What Web-Based Email Service Do You Use? 27
Technodummy asks: "I travel a lot, and need a reliable webmail address. Since Hotmail was taken over, it's gone downhill, but I haven't be able to find a reliable replacement. I also share a net account, so POP is not the answer. Any ideas?" What things do you all like about web-based email services and what aspects of them do you think can be improved on? Are there any services out there that allow you to use HTTPS to retrieve your mail rather than plain old HTTP?
Yahoo (Score:2)
Probably most important: In my experience, it's always been up when I've wanted to send or receive e-mail, and it's nearly always as quick as any Web site out there.
You can install up to fifteen filters; enough to sort out, e.g., messages you get from a mailing list. Their "bulk mail" option (using the Brightmail spam filter, I think) catches a lot of spam. (It can also show all headers, e.g., for use with SpamCop.)
Good integration with Yahoo! Alerts (news searches forwarded to e-mail), Calendar, and other Yahoo! services. Vacation messages. Spell checking feature for outgoing messages. E-mail forwarding and POP3 means it plays well with your real e-mail software.
The 6MB limit for messages is lame; $20/year ups it to 25MB.
Finally: they've, ever, even once sent me any junk mail. Nice! --PSRC
Unfairly moderated; please give this a second look (Score:1)
I would much sooner moderate this as "informative" than "off-topic", as it is a useful answer to the posted question.
To elaborate on what Mr. Norway said, you can use MindTerm to give you a Unix terminal session from within a web browser. Then, using that session, you can use any mail client you choose that runs in a Unix terminal. These include Mutt, Pine, Elm, Mh, the Emacs mail modes, and the original Unix Mail.
HTML is not the only Web technology; Java applets have become fairly popular in recent years, and MindTerm is the single most useful one I've ever seen.
But my grandest creation, as history will tell,
Webinbox (Score:1)
I use that when for some bizarre reason I need email right now and can't telnet to my box...
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and the answer is... (Score:1)
Hushmail. No question. (Score:2)
When I need Web-based email, it's Hushmail. Here's my take of Hush's strengths and weaknesses:
STRENGTHS:
WEAKNESSES:
... On the whole, I think Hushmail has considerably more strengths than weaknesses. If you need a good, solid email service and normal SMTP mail isn't possible, Hush seems to me to be the best alternative right now.
If you want to reach me there, it's rjhansen@hushmai1.com. Please note that you'll need to change the "1" to an "L" in order to mail me there. It's not much of a spamblock, but it's something.
Good luck!
Doesn't work fine (Score:2)
Beware of sites that will "collect" your pop3 mail (Score:2)
Check out webmail.com [webmail.com] for one example. Major sites like Hotmail and Yahoo Mail will also offer to collect your mail as well.
My user population (over 10,000) is CONSTANTLY doing this even though we provide our own secure web-based mail page if they want to use it.
Why do I have a problem with this? Think about it. You're entering your id and password into some other site's web page and they go log in on your behalf, usually in cleartext. Even if I tcp_wrapper reject these places, the damage is done. The user has already entered in their ID and password.
So what we do is, we notice a logon from hotmail, yahoo, webmail.com, etc, we immediately lock their account under the part of our AUP that forbids revealing your ID and password to a third party.
Anyone can set up a web-mail page like IMP [horde.org] and change it to STORE the system names, IDs, and passwords that they collect and use them later.
So, when looking for a web-based mail site, don't be tempted to let them collect your other account's e-mail as well. You're trusting them with your ID and password. Not good, IMO....
operamail.com (Score:2)
- clean, clear interface (1 banner, bottom of page, for the Opera browser. no doubleclick adserver tracking you.)
- https
Been using it for quite a while now (about 1.5 years I think) and I'm happy with it.
//rdj
Re:Unfairly moderated; please give this a second l (Score:1)
Hushmail, hushmail, hushmail. (Score:1)
You can find it at Hushmail.com [hushmail.com].
Re:Hotmail (Score:2)
I have a big problem with the way that Hotmail tracks what links you click on within emails. You know how webmail services will parse the URLs in a text email and turn them into new window links? The simple and non-invasive way to do it is to just add a TARGET="new" to the link. Yahoo does this, for example.
Instead, Hotmail catalogs all of the links in the current message and stores them in a database server. When you click on a URL, Hotmail calls the server to say "user micromoog clicked on link X in email Y at time T". After a processing delay you get redirected to the actual link, unless you waited more than a couple minutes between opening the email and clicking the link, in which case your database entry has been timed out and you get a 404.
Isn't that wonderful? And the only plausible reason to do it that way is to perform intensive link tracking on personal emails.
Meanwhile, if you're looking for pure SSL email, try hushmail. I use my Yahoo account only for low priority personal stuff.
HORDE/IMP (Score:1)
Re:I use (Score:2)
Visto.com (Score:1)
Ebbe
Re:Beware of sites that will "collect" your pop3 m (Score:1)
This is mailstart's primary purpose ... to let you check pop accounts. I don't use those third party things to get any of my pop accounts for this exact reason. I get fetchmail to check the pop servers that I can't encrypt to ... meaning that the only people who are supposed to rec'v that password (the pop server itself) are the ones who do.
Might sound a little lame, but I actually keep a copy of PuTTY in a www directory that I can get to from anywhere ... its about 200K, and supports ssh1 (the latest v also supports ssh2), so I can grab it really quick wherever I am (even on a slow dialup), shell in, use pine or whatever and never deal with sending a password in the clear. The only trouble with this method is if you hit a library/shop/lab that only has Macs ... ssh clients for the mac are rare things, or were as of about a year ago...
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/ [greenend.org.uk]
I realize its not the "web-based" sol'n you were looking for, but there are places that will give you a shell account, and I wouldn't be terribly surprised if several of them have fetchmail up and running. Toss a copy of putty into a yahoo! or geocities web directory that you can remember the location of, and your shell account is always accessible! :)
(that is, of course, unless the ISP you happen to be using firewalls outgoing stuff on 22 ...)
Webmail services (Score:3)
A really good web site that sums up all free webmail services is : http://www.emailaddresses.com/
Particularly, check their free POP/IMAP-webmail providers. Also has reviews and user comments, and feature comparisons.
Through them I found www.mailandnews.com, which is my current favorite webmail. mailandnews offers 10MB email space, address book, email forwarding, POP3/IMAP, both unsecure and secure servers for webmail, and very little in the way of intrusive advertising. Its very good for reliability and is pretty fast.
Highly recommended
$0.02 cha-ching
mike
HTTPS (Score:1)
mail.com (Score:2)
Imail server (Score:1)
Re:Unfairly moderated; please give this a second l (Score:1)
--
"Trying is the first step towards failure."
Re:Hotmail (Score:1)
Since Hotmail was taken over, the service has failed time and again in various annoying ways. The only reason I'm still using them, is that every time I find what looks to be a great email provider, they disappear off the face of the earth, never to be seen again. (the last one was imaginemail.com which was really good)
Hotmail also loads slower now, as everything gets more coporate looking and more "services" are added. You can't opt in for a fast-loading selective service display, which would be great.
I don't think MS is the reason for the breakdown in quality, I think any other large company would have screwed it up just the same. When money becomes the first priority, service always becomes second.
Hotmail (Score:1)
I'm not sure what your problem with Hotmail is (other than, I suppose, that it's run by the Bane of Slashdot). It's very reliable, and uses https for the login at least.
You have to deal with a single banner on each page, but hey, look at Slashdot.
Re:Myrealbox (Score:1)
I think it's run by the same group that write the NIMS code.
It supports pop, imap and has a web based interface.
Personally I've been using usa.net for years. $12 a year forwards it to my work account. I haven't had to tell my friends about a change in my email address since despite several moves.
epriority.com (Score:1)
My school uses Horde for its webmail access, it's decent.
Myrealbox (Score:2)
Its Imap mail, so you can use a e-mail client,
and you can check it from the web.
The only problem is, the server is down about once a month for a couple hours, which happens to be right now.
Re:Hotmail (Score:1)
After the switchover, my account worked fine. For a while. Then I started running into server outages. And for some reason, the old Tru64 Alpha I use at school doesn't work. (I don't know why; I think it's either the fact that Netscape uses HTTP/1.0, or that they require you to use Windows. I think the former is more likely). So while Hotmail hasn't necessarily been going downhill steadily as the article suggests, the takeover didn't really help things.
Encrypted E-Mail (Score:1)
For encrypted e-mail I use http://www.ziplip.com [ziplip.com].
Although the site is fairly slow to load, it has a 128-bit SSL connection from the word "go", never going into plaintext. You can send normal e-mails with it, or (unlike HushMail), you can send "Secure E-Mail".
The secure function takes the form of of sending the recipient a message saying "You have been sent a message by Anonymous12131243243@1243.4232.com (or some such). The recipient then clicks on the link, and is presented with a SSL-secured connection to ZipLip. They then enter the password you supplied them with (over the phone or whatever), or they can guess the password using the optional Hint. Then they can read the message. After they have read it, it's wiped from the server.
You can also tell the server to wipe messages 12-hours, 24-hours, 48-hours, one week etc. after sending - just in case the person never checks the e-mail.
Not a perfect solution to secure e-mail, but (IMHO) better than HushMail.
-Blacklaw"Everyone is entitled to their opinions. Even stupid people"