How to stop my viewer status in a private blog
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When I join a
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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I’m seeing that sites where you are specifically the viewer role aren’t listed here. Is there a way for a Viewer to self remove from a private blog, or do they need to request removal from the site owner?
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Before I made the suggestion I did briefly wonder whether the “Leave a Blog” process would work for the “Viewer” role, but decided not to check with staff because I thought that question had been answered affirmatively by staff in a previous topic. However, I might have misremembered that.
After reviewing the “Viewer” description in the User Roles support page I’m more doubtful that it will do the trick. Calling for staff attention was a good idea, if that was you. Thanks. : -)
Does the “Leave a blog” process described in the My Blogs support page work for Viewers? If not, then how does a Viewer terminate their role on a site? Must they ask an administrator of the site to remove them from the user/viewers?
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@musicdoc1, the same here. I thought your answer was correct until trying it on a spare account.
My guess here after thinking about it is that you can just unfollow and no longer visit a private site. A viewer has no need to terminate that relationship and block their own access since they can just not go to the site, while a blog owner might want to stop giving permission for someone to see their site.
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Hey all, If you are added to a Private site as a Viewer, the site doesn’t show up in your list of sites at My Blogs in the WP Admin dashboard, so it wouldn’t be possible to Leave a Blog that way.
If you Follow the same Private site, you can remove your subscription, but it looks like the only way to be removed from a Private site is to ask the site owner/admin to remove you (or simply stop accessing the site).
To this day the whole Viewer on a Private site is a bit of a mystery to me:
A. How does the Viewer access the site after receiving the initial approval email from the site owner; the Private site doesn’t seem to show up anywhere in the Viewer’s account, unless they Follow it – but that is an entirely different process.
B. This exact question: How an invited Viewer removes himself/herself from a Private site. There may be a circumstance where the Viewer doesn’t want to contact the site owner to be removed and just not accessing the Private site any longer is sort of a security issue in my mind.Waiting to hear from Staff, too.
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There may be a circumstance where the Viewer doesn’t want to contact the site owner to be removed and just not accessing the Private site any longer is sort of a security issue in my mind.
Exactly. It’s not difficult to think of circumstances where the Viewer would be reluctant to make any contact with the site owner let alone asking for a favor, and it’s equally easy to imagine a situation in which removal from the host’s viewers list would be imperative to one who no longer wishes to be on that list, for personal, legal, ethical, etc. reasons.
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imagine a situation in which removal from the host’s viewers list would be imperative to one who no longer wishes to be on that list,
Amen. Reminds me of a public site I saw yesterday where the owner was publishing an updated list of new followers’ WordPress IDs (e.g.: @musicdoc1) , calling it the “member appreciation” list. Kinda creepy. There were very few members. Maybe he obtained permission before posting, but didn’t say that.
There may be a circumstance where the Viewer doesn’t want to contact the site owner to be removed and just not accessing the Private site any longer is sort of a security issue in my mind.
I see it as a privacy/security issue, too.
The ability of a Viewer to leave a site quietly without asking the site owner, and without notifying them, is important. No other user role has to ask to be removed. Knowing this now, I’ll never accept Viewer-only membership in a private site.
It seems like a kind of thing that GDPR would frown on even more than I do.
It’s also just a matter of account administration. A WordPress.com account holder should be able to see a list of all WordPress private and public sites where they are a user/member in any role, and dis-enroll from there. Seems it would be under My Sites/Switch Site.
Since Viewer is the only role that does not have self-removal freedom in a private blog, it will be interesting to hear whether there was some intentional reason for it.
Some other observations, in case you’re not confused enough:
In a private blog:
1. A newly admitted Viewer does not show up as a User at /wp-admin/users.php, but users in other roles do; i.e., Viewers are not “Users,” just “private blog members.” They are not listed as a Follower in wpadmin stats, either /wp-admin/index.php?page=stats&blog[…]subscribers. This seems reasonable, because a Viewer might want access, but not Follow/Subscribe. So wp-admin doesn’t list them anywhere these days unless they Follow, except in the Invites list. (??? did I miss something?)
In the new admin parallel universe (PU), wordpress.com/people/followers/… (Manage/People) does not show the new Viewer as a Follower unless they subscribe to Follow. If they do, then they appear under both Viewers and Followers (and Invites if applicable).
2. Viewers can’t be promoted to a higher user role without sending them a new invite bearing a different role selection. It would be like promoting a public blog Follower to a User (“Team” in PU). Since they are not on the User/Team list, you can’t change their user role online without sending the new invite. They get promoted when they accept the invite. Actually, it’s not really “promoted,” it’s “granted membership on the Team.” They get a seat on the Team list, and are still on the Viewers list. (People originally invited to be Contributors do not appear on the Viewers list. Viewer seems to be a special kind of membership.) And they can subscribe/unsub as a Follower if they wish, regardless of role.
3. No user role higher than Viewer can be demoted to Viewer. They can be moved among the other roles, but now down to Viewer. Seems almost comparable to moving a Team member to mere Follower in a public blog, though Viewer and Follower are not the same thing at all.
As I understand this for the moment, confusion arises when thinking in wp-admin terms while operating in the PU world. When it comes to people admin, it’s probably better to just stay in the PU and ignore wp-admin … um … except that’s where you have to go to Leave a Blog (when you can) or to use the different functionality of the follower list in stats, as compared with Manage/People/Followers.
(Is there an official name for the PU? Current version of Dashboard?)
This leaves me with only the problem that a Viewer in a private blog cannot dis-enroll at will without asking the owner to do it for them.
Thanks everyone for your contributions to the topic, and for pointing out any errors you find in my observations/conclusions. Looking forward to the expert explanation.
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Hi folks, thanks for all this good, detailed feedback. What you’re saying makes sense.
The current dashboard name is Calypso.
I’ll do a little more testing tomorrow, getting screenshots and what not, then we’ll file an enhancement request here:
https://github.com/Automattic/wp-calypsoIf any of you enjoy using Github, you’re welcome to follow (I’ll post a link) or even post the issue yourself and update this thread if you’ve already got screenshots and what not ready to go.
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Okay. I did a bit more digging. This issue sounded familiar, so I found a similar one here and added my comment.
https://github.com/Automattic/wp-calypso/issues/3321
You’re welcome to follow along!
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Correction: In my paragraph 3 above,”They can be moved among the other roles, but now down to Viewer.” should say “but NOT down to Viewer.”
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@supernovia – Just wanting to follow up here. Since there is no mechanism currently in place for a Viewer to remove themselves from a Private site, would Staff remove a Viewer if requested by the Viewer?
Thanks.
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@walymor,
Reminds me of a public site I saw yesterday where the owner was publishing an updated list of new followers’ WordPress IDs (e.g.: @musicdoc1) , calling it the “member appreciation” list.
The My Community widget displays a grid of Gravatar images each of which links to the complete Gravatar profile page of a WP.com user. It may customized to include not only followers, but likers and commenters as well. It’s very common for sites to acknowledge their followers in this way. Even novice WordPress.com users, if they visit other WP.com sites now and then, will quickly become aware that providing links to one’s followers is an accepted and ordinary practice, just as it is on social media and social networking sites.
The ability of a Viewer to leave a site quietly without asking the site owner, and without notifying them, is important. No other user role has to ask to be removed.
Were an administrator to provide a links list of Viewers in a page or in a widget on a private site, there is no reason to expect that the list, or any link in that list, would necessarily remain private after being privately published.
One major difference between publicly listing Followers, as I’ve described above, and the possibility of listing Viewers on a private site is that, as you’ve explained so eloquently, whereas a follower can easily unfollow a site and users with any other role than Viewer can remove themself from that role (Leave a Blog), there is presently no means available for the Viewer to remove themself.
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