As a user of an open-source email client receiving marketing emails, I want to be able to identify messages with expiration dates, especially those that have already expired, in order to effectively declutter my inbox and actively contribute to reducing the ecological impact associated with storing these expired messages.
Problem and Context
The “Email Expiration Date” project aims to reduce the environmental impact of commercial emails by facilitating the deletion of outdated messages. Currently, email clients lack integrated tools to effectively manage the deletion of emails sent by advertisers who have set an expiration date. Implementing this feature in email clients would provide users with effective cleanup tools based on email expiration dates.
For more information about the project and the proposed standard, please refer to:
- “Email Expiration Date” project site: https://www.zerocarbon.email/
- Internet standard draft published at the IETF: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-mailmaint-expires/
User Benefits
Integrating this feature would allow users to more easily clean up their inboxes by automatically deleting expired messages they are unlikely to read. With just one or two clicks, they could remove hundreds of unnecessary messages, improving email management efficiency and contributing to the reduction of the carbon footprint associated with email storage (see Ressources section).
Implementation Proposal
We are considering several options for implementing this feature:
- Search Option: Add a search option to find all expired messages in an email inbox. Users can then simply delete the messages if they wish.
- Virtual Folder/Tab: Create a virtual folder (or tab) listing all expired emails, offering the user the option to delete them with a single click.
- Expired Message Alert: Display an alert whenever more than xx expired messages are present in the email inbox, offering the user the option to delete them with a single click.
- Automatic Deletion: Allow the email client to automatically delete expired emails from a given sender from a displayed email. In this case, it is essential to obtain the user’s explicit consent so that no emails are deleted without their authorization.
- Preference Center : Show the complete list of bulk email senders to the user. In this list, they can enable or disable automatic email deletion according to their preferences (and unsubscribe via List-Unsubscribe).
What we propose not to do:
- Individual expiration notifications: It is not recommended to create individual alert messages for each expired message. In addition to generating too many alerts, some spammers (and marketers) could take advantage of this to generate notifications using expiration dates.
Options and Settings
To ensure this feature is flexible and respectful of user preferences, the following options should be available:
- The ability to prevent the email client from deleting emails from certain senders via a list of senders not to be deleted.
- An option to add a sender to this list from the email reading screen.
- The ability to disable cleanup tools based on expiration dates, although the feature should ideally be enabled by default for any new installation of the email client or after the update adding this feature.
Challenges and Considerations
It is crucial that this feature be discussed within the community to anticipate and address potential challenges. For example, measures must be taken to prevent the malicious use of expiration dates, such as dates set before the email is sent or just a few hours after sending. The user must always remain in control of deleting emails in their inbox.
Priority
Given the climate emergency and the importance of reducing the environmental impact of technology, we request that this feature be considered a high priority. Every technology must adapt to minimize its environmental impact.
Usage and Adoption
Currently, only a small number of mass emails have an expiration date. According to a study by Orange in France, as of May 2024, about 5% of emails have an expiration date (source: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jonathanloriaux_orange-email-expiration-date-activity-721173079015230...).
This is mainly due to the difficulty of enforcing an evolution of an internet standard. Although mass senders are very interested in deploying expiration dates in their emails, few sending platforms allow the addition of SMTP “Expires:” headers, and no major Mailbox Provider has implemented the technology.
Therefore, it is essential that the entire ecosystem (mass senders, mass email sending solutions, and email clients) advances to make this project a reality.
Wireframes
These wireframes are examples of what the functionality could look like in existing email clients. We will progressively add more examples.
Search Field
Virtual Folder/Tab
Additional Comments
Expiration dates in emails are mainly intended for mass emails. At this stage, it does not seem relevant to allow an email client user to set an expiration date for emails they send.
Ressources
- The IETF Standard Draft : https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-mailmaint-expires/
- List of companies (Brands, ESPs, MBPs) supporting the project : https://www.zerocarbon.email/
- Study on the carbon footprint of obsolete emails: https://splio.tech/carbon-footprint-of-decaying-emails-26b253aad4a7
- List of email service providers implementations : https://www.zerocarbon.email/documentation/list-esps/
