Can the birthday notification feature be turned off globally? The notifications are really falling flat. Beyond that, sending around privacy information so casually does not seem like a good choice in this day and age.

No we do not have a global switch for it.

Users can choose not to share their birthday on their profile page to address the privacy concern.

Only users who have subscribed to a classmate receive a reminder about the birthday for that individual.

Users can individually turn off receiving birthday reminders even for those they subscribe to under Notify Me

Jessica
Class Creator Support

What happens in this regard if I deactivate the birthday input field in the profile generator? Will that cause a global suppression or would I need to go through all the profiles and expunge all the entered birth dates?

I think it is a bad idea to force this feature on your clients. I'm finding it a real dud. Peoples birthdays are announced, no one says anything and how do they feel?

Hi Carl,

No that would not change the functionality of the birthday reminders as the birthday field is considered part of the site members contact information and is a default part of the system at this time. We've not had this request before so I'm checking to see what the options might be with the programmers.

Jessica

Carl, I enjoy having the birthday notification feature. Usually, it will be just a few close ones who send a message to the one having a birthday. For me, that's sufficient cause for keeping the birthday notification feature intact. As to your privacy concerns, whether we like it or not, just about anything that is in a public database can be easily discovered about anyone on the internet, including one's birthdate.

Carl Zipperle wrote:

It's possible private messages are being sent. I myself generally do that rather than post something publicly.

Your members have control over what is shown on their profile and they have 2 options for showing/not showing their Birthday. They can just leave that field blank (I always tease my members who have done that, telling them "We know how old you are, why hide it?") or they can select the "Do Not Show Birthday" option at the bottom of their Edit Profile page.

I looked at your Home Page and don't see a list of current Birthdays. You may have that turned on for members only. Your Classmates Profiles are locked so the only people who can see those Birthdays are the 79 members who have joined your site. So, if they haven't signed up to follow a classmate or receive any Birthday notifications and they can't see a list of current Birthdays for any of the other members, they would have no way of knowing that it is someone's Birthday.

Re: No one says anything. Sometimes my Birthday Greetings are very long so I prefer to send them via Private Message rather than posting them on their Profile pages. Your members may be doing this too.

As far as privacy concerns go, I would be very worried if all the contact information were visible, which it isn't. Our pages can all be password protected for security and that's exactly (well, one of the many reasons) why I chose Class Creator to host our site