A low-risk way to dip your toes in is to email a blogger to say that you enjoyed their post or that you found it helpful. The message doesn’t have to have useful information in it, just be sincere. Per OP, often there won’t be a reply but also often it’s much appreciated - particularly by non-mainstream writers.
I’ve been on the creator side with 1M+ followers and the amount of times someone has dropped a kind note like that can be counted on one hand. It’s such a breath of fresh air compared to the hate, criticizing and general unpleasantness that is so pervasive when dealing with online communities - even my own.
As a result, I make it a point to send notes to anyone if I’ve enjoyed their work, because I know how much its meant to me, that I hope to pass along those kind, appreciate feelings.
I get them occasionally - maybe every couple of months or so - and I have nothing like that sort of following.
But I do have a 'say thanks' page on my blog rather than the more usual 'buy me a coffee'. Perhaps people feel less awkward doing it when it's invited! Anyway, I recommend it because the emails are always nice to receive.
I make it a point to 'like' and vote up any decent content because standup comedian Loui CK was convincing when he called for it citing effort and guts to look in the camera while others behind keyboards trash efforts for silly reasons.
Yes, the comment sections are not something I dip into because it's a minefield. The baby gets thrown out with the toxic bath water in that instance but it's much better for mental health.
A woman wrote a glowing review about a book of poetry my late grandfather wrote. After he died and I was combing the internet for references to him, I found her blog & post. I sent her an email sharing the news and to express how nice it was to read her words as I remembered him. She got back to me quickly. Turns out she had met him at some point in her youth through her mother. We ended up trading stories for a few days.
I get dozens of cold emails and LI messages from sales/ recruiting a week. Only about one per year writes "I read your blog and liked your point about xyz." I always take that call. My LI (and HN) profile opens with my blog, so if they did 5 seconds of research they would find it.
The problem is it isn't really people doing that. All it takes is one person to set the process running and forget about it. Soon enough all exploitable systems are exploited if the cost of doing so is low enough.
And not only crime. I think it's going to be a lot of people trying to hustle via mass-automated fake-human interaction -- whether it's sales, influencing/advertising, recruiting, dating, or whatever.
And they're being encouraged towards that: even tech companies with reputations to lose are already aggressively offering to take over as someone goes to write an email or text, and proactively "summarizing" the one-to-one human communications of others. But there will actually be demand for one-to-many fake one-on-one interactions, in the hustle culture, and doing it to strangers will seem no worse than what they've already done: corrupting pre-existing interpersonal relationships.
Oh I really enjoy it when I get random emails from people that have read my posts and have occasionally mailed maintainers of software projects that it is working perfectly for me. It's always a nice change of pace from bug reports.
I sometimes get emails and blog comments like this and always love them. One of my favorites was a comment last year, left on a 15 year old post about building my first gaming PC. I love how the comment said it was a "really fantastic build for the time". Something about "for the time" made me feel so retro :D
As a member of the younger generation, nobody really explained to me how powerful email contact actually is. Anyone who leaves an email somewhere for me to contact them gets a big kudos, anyone who also then replies to my email within 15 minutes is amazing and I always appreciate a direct line of communication.
I do wish IOS would support push mail for private mail servers.... You can't have everything I guess
Even lower risk is to email hn@ycombinator.com with duplicate posts or other issues on this site! It helps, and it gets you a bit over the fear of emailing. ;)
He has always replied to me, and has always been gracious, even when I felt a little too argumentative.
It’s hard being an hotheaded internet keyboard warrior like me when the moderators are going out of their way to remain polite and courteous when disagreeing.
This is why I share my email on my website and on my HN profile: it’s so much easier to see the human in 1:1 conversation.
I'm not sure if this is sarcasm, but I've been blown away by the thoughtful responses I've gotten from dang. They don't always come quickly, but I would expect that given how crazy I assume that inbox is.
I suspect the emails are triaged quickly and there is a low-priority bucket which may or may not ever get a reply. In my experience if there is a clear call to action and addressing the issue will have any sort of meaningful impact, it's unusual to not get a reply.
I don't often email the HN mods, but now and then I'll pitch an idea, and they respond. I usually end it with a big thank you to all of them, because they do thankless work, though I think most here on HN appreciate them for their work, this is an out of the norm community. :)
Also authors. Not the mega superstars of the world but even very bestselling novels as long as you show that you thought about it or actually did read the book
I have emailed people based on a YouTube video, podcast episode, blog post, or just browsing a project on GitHub. If their email address is available I see that as permission to contact them for "wholesome" purposes. A few things that come to mind:
1. clarification on something in particular that they have already published
2. engage in genuine discussion about adjacent topics in which their opinion is specifically relevant
3. expressions of appreciation
4. corrections of information to prevent genuine harm or significant frustration for others
My success rate is probably 50-75% but I only do it a few times per year.
Cold-calling to get people try try your new app or answer a survey is rude.
My senior year of college, I emailed a Danish/Swedish professor (had lived in both countries and published in both languages) about a niche research article he had published that I was unable to find. He not only sent me the article, but mailed a couple copies of his books to me in the US. Sadly, my Scandinavian reading comprehension has plummeted since then and I am unable to read his books anymore, but they sit on my shelf and remind me of that period of my life and my wonderful Nordic Studies professors.
I have emailed two authors now and both responded enthusiastically and answered my questions. Granted, these were also niche texts so I don't imagine it's common for them to get fanmail either!
I find myself in a similar situation. Drafting an email to an academic. And as I decipher her motivations with respect to her own work from micro-expressions she had in an interview, I start to think we're not that different. I'm falling in love, how embarrassing ...
Whenever I write something that gets some traction, I get emails. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. One of them is from a guy that tells me "I love your blog, but you got terrible spelling." If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't bother doing a spellcheck before publishing.
I'm always saying it's better to finish on a good note rather than a bad one, "<Insert Bad Things> but <Insert Good Things>" (eg. "You're stupid but I love you" vs "I love you but you're stupid"), but that's the kind of case where it's clearly better to do the reverse. Huh.
This is my strategy with forum comments. Always try to end with a compliment. Takes the edge off any criticism and makes an angry reply much less likely.
I’ve had about 10 emails about things I’ve said or presented on this website. I haven’t replied to all of them, which makes me feel bad because each one of them was a nice little surprise on any random day. I worry that no response makes people feel bad. I just can’t respond sometimes because of the anxiety I struggle with. But gosh do I love hearing from strangers about anything. I bet if I can get more comfortable talking with strangers I’ll really enjoy being old one day.
I struggle with interacting with random people, too. I'm alright with writing stuff that is largely impersonal and in public (like here on HN), but there's something about a direct email or a real in-person conversation with someone who I don't know that makes me feel anxious in ways that I don't like.
Maybe it's because I feel like I don't have all the right answers, or that it might be an uphill battle for me in some way, or I'm afraid of making a lasting connection (and the combination of burden and joy that this brings), or I'm instead afraid of missing a connection despite putting effort into it. Perhaps it is all of those things together or something else entirely.
Whatever it is, I know one thing for sure: Inaction has a deterministic outcome.
So when I do nothing, then nothing happens. Nothing is gained, nothing is lost, and nothing is spent.
And maybe that's not an optimal outcome, but it's at least a predictable outcome -- and that alone seems to serve to resolve whatever unwelcome feelings of anxiety I might otherwise experience.
I'm like this with calls. I'll correspond with you on email all day long if you want, but if I'm asked to have a random chat call with a stranger, I get really averse to it.
I’m curious to hear about why talking to strangers is troublesome for you? For me maybe when I was younger but these days I just treat everyone like an old friend. What kind of pitfalls do you run into? Just a general sense of anxiety?
I have a similar anxiety about emailing or messaging people directly. If I'm just posting a comment on HN or reddit, there's not much commitment and if someone responds but I don't feel like continuing the thread, it's fine to completely ignore it. But if I send something directly to someone, it feels very personal, and like I'm starting a conversation. Once I'm in a conversation I'm obligated to continue it until it reaches a conclusion, and while the anxiety of trying to write things in a personal way is bad, the anxiety of trying to force a conclusion to the conversation is worse.
I've received a couple of emails about ghidra-delinker-extension, but I would not limit this to only emails. I've also had numerous people contacting me through GitHub issues or Discord messages over the years, with this as a topic starter.
I've had deep technical exchanges with smart people all across the world I would've never met otherwise. I've seen people using my tool for completely insane projects successfully. I've even had a data scientist from India who was inspired and motivated by my story of presenting at ACM 2025 as a hobbyist to put his work out there.
Interacting with all these people has broadened my horizons - literally going halfway across the globe in one instance. All of that happened despite me being an introvert, who hates initiating any form of social interactions with people and sounds like a raving lunatic on my blog.
Maybe I should be the one to send out more emails...
Maybe it's because I'm a negative person, but even when I do keep in touch with people, I can count those I've stayed in long term contact with on one hand.
And the knowledge I can offer others is also limited.
I receive a dozen or so emails a year from people who read my free sci-fi books. they are generally to say thanks, or to point out spelling errors or something factually incorrect that I have usually fixed. Most are shocked I reply. I guess quite a few also get zapped by my aggressive spam filters, which with the amount of spam I get is going to make it a real problem in the future.
Hey, I do this too, and I absolutely love receiving thoughtful e-letters, the few times a year they happen!
Here are my reasons, copied from my site's "Standing Invitation" [0].
> Email me just because (not just for work). Whatever feeds your curiosity; silly, fun, nerdy, serious.
> Why?
> 1. Do unto me what I have done unto others. I habitually cold-email anyone who moves me in some way (joy, insight, utility, mind shift…). I also love to receive such email!
> 2. There is too little unsolicited positive feedback in much of most of our lives. At some point in the fuzzy past, I decided enough was enough. At least someone somewhere ought to feel good sometime for no reason whatsoever. Since that realisation, I have cold-emailed people willy-nilly. See also: Saying Thank You [1], and Days Are Easily Made [2].
> 3. It's always been a delight; no regrets. You should try it too!
If I haven't chatted with a CEO or other builder in a week I've probably not spent a ton of time online.
Obviously different people have different time and attention; they don't all get back to you.
But it really doesn't take very long to just throw together a note sharing your thoughts or questions for them you may have. They may not answer. But they might.
If it does fail though, I've also been finding that asking an LLM what so and so would say to whatever I have to share can sometimes be insightful and based on their public comments. Though obviously, probably best not to hold what an LLM said against the person the LLM said might say it...
Email them because most people these days never receive a personal email from another real human being, instead of newsletters, solicitations, marketing, announcements, notifications and spam.
I think the last time I emailed a stranger when I had no business reason to do so was to thank someone for creating an excellent set of instructions for running OpenBSD on the exact model of laptop I wanted to use. I didn't expect a response and I didn't receive a response. I just thought he should know that something he did helped someone else, and now he knows.
The last time I cold-emailed someone was back in 2021 when I had issues with uboot. Some software doesn't make it easy to file bug reports, and this one chap was working on the same board I had, so I felt like I had nothing else to lose. Thankfully they were nice, actually knew what the problem was, and had a fix in that same week.
The big one is the fact that you will likely be ignored by a large host of them. Even with modern spam filters, a lot of unsolicited messages are simply a waste of packets. Odds are, even your useful, inquisitive message will be buried under the more disingenuous messages, especially in an age of LLMs. Trying to get in contact with anyone that already has a large audience can be discouraging.
On some level, strangers are easier to connect with than people who are in your life more permanently, like neighbors. Maybe there are fewer expectations and more mutual curiosity. It seems backwards, but for dipping your toe into more personal connection, it is an easier path.
This is funny but true. I don't think I've spoken to my neighbors in any place I've lived in 10 years other than maybe awkwardly running into each other in the hallway.
In apartments this has always been the case for me. I moved in to a townhouse recently and the neighbours on one side spend half the day gardening out the front so I do end up talking to them.
I think it would be nice if apartment buildings prioritised making some communal space that’s comfortable to hang out in so you’d have a chance to chat with people who live in the building. Usually it’s just some token couch in the lobby.
I’ve never received a heartwarming message before.
(Though maybe that’s just because I haven’t been sharing any useful information so far.)
Instead, I’ve received a few emails that seemed like copy-and-paste sales pitches, so I naturally became wary of emails from strangers, thinking, “Oh, another sales pitch…”
But I had no idea there were people out there who thought this way!
Thank you for introducing me to this new way of thinking.
I still somewhat like the email format, but I am also unable to deal with it, accumulating literally thousand of unread (non-spam) emails. I just can't keep up with the volume. I saw others use clients such as mutt or what not, and read through email on the terminal, so perhaps I should do that, but this is never the bottle neck for me. It is writing replies that is the bottleneck; it takes too much time away. I also need to think before writing, which is another bottleneck. I am very bad at thinking.
> Social media platforms rise and fall like ancient empires sped up a thousand times. Yet email endures.
I do use Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and Proton mail for various things but I also run my own email server for some things (mostly personal), which I've done since the mid-late 1990's and plan to continue doing so. Because I control it and I feel that gives me a small bit of power compared to the trillion dollar companies.
> The first time I emailed a stranger, I swear my cursor hovered over Send for a full five minutes.
I would estimate communication is 95% non verbal and 5% verbal. The problem with online interaction is you are limited to this 5% while interacting with an almost infinite number of social groups and people.
Learning how to adapt to online socialization is learning how to adapt to being blind. Only you aren't blind, you are choosing to wear a blindfold.
What's the best way to contact someone about to get real feedback on a paid app / SaaS? Give them a free license? Mention something specific about them, so they knew you actually cared enough to check out that person and manually write the email?
Their silence says nothing about your worth. They might be busy, taking a break from email, or not in a place where they can engage with new folk…who knows? And what does it matter?
I read a whole article about how cool it is to email people and I’m opening to the idea… then I see the signature and realize it’s probably just a cheap way to get dates, that come to him.
I agree with this and have received insights on difficult challenges, but I've found that each year it gets more difficult to find an email address for someone.
i do this with some frequency, maybe a few times a month. i'll email bloggers/poets/researchers i like or founders of interesting companies that solve very specific problems in a satisfying way. i've gotten more responses than you'd think! even when emailing founders or writers you'd expect had hundreds of much more important emails to attend to.
not to make this yet another 'in the age of AI' comment, but i can't help myself: given how cold and barren the mainstream internet feels now, cold emailing strangers in a non-transactional way is a humanitarian act. when i get emails from strangers about my own personal blog it makes me feel a little brighter about things for like an hour after. it's why i keep my email on my blog, despite the occasional spam/anonymous hate
Well I wouldn't email anyone.
LinkedIn, X, WhatsApp
and even reaching out through friends seems much more effective
But the key is to get to know anyone that you think it is minimally (or surprisingly) reachable and try to get the best out of them.
And always be reachable up to your limit. Help people whenever you can to reach their goals, you'd never know :)
It’s not that I’m afraid. As an introvert, I just think it’s a pain in the ass. Versus contacting strangers for work, I don’t mind because it’s something I have to do.
I used to. I do much less now that email is no longer available for whois results from domains because of GDPR. It really killed communication on the internet. The switch to non-protocol based corporate communication services was the other half of killing it.
A low-risk way to dip your toes in is to email a blogger to say that you enjoyed their post or that you found it helpful. The message doesn’t have to have useful information in it, just be sincere. Per OP, often there won’t be a reply but also often it’s much appreciated - particularly by non-mainstream writers.
I’ve been on the creator side with 1M+ followers and the amount of times someone has dropped a kind note like that can be counted on one hand. It’s such a breath of fresh air compared to the hate, criticizing and general unpleasantness that is so pervasive when dealing with online communities - even my own.
As a result, I make it a point to send notes to anyone if I’ve enjoyed their work, because I know how much its meant to me, that I hope to pass along those kind, appreciate feelings.
I get them occasionally - maybe every couple of months or so - and I have nothing like that sort of following.
But I do have a 'say thanks' page on my blog rather than the more usual 'buy me a coffee'. Perhaps people feel less awkward doing it when it's invited! Anyway, I recommend it because the emails are always nice to receive.
https://www.robinlinacre.com/thanks/
I make it a point to 'like' and vote up any decent content because standup comedian Loui CK was convincing when he called for it citing effort and guts to look in the camera while others behind keyboards trash efforts for silly reasons.
I sent Colin Furze a note and got back a nice reply. The dude has an insane number of followers, so it was surprising I got a reply.
I'd be curious to hear more; I assume you are distinguishing a positive note (email etc) from a positive comment?
Yes, the comment sections are not something I dip into because it's a minefield. The baby gets thrown out with the toxic bath water in that instance but it's much better for mental health.
A woman wrote a glowing review about a book of poetry my late grandfather wrote. After he died and I was combing the internet for references to him, I found her blog & post. I sent her an email sharing the news and to express how nice it was to read her words as I remembered him. She got back to me quickly. Turns out she had met him at some point in her youth through her mother. We ended up trading stories for a few days.
Whenever a stranger sends me a well-written - even if brief - email, it makes my day.
So every now and then, I spread some joy by sending an email to a complete stranger.
And I always add that I don’t expect a reply, so they don’t feel obligated to respond.
I do this often and it is something that everyone not only appreciates but sometimes their favorite email of that day.
Even a simple email like "I really like the design of your website/blog" will make their day.
I once complimented a blogger for composing a particularly eloquent sentence. My compliment was concise and sincere.
All I received in reply was “Thanks!”.
I was thrilled. I earned an exclamation point from an academic who would never deign to use such punctuation lightly.
I get dozens of cold emails and LI messages from sales/ recruiting a week. Only about one per year writes "I read your blog and liked your point about xyz." I always take that call. My LI (and HN) profile opens with my blog, so if they did 5 seconds of research they would find it.
Just this week, I got my first AI-automated one, following a pattern of "liked your X, especially Y".
I hope the people doing things like that realize that's awful for humanity, and they stop doing that.
The problem is it isn't really people doing that. All it takes is one person to set the process running and forget about it. Soon enough all exploitable systems are exploited if the cost of doing so is low enough.
And not only crime. I think it's going to be a lot of people trying to hustle via mass-automated fake-human interaction -- whether it's sales, influencing/advertising, recruiting, dating, or whatever.
And they're being encouraged towards that: even tech companies with reputations to lose are already aggressively offering to take over as someone goes to write an email or text, and proactively "summarizing" the one-to-one human communications of others. But there will actually be demand for one-to-many fake one-on-one interactions, in the hustle culture, and doing it to strangers will seem no worse than what they've already done: corrupting pre-existing interpersonal relationships.
I get those emails too but they’re always followed by “btw we sell so and so, do you got time for a demo?”
So when someone tells me they like my blog, i’m afraid to respond because they’ll just pitch me in response
I only have my email in my app, no social media or whatever. And received a lot of kind emails from users, issues they found, feature requests.
It is really something and I'm very grateful for their emails.
Oh I really enjoy it when I get random emails from people that have read my posts and have occasionally mailed maintainers of software projects that it is working perfectly for me. It's always a nice change of pace from bug reports.
I sometimes get emails and blog comments like this and always love them. One of my favorites was a comment last year, left on a 15 year old post about building my first gaming PC. I love how the comment said it was a "really fantastic build for the time". Something about "for the time" made me feel so retro :D
As a member of the younger generation, nobody really explained to me how powerful email contact actually is. Anyone who leaves an email somewhere for me to contact them gets a big kudos, anyone who also then replies to my email within 15 minutes is amazing and I always appreciate a direct line of communication.
I do wish IOS would support push mail for private mail servers.... You can't have everything I guess
Even lower risk is to email hn@ycombinator.com with duplicate posts or other issues on this site! It helps, and it gets you a bit over the fear of emailing. ;)
dang just does NOT reply though. I don't know what his beef is?
He has always replied to me, and has always been gracious, even when I felt a little too argumentative.
It’s hard being an hotheaded internet keyboard warrior like me when the moderators are going out of their way to remain polite and courteous when disagreeing.
This is why I share my email on my website and on my HN profile: it’s so much easier to see the human in 1:1 conversation.
I've always gotten timely replies too from dang, not sure why your experience is so different. Maybe an unlucky spam filter?
I'm not sure if this is sarcasm, but I've been blown away by the thoughtful responses I've gotten from dang. They don't always come quickly, but I would expect that given how crazy I assume that inbox is.
> They don't always come quickly, but I would expect that given how crazy I assume that inbox is.
A wizard is never late or early, but arrives precisely when he means to.
Nothing personally against Dang, you are right, usually replies are great, but I just have not received replies as of late.
Yeah, could be that the Mods are just really busy.
I suspect the emails are triaged quickly and there is a low-priority bucket which may or may not ever get a reply. In my experience if there is a clear call to action and addressing the issue will have any sort of meaningful impact, it's unusual to not get a reply.
At least it probably means they haven’t been replaced with LLMs…
Or they were running Fable :-)
He's not the only one behind the wheel. I've emailed at least 6 times in as many years and always got substantial replies.
I've emailed dang before and definitely got a reply.
He's replied to my emails before... /shrug
I don't often email the HN mods, but now and then I'll pitch an idea, and they respond. I usually end it with a big thank you to all of them, because they do thankless work, though I think most here on HN appreciate them for their work, this is an out of the norm community. :)
Also authors. Not the mega superstars of the world but even very bestselling novels as long as you show that you thought about it or actually did read the book
"just be sincere"
All emails I got so far from Nigeria claimed to have been sincere!
Yes!
I hope this feature of the internet is protected.
I have emailed people based on a YouTube video, podcast episode, blog post, or just browsing a project on GitHub. If their email address is available I see that as permission to contact them for "wholesome" purposes. A few things that come to mind:
1. clarification on something in particular that they have already published
2. engage in genuine discussion about adjacent topics in which their opinion is specifically relevant
3. expressions of appreciation
4. corrections of information to prevent genuine harm or significant frustration for others
My success rate is probably 50-75% but I only do it a few times per year.
Cold-calling to get people try try your new app or answer a survey is rude.
My senior year of college, I emailed a Danish/Swedish professor (had lived in both countries and published in both languages) about a niche research article he had published that I was unable to find. He not only sent me the article, but mailed a couple copies of his books to me in the US. Sadly, my Scandinavian reading comprehension has plummeted since then and I am unable to read his books anymore, but they sit on my shelf and remind me of that period of my life and my wonderful Nordic Studies professors.
I have emailed two authors now and both responded enthusiastically and answered my questions. Granted, these were also niche texts so I don't imagine it's common for them to get fanmail either!
Tall, handsome, professors I bet!
I find myself in a similar situation. Drafting an email to an academic. And as I decipher her motivations with respect to her own work from micro-expressions she had in an interview, I start to think we're not that different. I'm falling in love, how embarrassing ...
This comment is a little creepy.
Whenever I write something that gets some traction, I get emails. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. One of them is from a guy that tells me "I love your blog, but you got terrible spelling." If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't bother doing a spellcheck before publishing.
I'm always saying it's better to finish on a good note rather than a bad one, "<Insert Bad Things> but <Insert Good Things>" (eg. "You're stupid but I love you" vs "I love you but you're stupid"), but that's the kind of case where it's clearly better to do the reverse. Huh.
This is my strategy with forum comments. Always try to end with a compliment. Takes the edge off any criticism and makes an angry reply much less likely.
I’ve had about 10 emails about things I’ve said or presented on this website. I haven’t replied to all of them, which makes me feel bad because each one of them was a nice little surprise on any random day. I worry that no response makes people feel bad. I just can’t respond sometimes because of the anxiety I struggle with. But gosh do I love hearing from strangers about anything. I bet if I can get more comfortable talking with strangers I’ll really enjoy being old one day.
I struggle with interacting with random people, too. I'm alright with writing stuff that is largely impersonal and in public (like here on HN), but there's something about a direct email or a real in-person conversation with someone who I don't know that makes me feel anxious in ways that I don't like.
Maybe it's because I feel like I don't have all the right answers, or that it might be an uphill battle for me in some way, or I'm afraid of making a lasting connection (and the combination of burden and joy that this brings), or I'm instead afraid of missing a connection despite putting effort into it. Perhaps it is all of those things together or something else entirely.
Whatever it is, I know one thing for sure: Inaction has a deterministic outcome.
So when I do nothing, then nothing happens. Nothing is gained, nothing is lost, and nothing is spent.
And maybe that's not an optimal outcome, but it's at least a predictable outcome -- and that alone seems to serve to resolve whatever unwelcome feelings of anxiety I might otherwise experience.
I'm like this with calls. I'll correspond with you on email all day long if you want, but if I'm asked to have a random chat call with a stranger, I get really averse to it.
I’m curious to hear about why talking to strangers is troublesome for you? For me maybe when I was younger but these days I just treat everyone like an old friend. What kind of pitfalls do you run into? Just a general sense of anxiety?
I have a similar anxiety about emailing or messaging people directly. If I'm just posting a comment on HN or reddit, there's not much commitment and if someone responds but I don't feel like continuing the thread, it's fine to completely ignore it. But if I send something directly to someone, it feels very personal, and like I'm starting a conversation. Once I'm in a conversation I'm obligated to continue it until it reaches a conclusion, and while the anxiety of trying to write things in a personal way is bad, the anxiety of trying to force a conclusion to the conversation is worse.
Tried writing a response multiple times and then ssl-3 nailed it with their comment and saved me. :)
hah.
Any time. ;)
I've received a couple of emails about ghidra-delinker-extension, but I would not limit this to only emails. I've also had numerous people contacting me through GitHub issues or Discord messages over the years, with this as a topic starter.
I've had deep technical exchanges with smart people all across the world I would've never met otherwise. I've seen people using my tool for completely insane projects successfully. I've even had a data scientist from India who was inspired and motivated by my story of presenting at ACM 2025 as a hobbyist to put his work out there.
Interacting with all these people has broadened my horizons - literally going halfway across the globe in one instance. All of that happened despite me being an introvert, who hates initiating any form of social interactions with people and sounds like a raving lunatic on my blog.
Maybe I should be the one to send out more emails...
Maybe it's because I'm a negative person, but even when I do keep in touch with people, I can count those I've stayed in long term contact with on one hand.
And the knowledge I can offer others is also limited.
I receive a dozen or so emails a year from people who read my free sci-fi books. they are generally to say thanks, or to point out spelling errors or something factually incorrect that I have usually fixed. Most are shocked I reply. I guess quite a few also get zapped by my aggressive spam filters, which with the amount of spam I get is going to make it a real problem in the future.
Hey, I do this too, and I absolutely love receiving thoughtful e-letters, the few times a year they happen!
Here are my reasons, copied from my site's "Standing Invitation" [0].
> Email me just because (not just for work). Whatever feeds your curiosity; silly, fun, nerdy, serious.
> Why?
> 1. Do unto me what I have done unto others. I habitually cold-email anyone who moves me in some way (joy, insight, utility, mind shift…). I also love to receive such email!
> 2. There is too little unsolicited positive feedback in much of most of our lives. At some point in the fuzzy past, I decided enough was enough. At least someone somewhere ought to feel good sometime for no reason whatsoever. Since that realisation, I have cold-emailed people willy-nilly. See also: Saying Thank You [1], and Days Are Easily Made [2].
> 3. It's always been a delight; no regrets. You should try it too!
> So, let serendipity reign; write away!
[0] https://www.evalapply.org/about.html#standing-invitation
[1] https://blog.jim-nielsen.com/2022/saying-thank-you/
[2] https://www.autodidacts.io/how-to-make-someones-day/
If I haven't chatted with a CEO or other builder in a week I've probably not spent a ton of time online.
Obviously different people have different time and attention; they don't all get back to you.
But it really doesn't take very long to just throw together a note sharing your thoughts or questions for them you may have. They may not answer. But they might.
If it does fail though, I've also been finding that asking an LLM what so and so would say to whatever I have to share can sometimes be insightful and based on their public comments. Though obviously, probably best not to hold what an LLM said against the person the LLM said might say it...
Email them because most people these days never receive a personal email from another real human being, instead of newsletters, solicitations, marketing, announcements, notifications and spam.
I think the last time I emailed a stranger when I had no business reason to do so was to thank someone for creating an excellent set of instructions for running OpenBSD on the exact model of laptop I wanted to use. I didn't expect a response and I didn't receive a response. I just thought he should know that something he did helped someone else, and now he knows.
You can email anyone if there's something you need to communicate to them. Since when was it ever a big deal to email someone you don't know?
The last time I cold-emailed someone was back in 2021 when I had issues with uboot. Some software doesn't make it easy to file bug reports, and this one chap was working on the same board I had, so I felt like I had nothing else to lose. Thankfully they were nice, actually knew what the problem was, and had a fix in that same week.
The big one is the fact that you will likely be ignored by a large host of them. Even with modern spam filters, a lot of unsolicited messages are simply a waste of packets. Odds are, even your useful, inquisitive message will be buried under the more disingenuous messages, especially in an age of LLMs. Trying to get in contact with anyone that already has a large audience can be discouraging.
> The big one is the fact that you will likely be ignored by a large host of them.
So you have a fear of rejection?
Mate, you need to pull yourself together.
> So you have a fear of rejection?
Well, may be true for some people. For me, it is a matter of wasting my time when I have other things I could accomplish.
Forget emailing strangers, I have a hard time talking to my neighbours.
Have you tried emailing them?
On some level, strangers are easier to connect with than people who are in your life more permanently, like neighbors. Maybe there are fewer expectations and more mutual curiosity. It seems backwards, but for dipping your toe into more personal connection, it is an easier path.
This is funny but true. I don't think I've spoken to my neighbors in any place I've lived in 10 years other than maybe awkwardly running into each other in the hallway.
In apartments this has always been the case for me. I moved in to a townhouse recently and the neighbours on one side spend half the day gardening out the front so I do end up talking to them.
I think it would be nice if apartment buildings prioritised making some communal space that’s comfortable to hang out in so you’d have a chance to chat with people who live in the building. Usually it’s just some token couch in the lobby.
Have you tried nailing 95 theses to their doors, by way of introduction?
Most apartments I've lived in have a communal rec room of sorts. No one ever uses it.
I’ve never received a heartwarming message before. (Though maybe that’s just because I haven’t been sharing any useful information so far.)
Instead, I’ve received a few emails that seemed like copy-and-paste sales pitches, so I naturally became wary of emails from strangers, thinking, “Oh, another sales pitch…”
But I had no idea there were people out there who thought this way! Thank you for introducing me to this new way of thinking.
The Prince of Nigeria does the same.
I still somewhat like the email format, but I am also unable to deal with it, accumulating literally thousand of unread (non-spam) emails. I just can't keep up with the volume. I saw others use clients such as mutt or what not, and read through email on the terminal, so perhaps I should do that, but this is never the bottle neck for me. It is writing replies that is the bottleneck; it takes too much time away. I also need to think before writing, which is another bottleneck. I am very bad at thinking.
> Social media platforms rise and fall like ancient empires sped up a thousand times. Yet email endures.
I do use Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and Proton mail for various things but I also run my own email server for some things (mostly personal), which I've done since the mid-late 1990's and plan to continue doing so. Because I control it and I feel that gives me a small bit of power compared to the trillion dollar companies.
> The first time I emailed a stranger, I swear my cursor hovered over Send for a full five minutes.
I would estimate communication is 95% non verbal and 5% verbal. The problem with online interaction is you are limited to this 5% while interacting with an almost infinite number of social groups and people.
Learning how to adapt to online socialization is learning how to adapt to being blind. Only you aren't blind, you are choosing to wear a blindfold.
I tried this with a blogger I admire. Got no reply. Felt weird for a day then forgot about it. Still glad I sent it though.
Leaving a proxy email on my HN profile has given me tons of interesting messages, highly recommend it!
What's the best way to contact someone about to get real feedback on a paid app / SaaS? Give them a free license? Mention something specific about them, so they knew you actually cared enough to check out that person and manually write the email?
Their silence says nothing about your worth. They might be busy, taking a break from email, or not in a place where they can engage with new folk…who knows? And what does it matter?
Or it gets filtered as spam. very common
I read a whole article about how cool it is to email people and I’m opening to the idea… then I see the signature and realize it’s probably just a cheap way to get dates, that come to him.
> it’s probably just a cheap way to get dates, that come to him.
Odd you think this way..... however why would this be a problem?
Or do you believe one is only allowed to meet prospective partners though exploitative 'dating' apps installed on ones fondle slab?
I agree with this and have received insights on difficult challenges, but I've found that each year it gets more difficult to find an email address for someone.
i do this with some frequency, maybe a few times a month. i'll email bloggers/poets/researchers i like or founders of interesting companies that solve very specific problems in a satisfying way. i've gotten more responses than you'd think! even when emailing founders or writers you'd expect had hundreds of much more important emails to attend to.
not to make this yet another 'in the age of AI' comment, but i can't help myself: given how cold and barren the mainstream internet feels now, cold emailing strangers in a non-transactional way is a humanitarian act. when i get emails from strangers about my own personal blog it makes me feel a little brighter about things for like an hour after. it's why i keep my email on my blog, despite the occasional spam/anonymous hate
Well I wouldn't email anyone. LinkedIn, X, WhatsApp and even reaching out through friends seems much more effective But the key is to get to know anyone that you think it is minimally (or surprisingly) reachable and try to get the best out of them. And always be reachable up to your limit. Help people whenever you can to reach their goals, you'd never know :)
Building a network is also very important. It is a long run and also a habit to keep
I emailed Lenstra about some ancient history, we had a nice chat.
RSA129 - I have a color copy of the prize check. I asked how many he sent out.
I email strangers all the time relating to my businesses. But for "personal" time? Gives me the shivers.
Why?
I'm reading lots of reply's on here from people afraid of talking to strangers. Is there something wrong with you all?
FWIW: Strangers have the best sweets.
It’s not that I’m afraid. As an introvert, I just think it’s a pain in the ass. Versus contacting strangers for work, I don’t mind because it’s something I have to do.
actually spam filters have evolved to make it so you can often not even email people you know and have pressing need to contact.
I used to. I do much less now that email is no longer available for whois results from domains because of GDPR. It really killed communication on the internet. The switch to non-protocol based corporate communication services was the other half of killing it.
I've had moderate success with the little AIs, though they seem to have added some annoying "don't do that" stuff.
Because he's a drunk dork? Wait, both things don't match.
Needs [2025], as it was written last year.
I assumed this was a longform "Ode to Spam"
...I'm still not sure it isn't. :)
> Allow me to explain.
No.
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He's right, we really have forgotten that email can just be about reaching out to strangers for honest communication.
Maybe I'll have Claude send him a thank you.