From Gmail to Fastmail

Post by etix » Sun, May 25, 2014, 1:07 PM UTC

chmars wrote: post #144

sivers wrote: post #34

I'm so glad someone wrote this up. I've been meaning to. Of all the tech changes I've made in the last few years, moving from Google Apps mail to Fastmail is the one that's made me the happiest, every day. The webmail is absolutely amazing. So fast, rock-sold, clean, minimal, focused. Having your webmail experience be completely ad-free and snoop-free, and, well, Google-free is priceless. Choose the Business email op…

Does Fastmail provide a matrix of all offers? I have for example never understood why business accounts have a USD 15/year management fee while family accounts have not …

Post by etix » Sun, May 25, 2014, 1:22 PM UTC

brongondwana wrote: post #109

mercer wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any good reason why they haven't done this already? It seems to me privacy is a major selling point, especially after the Snowden revelations.

Basically, we just don't have the hardware in Iceland to support both running a full replica of everything from New York and also running production traffic in Iceland. A fair bit of that is my personal fault for not pushing the extraction from Opera's racks into our own separate racks. We've been paying for capacity in Iceland for 3 months that we're not using yet.

Post by plg » Sun, May 25, 2014, 1:52 PM UTC

bigtones wrote: post #91

plg wrote: post #74

"IMAP was working less reliably and I felt more like the product than the customer" This is the key for me. (1) IMAP not working well and in particular, (2) feeling more like the product than the customer. With fastmail.fm their business model is they provide a service (email) and in return I give them money. They succeed as a business by getting more money. I am happy to give them money in return for a high quality…

Google Apps no longer serves ad's in email to anyone. So their business model is not to sell ads - it's to charge for email, calendar and storage - a very similar model to FastMail. Except Gmail has perfect forward secrecy, the best security of any email provider, and great web and mobile apps.

Post by etix » Sun, May 25, 2014, 2:24 PM UTC

Derbasti wrote: post #133

I recently switched from Gmail to a mail provider called Posteo. They are a German mail provider much like Fastmail. Here is the neat thing: You can create a mail account and physically mail them paper money, without ever giving them your name or address. I wish more services would be doing that! In particular, I think we sorely need an anonymous way of paying money on the web, like physical money.

Post by Derbasti » Sun, May 25, 2014, 3:07 PM UTC

etix wrote: post #157

Derbasti wrote: post #133

I recently switched from Gmail to a mail provider called Posteo. They are a German mail provider much like Fastmail. Here is the neat thing: You can create a mail account and physically mail them paper money, without ever giving them your name or address. I wish more services would be doing that! In particular, I think we sorely need an anonymous way of paying money on the web, like physical money.

That's neat. Is it a German only website or do they have an English version available?

  The webmail interface can be switched to other languages. 
  However, the rest of the service is in German, i.e. 
  sign-up, EULA, mail settings (forwarding, POP download, …),
  payment information etc. If you don't know any 
  German, you might miss some things.

  Der Webmailer lässt sich auf andere Sprachen umstellen. 
  Allerdings ist unser Angebot ansonsten komplett 
  deutschsprachig, also Anmeldung, AGBs, Einstellungen rund 
  um die Mailadresse (Weiterleitungen, POP-Sammeldienst,…), 
  Zahlungshinweise usw. Wer gar kein Deutsch kann, geht da 
  vielleicht etwas verloren.