Subtle changes, bugs and feedback

Yeah, it's weird wording. The global one means "allow any of the following email notification types to be enableable"

It's weirder than that.

The global one when checked means "allow any of the following to be enabled, and if you are following items with emails enabled then re-enable those.

The global one unchecked means "stop all emails, and prevent enabling of new ones".

The ones below for replies and mentions, etc mean "send emails when these happen".

But... the ones relating to "items in a microcosm you are watching" and "a comment has been posted in an item you are watching" actually mean "use this as the default email preference for future things of this type that I follow".

So unchecking those doesn't remove email notifications from conversations you already said you do want emails for. And checking those won't change your existing follows, but will make future follow send emails.

It's horribly complex behind the scenes, and the form does a poor job at describing what it happening. But this is as close as we can get to giving you fine grained control over getting emails when you want them, but not the rest of the time.

In summary: If you want emails make sure the global thing is checked, and then visit the item in question and make sure you're following that with emails. The form mostly relates to future follows, not historical ones.