Why I Don't Want A Notification Screen Anymore

[awesumjon]

I know a lot of people don't like that a toast alert goes off and you look at your phone and have no idea what it is unless there's a Live Tile notification.

This happens to me too but I know what I do and don't have enabled for Toast and it's not many (<5) so I don't have a real problem with it.

Many people want to see what notifications they have all on one area, whether that be an Android-esque drop down shelf or a left-to-right swipe to the left for a separate screen to see all your current notification.

At first I was ok with this idea and didn't mind it one bit. In fact, I thought it was a good idea.

Then, while handling a wasted Droid 3 of mine, I saw these little alerts going off on the top. A game I installed from Gameloft was telling me of a sale on some of their micro-transactions. I pull down the shelf and there are many many notifications from different games "50% OFF!" "30% Off!" "Try A Game Get 100 Coins!"

After seeing this, I was reminded about seeing the UserVoice suggesting for a notification shelf, and I cringed.

We can obviously see how a notification screen can help US, but we forget that developers and publishers whose main app-based income most likely comes from in-app micro-transactions and a separate notification area will quite possibly turn into a "sale-notification free-for-all" with all your apps!

A recent XBLA game tried to tie an Achievement with some micro-transactions before it was pulled from the marketplace. Will MS do the same with apps that send "sale notifications" even from the indie developers or leave it to the consumer to individually ignore each alert?

Obviously this is a one-armed argument based off micro-transactions, but there are other types of pointless "alerts" that some publishers send each chance they get on the Android side, and it's something I would absolutely be against in this awesome OS.

I think I've gone on long enough, once I start typing I get all my thoughts out before I realize it's time to stop :dry So what do you think?

ps. Thanks for reading this whole thing!!

 

[foosball]

2 comments:

- This is only one downside to having a notification screen and it's not like it has to be this way. There are plenty more positive reasons to continue to want to see notifications on a separate screen.
- That's why it's important to have a system which gives the user CONTROL over notifications. Problem solved.

 

[willied]

I imagine WP wouldn't allow that kind of stuff. iOS doesn't have that problem, right?

 

[Tyresian]

Actually since iOS 5 it DOES have that problem. One of my friends had been a long time iPhone user and loved it until iOS 5. He said the notification menu was very cluttered and really liked how WP didn't have this problem.

 

[smoledman]

Actually since iOS 5 it DOES have that problem. One of my friends had been a long time iPhone user and loved it until iOS 5. He said the notification menu was very cluttered and really liked how WP didn't have this problem.

Hmmm now I'm starting to think twice about a notification center. If Microsoft does do it - they should have very strict controls on it.

 

[JR A]

You should try BlackBerry.

Best. Notifications. Period.


And Sound Profiles too

 

[Laura Knotek]

You should try BlackBerry.

Best. Notifications. Period.


And Sound Profiles too

I'll skip the hourglass and the battery pulls.

I came to Windows Phone after using BlackBerries for 4 years.

 

[Verkunder]

It warms my bones to see there are still purists out there that see the purpose behind Live Tiles. Windows Phone isn't going to simply copy other platforms.

Fight the good fight, sir; you are not alone.

 

[jabtano]

It warms my bones to see there are still purists out there that see the purpose behind Live Tiles. Windows Phone isn't going to simply copy other platforms.

Fight the good fight, sir; you are not alone.

Rather is see others copying Windows Phone......

 

[mparker]

If I care about the notifications from an app then I put it on the start screen. If I don't want notifications from that app then I don't put it on the start screen. Never had a problem with that approach.

I do like the ICS notification system, but it's much more in-your-face with no good way to prioritize the notifications. With WP7 they are pretty much already prioritized because the apps I care about are at the top of the start screen, the only issue really is that there's no good way to see the notification "junk pile".

We could go with an Android-style system where when you swipe down to see the battery and time you also get the notification list, but that's still too obtrusive. We should have to do something special to get to the notification junk pile. Maybe swipe right once for the app list, swipe right again to get the unpinned notifications.

 

[selfcreation]

yeah I personally dont care for a *notification screen*

all my notifications I get on my live tiles, witch are my top 5 pined tiles, so I see them ALL right away.

this is just gona be an other Function for people to complain about .... cause it wont be up to par with what they want.


every thing is amazing and no one is happy. lol

 

[jmerrey]

I'm not sure about the iphone, but I know on the ipad you have a page in the settings that lists every installed app that could send you notifications. From there, you have the options to turn them on or off. So, it's pretty easy to avoid spam notifications from games, etc.

 

[thed]

Count me in as still wanting a notification center.

Notification spam isn't really a good argument against a notification center. One of the requirements for an app to pass certification is that the user has to opt in to push notifications. So, if you don't want the notifications there is always a way to disable them.

 

[tk-093]

Actually since iOS 5 it DOES have that problem. One of my friends had been a long time iPhone user and loved it until iOS 5. He said the notification menu was very cluttered and really liked how WP didn't have this problem.

It's not really a problem on iOS 5 at all. Each app allows you to go in and tell it if you want it to put stuff in your Notification center or not. If all I want is text messages to be there, I can have that... If all I want is Facebook updates to be there, or Draw Something to be there, I can have that too. It's totally customizable.

Now, what sucks about it, is that you can swipe away indivdual updates like you can on Ice Cream Sandwich, but the problem on Android which was mentioned is the stupid little "spyware" notifications you can get, so it's not perfect either.

I've yet to use a WP as my primary line so I don't have a good opinion yet of how well I will like how WP does it. Obviously if Live Tiles are used correctly that takes care of a lot of your notifications.

 

[sting7k]

I was all excited for notification center in iOS 5. Then when it came out I found I really barely used it. Came to find I really only cared about/needed notifications from were SMS, email, and ESPN ScoreCenter. Sadly ScoreCenter does not have notifications on WP7.

 

[IamVortigaunt]

It appears that Windows 8 allows apps to display missed notifications on the lock screen. Perhaps something like this would work on the phone. The main problem seems to be missed toast notifications while not using the phone, so perhaps the home screen could display which apps sent notifications and the number of them sent. Then when you launch the app itself the toast notifications show up. This way, you know what apps tried to notify you, but you don't get spammed by all of them at once. Perhaps there would be an option to clear the lock screen after each unlock or to keep the notices there until the app was opened. I guess one drawback of this approach would be that you have to open each app to see what the notification is. However, I'd think the really important notifications would be from apps you have pinned to your start screen, so hopefully the live tile would provide some info. This would avoid the potential problem of having to sift through a bunch of notifications you don't care about.