# Slack plugin: automatically subscribe a channel to updates on a topic when link is shared

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/slack-plugin-automatically-subscribe-a-channel-to-updates-on-a-topic-when-link-is-shared/56520>\
**Category:** Feature\
**Created:** [Janeiro 28, 2017, 4:30pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/slack-plugin-automatically-subscribe-a-channel-to-updates-on-a-topic-when-link-is-shared/56520 "2017-01-28T16:30:20Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 1

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**Author:** ![mcwumbly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/mcwumbly/32/103861_2.png) [@mcwumbly](https://meta.discourse.org/u/mcwumbly)\
**Post date:** [Janeiro 28, 2017, 4:30pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/slack-plugin-automatically-subscribe-a-channel-to-updates-on-a-topic-when-link-is-shared/56520/1 "2017-01-28T16:30:20Z")

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In our company, Slack channels proliferate with wild abandon. This is a topic of discussion in of itself, but it will likely be a challenge to work towards having a more curated set of Slack channels… some folks have [worked on aspects of this problem](https://github.com/mikegehard/kotlinArchiveChannel), but even with automatic cleanup, I expect the number of channels to continue growing.

So in Slack, it is culturally expected at this point that channels will be frequently created and often represent niche interests. Out of a few thousand people, some channels may be very active, but only have ~ 10 active people in them.

This is one of the reasons that I’ve [advocated for tag support](https://meta.discourse.org/t/the-official-discourse-slack-plugin/51412/6) in the official slack plugin. We don’t want to see the same proliferation of categories in our Discourse setup, but we don’t mind tags enjoying the same kind of freedom that Slack channels have. So the thinking is, if Slack channel users are able to self-subscribe to tags of interest to that channel, then _relevant_ Discourse discussions can feed into the appropriate channel.

But here’s another thought I had around the same problem:

What if, any time a link to a Discourse topic is posted in Slack, the channel could auto-subscribe to updates for that topic? This would eliminate the need to remember to tag things appropriately, or which tags map to which channel.

(The tag support thing would still be valuable, I think, but this could complement it pretty well).

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_[View the full topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/slack-plugin-automatically-subscribe-a-channel-to-updates-on-a-topic-when-link-is-shared/56520)._