e-mail provider

Odd little pickle....

We are finding out that comcast is blocking e-mail from reaching us. Not spam e-mail, just normal one person e-mail. I've had issues in the past, but now it's getting really bad. On top of that, we are not able to call to Puerto Rico right now- which is really odd. So that will be in for a call later today.

As for an alternate- google is changing their privacy policy tomorrow, and will be mining more stuff from us, so even though I have a g-mail account, that doesn't seem like a good place anymore.

So, where's a good, safe, secure e-mail that I can use?

I'm watching this, as we are also having issues with Comcast. Can't get PMs from here.

Nothing free is in the same league as Gmail. There's hotmail/MSN, Yahoo...you'll have to settle for one of those.

I use the Multifox plugin to keep my Google services sandboxed from everything else. I run Gmail and Google Reader in a secondary identity profile (separate set of cookies etc.) and copy and paste links from there into the primary identity.

Juno has always been an old, old favorite of mine.

Whatever you do, DON'T get Yahoo! (! ... ?) They're email is absolute CRAP but I can't dump it because it's tied to friggin everything.

From what I understand Google is not gathering any more info about you it is just consolidating it.

Unfortunately Gmail is still the best of the free email services.

For the google history clean up...
www.google.com/history

FYI video:
http://news.yahoo.com/how-to-remove-your-google-web-data-history.html

Buy your own domain name and a $6 a month host (heck, host at home an old PC running linux for nickels) and do it yourself

edit: check this out. I've used it for a client in the past. Works great and does just about every googlemail/docs does http://www.zimbra.com/products/hosted_demo.php

Depending how far down the rabbit hole you want to go you could set up your own email service just for your own use and whoever else you wanted to add.

The best part is that it could be @whateveryouwant.com/net/org/us

Rusted_Busted_Spit wrote: From what I understand Google is not gathering any more info about you it is just consolidating it. Unfortunately Gmail is still the best of the free email services.

However one wants to interpret it- they do collect info, and sell it- http://www.google.com/intl/en/policies/privacy/preview/

That goes into effect tomorrow, March 1.

Too bad it's such a pain to turn everything off...

But it would be nice to have an e-mail server who just gives me email, and doesn't try to "enhance my experience"- aka- finding the right banner ads to show me.

I've seen yahoo, and would rather avoid it. And I'm not actually a big fan of how g-mail is handled, either.

If you want to build your own, I recommend using a RoundCube interface with SpamAssassin.

I did find this : The Top Three Free Secure Email Services

Secure Email Services Here are three of the best secure email services available.

1. S-MAIL - S-MAIL offers a free secure mailbox that encrypts your messages and transfers them securely. S-MAIL offers services for subscription including a secure email agent that works with email clients and commercial secure email for businesses.

2. Comodo SecureEmail - This secure email offering is free for non-commercial use. It is a simple download and install that integrates with most major mail clients and can help reduce the problems with public-key and digital signature exchange. Recipients either use SecureEmail as well, or they can read your message using Comodo's Web-based reader.

3. Hushmail - Hushmail provides secure web-based email accounts as well as document storage. This is a truly free secure email system on the Web, but you must log in at least every 3 weeks for the account to remain active. Setting up the account is simple. Hushmail offers a premium service as well, which includes 250MB of storage and Outlook support.

In reply to Rusted_Busted_Spit:

Good find! My google search didn't come up with that....

jrw1621 wrote: For the google history clean up... www.google.com/history FYI video: http://news.yahoo.com/how-to-remove-your-google-web-data-history.html

Now that I look at it closer, I may be lucky on this one- turns out that my two google accounts never had history turned on at all, and as far as I can tell, it can't be turned on unless I do it. So, that's not all that bad.

I use Disconnect on Firefox to prevent cookies.

I am in the process of extracting myself from Google as much as possible. I moved to an @me.com account because it is an Apple product and so far it works just fine for me.

pinchvalve wrote: I am in the process of extracting myself from Google as much as possible. I moved to an @me.com account because it is an Apple product and so far it works just fine for me.

One demon to another?

believe it or not, AOL email (now) is pretty much like gmail - and you can turn off the ad targeting easily

I've had Gmail for several yrs and Yahoo email for even longer .... I actually like the Yahoo mail better

I am all alone on my own hosted server for e-mail. Local co-op hosts my website and one of the perks is my own email. It's $75 a year one time payment.