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Don't give out your new e-mail address until you're sure you are going to stick with the new service.
  technofile
Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

Free e-mail? Don't give up. Here's where to find a list of services


July 31, 2002


By Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2002, Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2002, The Post-Standard

   Free e-mail services are disappearing fast. The latest casualty is Apple Computer's own Mac.com e-mail service, which had been providing free e-mail and file-storage space to Macintosh users. It will cost $100 a year starting Oct. 1.
   Other free mail services that have gone under or turned themselves into pay services recently include Suite101, StorageVault, AmexMail, Yahoo! regular e-mail (but not yet Web-based e-mail), AltaVista mail and many others. At least 30 such services have stopped providing free e-mail in the last 15 months, according to industry statistics.
   The trend is sure to continue. Obviously, most companies cannot afford to provide something for nothing in today's economy, no matter how benevolent they've been in the past.
   Can you still find a free e-mail service? Yes, there are many to choose from. Some are ad-supported (placing advertising on your screen even if you don't want to see the ads) and some are Web-based, requiring a bit of a hassle. Others are simply free.
   You can locate free e-mail services by checking the listing at the Free E-mail Address Directory at www.emailaddresses.com, a Web site that tracks free mail services and lists which ones are still active.
   Be wary of one aspect of the site, however: You'll see highlighted listings labeled "FEATURED," giving you the impression that these listings have been singled out as special. Not so; they're paid ads. (At least the folks at the Free E-mail Address Directory are honest about this sort of subterfuge; they tell you what "FEATURED" means if you click on a link that says "About." But they should simply label advertising for what it really is.)
   I can't recommend any particular services from the ones listed on the Free E-mail Address Directory -- I haven't tried any of them -- but here is some straightforward advice:
   1. Try two or three free e-mail services at the same time to see how they stack up, then choose the one you feel most comfortable with. (Then drop the others. Life is complicated enough.)
   2. Don't give out your new e-mail address until you're sure you are going to stick with the new service.
   3. Send yourself a variety of test e-mail messages to see how they arrive. Check how long it takes, and be sure to note whether there are any oddities in how the mail looks when you get it. (Some mail services can't handle "richly formatted" mail, so everything turns into plain text. That might be good and might be bad, depending on the sort of mail you send.)
   (Yes, you can send yourself mail. It's a great way to see your mail the way others will see it, and it's guaranteed to show you how mystifying your mail can be when you don't put your name on it. Mail from "grandpa2492" might be cute to little Debbie, but it's not funny when you're writing to strangers. Consider yourself forewarned.)
   4. Give ad-supported mail a chance. You see ads on TV and in the newspaper all the time, so you might not mind seeing ads in your e-mail software. And the company behind the service probably will be around longer than one that tries to do this without such ad revenue.
   5. Be wary of Web-based e-mail services, which are usually awkward and slow. But keep in mind that Web-based mail could be perfect if you travel a lot or regularly live in two locations (such as in the north in summer and the south in winter). Web mail can be checked and read from any Web browser, giving you a chance to read your mail on your son-in-law's computer while you are traveling, for example.
   A bonus to doing Web mail while visiting your friends or relatives: You can't interfere with their e-mail software or their incoming mail because you'll only be using their Web browser.