I’m on annual leave next week. Now would be the ideal time to drop premium rage-bait and walk away. “One browser tab is enough” was drafted but due to a tragic git clean accident we are all spared. This sideways look at notifications should be more relatable.
When I pay using NFC I’m annoyed twice. First by Apple Pay, then again when my banking app catches up. Can’t they decide between themselves? I don’t need two reminders about the groceries I bought a minute ago. Maybe I can disable notifications for either one, but then I might miss real fraud alerts.
Notifications are a chore I could do without.
Restart required
Notifications are a core feature of needy programs. Every app wants to be the centre of attention. They can’t wait to tell you about their new features. Presumably in-app notifications are the new trend because OS level notifications are easily blocked.
Vivaldi ruined my browsing experience for a long time.
Vivaldi's 'Restart Required' notice
That annoying “toast” wasn’t dismissible. It crossed the line of death and looked suspicious. Eventually it was fixed by moving into the tab bar.
I recently returned to Sublime Text to avoid modern apps that were too needy. In response to my post, developers were keen to laud their command line supremacy. I don’t disagree but the CLI isn’t immune to notification nonsense. Every time I open Neovim I get stopped.
Neovim notification: Plugin Updates - Press ENTER or type command to continue.
Guess what happens when I press enter? Nothing! How about telling me what the command is to update the damn plugin?! Dear devs, updates may be your life, they ain’t mine!
Noisy websites
The web platform demands that anything native apps can do, the web must copy. There are good arguments for this. The counterpoint is terrible implementation. Browser vendors have done a dismal job at designing the user experience around push notifications.
“This website wants to send you notifications, allow?”
Does this still pop up before a page has even loaded? I wouldn’t know. I blocked that years ago without thinking twice.
My advice, look for this:
Chromium notifications default behviour setting with 'Don't allow sites to send notifications' selected.
— or this:
Firefox notifications setting with 'Block new requests asking to allow notifications' checked.
— and block wholesale without exception.
In all my years of building websites I’ve never had a single client request or even consider notifications. Not one project that scoped in such a requirement.
Apple held out for declarative web push in Safari citing their usual privacy theatre (lol). Apple aren’t fans of silent push with no visible UI. I reckon their actual trepidation is their unreliable cloud syncing infrastructure. When I tested it was 50/50 on whether a notification ever arrived via Apple.
Mozilla’s servers are rock solid. One rainy day I ran an experiment to send large data split across many hundred web push payloads. I was able to clock kilobytes per second. This is awful abuse of the API. Apple might be right about silent push…
Literal spam
Proton Mail was one of the few mobile app that I allowed notifications. My inbox is usually rather chill, except when Proton spam me themselves.
Alongside my public addresses I use [redacted]@ for important accounts. I configured a folder to send mobile notifications for this address only. It worked for years. Then one day the spam notifications began. Spam that had already been flagged and filtered into trash (sent to any address).
I reported this bug to Proton Support in May and was told:
If we have any relevant information to share with you, or if we have any questions, we will follow up on this support ticket.
I never heard back. Notifications remain disabled.
Today my phone is almost entirely notification free unless I get an SMS from family. Oh, and Apple pestering me about iOS 26 several times a week.
iPhone system notification stating: iOS 26.6 is available. You can update now or schedule the update for later.
My iPhone will remain on iOS 18, thanks. Apple sure love their dark arts and deceptive patterns. There is no option to stop this constant nagging. If other apps tried it I bet Apple would delist them. This ain’t about security, I get iOS 18 updates.
Hot fires in your area
UK Government got trigger happy with their alert system.
Severe Alert. Issued by the UK Government. There is a very high risk of wildfires nationally. Residents, landowners and visitors should not undertake any activity that could start a fire, including disposable barbecues, firepits, garden incinerators or fireworks. Even a small flame can rapidly develop into a major wildfire placing lives, homes, businesses and emergency responders at risk. Follow official updates and report signs of fire immediately by calling 999. Search gov.uk/alerts for more information.
As with all mobile alerts of this nature, we’re reminded that abuse victims are at risk. This one also led to fire departments across England and Wales having to remind people their neighbour’s barbecue is not an emergency.
As Robb Knight noted: “there is nothing actionable in the alert”. Unless you count “Search gov.uk”, so I did. The more information provided was:
Sent by the UK government at 7:01pm on Friday 14 August 2026
This alert was sent to England and Wales.
Surrounding areas might also have received the alert.
Emergency Alert - GOV.UK
Thanks, Government. That could have been an email.
Why don’t these alerts respect my volume setting? Scared me half to death! If they have to be all or nothing, reserve them for zombies or higher.
Can’t be trusted
And that’s the problem with notifications. There is rarely the granular control necessary to make them useful. Most senders cannot be trusted to used them responsibly. The temptation to abuse direct access to people is too much, especially for men with guns.
If I ever allow notifications to begin with I disable them indefinitely the first time an app cries wolf. Every app cries wolf eventually.
Life is so much better when I go seeking information at my own pace.
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