Free e-mail...
By pgn
@pgntwo (22405)
Derry, Northern Ireland
April 29, 2018 7:09am CST
Electronic mail, or e-mail. We all use it. But do you pay for it?
Or do you use a free e-mail service, like Google's Gmail, or Hotmail (or is that Outlook now?), Yahoo Mail, or ProtonMail or... the list goes on, there's one at the end of this post, if you're interested in comparisons.
If you had to pay for e-mail, what would you expect in return? How much would you be prepared to pay per month or per year? Would you expect all your e-mail to be stored on your provider's servers, or would you rather suck it off to somewhere closer to home, somewhere less prone to being mined for information about you (if you think that's a risk, of course!)?
These are things people ask, and some of the answers relate to other areas of the Internet as well: instant messaging (Twitter or Facebook, for example), Internet voice services, (Whatsapp or Skype in this arena), to name but two.
Do you care? Have you given it any thought?
Want to know which is the best email service? Our helpful guide compares free email services Gmail, Outlook, Zoho, Yahoo, iCloud and privacy-focused Tutanota.
14 people like this
11 responses
@vandana7 (102698)
• India
29 Apr 18
I would be glad if it became paid mail. Seriously...my mail gets filled with so much spam that I give up cleaning. LOL. I bought a dress online, and every day there are offers. I search for a gift that I have to give for marriage..or search of medical insurance ..to plan my premiums sigh..and there are mails and mails and mails. Then the last three months of the year are horrifying. Tax saving schemes and NGOs. I donate to orphanage and half a dozen orphanages send mails to me every other day. They also keep calling...till 9.30pm...GROAN. They drop in uninvited. sigh. I often tell them I have to go out. I would pay the same charges as post office collects. 2 rupees per mail.
2 people like this
@vandana7 (102698)
• India
29 Apr 18
@thehousewife I have not subscribed to NGOs, and the innumerable tax saving offers. It is like I save through HDFC retirement scheme, every time they launch something knew, it lands in my folder. I need HDFC retirement scheme intimations, others no.
Then because HDFC is collaborating with ERGO, there are a bunch of medical insurance schemes.
Same with ICICI Prudential, etc. If I look up some properties on rental for one of the aunts, I will start getting mails from that site. There simply is no discretion.
1 person likes this
@vandana7 (102698)
• India
29 Apr 18
@thehousewife I have done for some. But they resurface if I revisit the sites. How can it be that I not visit some of those sites. sigh.
1 person likes this
@Namelesss (3364)
• United States
29 Apr 18
@vandana7 If you aren't giving these places your email then it is likely you should check your computer settings for privacy. Where you do give out your email there should be a place you can check/uncheck to receive or not further emails. But then again India may be different than here in US.
3 people like this
@JudyEv (381760)
• Rockingham, Australia
29 Apr 18
I'm afraid I don't care much and haven't given it much thought. I have a gmail account and Vince has bigpond. I rely on Vince to do the right thing and keep us 'safe' or whatever as regards the internet. That's why he's not allowed to die before me. 
2 people like this
@Cristi_Ichim (3750)
• Bucharest, Romania
13 May 18
I never thought of this but if I were to pay for mail I would not pay more than 5 dollars per month.
1 person likes this
@pgntwo (22405)
• Derry, Northern Ireland
13 May 18
@Cristi_Ichim Like :
- 5GB of storage for your mail on ther servers, or 0 storage, transfer all your e-mail onto your own storage?
- SPAM filtering as your mail is received, vs your own software to filter-out crud?
- Scanning content for nasties or for phishing links, vs reliance on your own a/v to pick that up?
These sorts of things...
1 person likes this
@DaddyEvil (174208)
• United States
10 May 18
I do use several of the free email accounts, pgn, but I also know how to block and stop them from mining any data that are in my emails, too.
I did the same after I set up Whatsapp to keep track of my overseas friends.
1 person likes this
@Poppylicious (11134)
• United Kingdom
1 May 18
I have had a Yahoo account since 2000 {I now only use it for competitions, surveys and companies I don't want to have my email address.} I have a gmail account and a personal paid for address as well, which is currently our surname.eu. Husband is finding us a new one because .eu may suddenly disappear when Brexit happens!
1 person likes this
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