Why is PHOTO B showing up instead of PHOTO A?

December 7, 2012 4:11 PM

How/why is my Facebook profile pic turning up on emails I send from my Gmail account to Hotmail/Outlook?

I have a gmail account, the email address that's associated with my Facebook account. My gmail account has PHOTO A assigned to it. My Facebook account has PHOTO B as a profile pic.

Now, for some reason, when my mother (who has a Hotmail/Outlook account) receives email from my gmail account, instead of the photo/icon attached being PHOTO A, she sees PHOTO B.

I'd rather people receiving my emails only get PHOTO A - and not whatever profile pic I've randomly assigned to Facebook that week. What settings do I need to change? At what end - Gmail or Facebook?

posted by crossoverman to technology (12 answers total)

This is possibly something at your Mother's end -- she has a photo assigned to you in her contacts, and either it happens to be your Facebook photo or she has your email and facebook linked on her end -- have you tried sending emails to other email addresses as test cases to see if this is just something for your mother, or if it's really a universal issue?
posted by brainmouse at 4:18 PM on December 7, 2012 [2 favorites]

She wouldn't have had photo B to assign to me at her end - and she mentioned the photo change around the same time I changed by Facebook profile pic.
posted by crossoverman at 4:22 PM on December 7, 2012

does she have an android phone where you can link Facebook and google contacts? that might be causing it to happen.

also, have you sent anyone else an email where this has happened or just her?
posted by sio42 at 4:30 PM on December 7, 2012 [1 favorite]

I believe you can also link Facebook and Hotmail contacts through Hotmail (at least you used to be able to), so it's possible that she's done that also.

But yeah, you should definitely check with at least a few other people (or a few other dummy accounts) that you've emailed before you can troubleshoot this.
posted by brainmouse at 4:32 PM on December 7, 2012 [1 favorite]

Maybe change you facebook profile pic to text stating test and try it again?
posted by Blasdelb at 4:43 PM on December 7, 2012

Hi, my mother is pretty technically inept - she doesn't have a smart phone or Facebook.

I've just sent a test Gmail to my old Hotmail account and the Facebook photo turns up there, but to another Gmail account and the Gmail assigned photo is attached.
posted by crossoverman at 4:43 PM on December 7, 2012

I've changed my Facebook pic, sent a Gmail to my Hotmail - and the old Facebook pic is still associated with it. I suspect this while change soon, though.
posted by crossoverman at 4:48 PM on December 7, 2012

What kind of phone do you have? It may be syncing the two accounts behind the scenes without you noticing.
posted by thewumpusisdead at 4:49 PM on December 7, 2012 [2 favorites]

I've got a Samsung Galaxy SIII. Hmmm, maybe that's it!
posted by crossoverman at 4:53 PM on December 7, 2012

I think the issue is caused by your phone. I have a similar issue with Gmail on my Android phone. Android syncs all of my contacts' social media accounts - they're all bundled up - and it does the same with me. So when I *sen* an email from Gmail the from field is actually the email account I have associated with FB, rather than my actual Gmail address, and as I recall my FB photo (which is different than my Gmail photo) is pulled through too. Luckily my real email address shows up in recipients' inboxes.
posted by KokuRyu at 10:58 PM on December 7, 2012 [1 favorite]

Thank you, KokuRyu and thewumpusisdead. I guess that has to be it. I still can't figure out how to untangle this, but at least I understand why it's happening now.
posted by crossoverman at 1:14 AM on December 8, 2012

It should be a setting in the phone settings under Accounts. There should be your google/gmail accounts, your fb, and any other email, twitter etc.

If you click on the account, there should be settings for what to sync. Provided the android os hasn't changed a lot since my last one a few months ago, you should be able to disable syncing of your fb account and it won't affect the fb app on your phone.
posted by sio42 at 5:58 AM on December 8, 2012