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this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2023
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No Stupid Questions
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Always has been. Heh. Actually hosting your own email server is a pain in the ass. It is absolutely possible and back when I first started using linux I think it was automatically installed (sendmail -- security nightmare, that thing) for a lot of distros. But there are some issues with self-hosted email getting flagged as spam, because some of the big servers like gmail use a whitelist to help fight spam. They basically expect you to be using a server hosted by a big company. And it isn't just one type of server, last time I looked into it. You have your inbound which can be multiple types but I believe imap is still the most popular, because it has instant update features for your client. Then you got your outbound smtp server. And keeping these things secure it kind of a big thing. I changed careers so haven't worked in the sysadmin area for a long time, but I do believe it is still an absolute effort to keeping all of this running, not being flagged as spam, keeping it secure, etc. But it is absolutely possible. I think I'll go read up on it now, because you made me curious.
edit: I forgot. You also have to set up your own spam filter. Which, at least in the past, was also a daunting effort.
edit 2: Yeah reading this makes it seem like it is still a bit of a bitch to do. Especially if you click that blacklist link. But definitely doable.
Oh it totally used to be easy. You needed to know about DNS and MX records and how to configure sendmail and you were good to go (optional IMAP/POP3 retrieval too).
Now, it's SPF, DKIM, DNSSEC (needed for strict DKIM), DMARC ensure you have good certificates for secure smtp/pop3/imap and even then if you have a funky domain (like most instances do) outlook/gmail will probably reject you into spam.
This is what I am afraid of. Because all major providers are companies in the end and they need to make a profit. So there may be a time when we really have to host our own email (not all of us can easily do)
I don’t know, maybe, I am just disillusioned in general that I am starting to look for community alternatives rather than provided by big companies. At least right now we have plan B like proton mail and the rest. But if the trend continues, the pessimist in me fears the time where everyone would have to self host email, or subscribe to a big provider and submit to their rules.
I shudder to think about the idea of emails becoming subscription services though.
Well a few minutes ago you were believing that email was owned by Google, surely this is good news to you on balance, right?
Yeah I guess. But yahoo, tutanota, proton mail, hotmail, etc. all answer to a company. I was hoping for a more permanent solution which I think could either be
Or
I guess proton mail will be the next best thing but there’s the fear that they too will not remain free forever.
Having companies involved isn't bad as long as there's enough choice. There are such a huge number of email providers I think there'll always be alternatives if one turns bad - respectfully I don't think your fears are realistic.
Also, paying isn't necessarily a bad thing, for example Protonmail's paid options I think are quite reasonable for what you get and it keeps it private and ad-free, it's a fair deal. I don't think free providers will ever go anywhere but there is the choice.
To be honest, proton is quite expensive for what it gives. Though this might differ depending on income levels and level of comfort. But their free version is serviceable enough if your email volume isn’t that high.
I took that as an example, I'm not necessarily endorsing it as the best solution. I personally use the free package.
The bundle with VPN is what I was looking at; for full-featured email, VPN and 500 GB cloud storage from a provider with a good track record doesn't sound bad if you don't mind putting those eggs in one basket.
I agree, the free option is very serviceable as a backup personal email. Though there will always be a part of me that is skeptical if these free services will disappear one day.
That said, I wouldn’t put everything in one basket. As I recall, their VPN is slow and their cloud storage has no mobile apps. Though that might have changed since I last tried the Proton suite.
OK, I have to say I really don't get you now. You first said you weren't aware of the federated nature of email and alternatives to Gmail so you were helped out here, now you say you were already familiar with and opinionated about Proton suite.
If you look at my original post I mentioned I have proton mail. What I wasn’t aware was if there were free providers as in lemmy.world where it’s free, without subscription, or free from any profitization.
It was discussed heavily in the comments that self hosting only brings problem.
I also conceded that there are no free alternatives apart from hosting your own. That’s why I agreed that protonmail is the next best thing. What I didn’t agree with it is its subscription model and hence its lack of protection against being profit-driven.
That too, I conceded. Someone mentioned tildes.team and I may start looking into that next.
Tldr: I understand that there are email providers available but most are still owned by companies, hence there will still be a time when we have to pay for them, as opposed to say, donation and community-driven.
Don't stress it too much. The companies have incentives to not fuck around with things too much. Especially with email. I think the biggest danger isn't even them having your email, but the fact that many things can be connected (and suddenly disconnected) that are linked to that account. So if you use an android phone and your google account gets locked for some reason, you can be locked out of your phone, your bank (due to email), your messages, your google photos, your google drive files, your apps that you paid for, anything you logged into using your gmail account, etc. I've been migrating some of my stuff into different places just for that reason.
Hmmm you have a lot of good points. Decentralizing my accounts would be a good starting point. Will need to track more email accounts but then that’s what a good password manager is for.
"I shudder to think about the idea of emails becoming subscription services though."
You mean like in the 90s? Hell I remember paying 25 cent per email on Prodigy back in the day...
You are not wrong. My entire career has been email and I make bank because it is way more complex than most people realize, and very few people want to learn it to the level of detail required. That is a big reason hosting providers got so popular.