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At least, stop personalizing your email subject lines with a recipient’s first name. What was once a highly effective strategy for boosting open rates has since lost its power.

A recent experiment revealed:

• Adding a recipient’s name in a subject line did not have a statistically significant effect on open rates, clicks, or unsubscribes.
• When [title] and [last name] were used, however, open rates were 11.8% higher.

The key takeaway? We’ve become used to subject-line personalization, and in an era of zero data privacy, it doesn’t feel so good anymore. Use a recipient’s surname or less common but relevant ways to personalize your emails.

Check out Ariyh for more on the data.

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IFTTT (If This Then That) is a free tool that connects apps and services together into Applets, or automations, to hack your workflow.

Quite literally, you can define how your apps respond and interact if this happens: then that, and that, and that, and that, and so on. It can get even more technical than that, if you want.

Back up your Instagram photos to Dropbox, have your lights turn on when you enter your home, sync Alexa to-dos with your Google calendar, or automatically remind a Slack channel about a meeting.

You’re gonna feel like that kid in Smart House (without the robot siege).

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TW: Gun violence.

Gun safety nonprofit Change the Ref has made an immersive computer game that simulates a school shooting.

The player has only one objective: navigate, escape, and survive the school day by collecting 5 key gun safety bills.

The data-informed design incorporates drills, alarms, messages, and objects left behind, as well as books and maps detailing gun violence in the U.S.