[NTLUG:Discuss] Advice on email account

[Preston Hagar]

On Mon, Jan 17, 2011 at 12:41 AM, Hank Ivy <hankivy at hot.rr.com> wrote:
> I am looking at changing my Internet Service Provider, ISP.  The only fly in the ointment is
> they provide my primary email account.  What advice do you have for me about two items.
>
> 1.  What independent email account provider would you recommend?
>  Should I go with something like gmail?
>  Should I just pay for a host presence (and IP name on the internet) and have my own email
> host?
>
> 2. Do you have any advice on how to go about changing email accounts without missing important
> emails?
>
>
> --
> Hank Ivy
>

Several people have suggested getting and hosting your own domain.  I
would highly agree.  That way, if gmail decides to end their free
email, or you change ISPs again or whatever, you can always move your
own domain somewhere else.

That said, I currently host my domain for free with google:

http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/group/index.html

You get 50 accounts, 7 GB (roughly) per account, pretty much unlimited
aliases/forwards, pop, imap, postini spam filtering, nice webmail,
etc.

I was hosting my email myself on a server I colo at colo4dallas, but I
eventually decided that it wasn't worth the trouble.  With Google as
your host, you don't have to worry about convincing say AOL to trust
you and allow you to send email to their users.  It is really easy to
setup and administer.

The best of all, you get to use your own domain name, so it give you
more "prestige" (I guess) with HR people or whoever and your email
address can stay the same if you are unsatisfied with Google or they
discontinue their service.  I have been using it for almost 2 years
now with maybe a total of 10-15 hours downtime (free customers don't
get SLAs or anything, but it is pretty reliable).

Preston