Mosport where we can use a SMTP service to send the mails and we can set a unique ID for each one so Google does not think they are related.

We also have the ability to send the tickets as a PDF attachment if people would prefer that.