Notifications vs Alerts

For this discussion, Notification means a message appearing on the game controller icon, and Alert means a message appearing in the bell icon. Oddly, both of these are labeled 'Notifications'.

Why is it I get GS alerts about games and news sometimes in the Alert area and sometimes in the Notifications area? This is very inconsistent. When I see a message pop up in my notification area, I assume someone has responded to a post or sent me a private message. Why am I getting gaming news in my Notification area when the Alert area seems to be designed just for that?

@br0kenrabbit: The "notifications" you see are notifications related to things you follow on the site - either updates to games you follow, content posted by people you follow, as well as direct mentions of you in forums/comments. You can customize which notifications you'd like to receive in your Settings, but I'm afraid we don't have a way to separate the content notifications from the direction mention notifications.