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Why would you use FastMail when hosting your own mail server has a much higher privacy level? It seems no better than gmail in this respect.

Avshalom 10y ago
because if you run your own mail server apparently you have a 50/50 shot of having literally none of your mail ever delivered.
- ultramancool 10y ago
  I bought a house and run all my bills from my own mail server, so that certainly hasn't been my experience. You just need to configure it correctly and make sure your IP doesn't have a bad rep.
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  Not really true. I've been running my own email server for years, and it's actually really easy. After the initial setup, I don't think I've ever had and email end up non-delivered.
keysergalt 10y ago
Security, Spam Filtering, Better web interface, native apps, two-factor auth, DR, etc. These are just some of the reasons.
- fiatjaf 10y ago
  Spam filtering?
lorenzhs 10y ago
Gmail scans your email to show you ads. That's how Google makes money from it. Fastmail doesn't show ads, you pay them money to do your email. Moving email off Google could also be a move towards not putting all your eggs in one basket. I think there's a valid incentive to move away from Gmail. That, and all the complications that running your own email server brings with it. If you read the article, the author explains it very well.
- ultramancool 10y ago
  > That, and all the complications that running your own email server brings with it. If you read the article, the author explains it very well. I have to disagree, it sounds like he just had a crappy provider, avoiding blacklists is pretty much just a matter of having your RDNS, SPF and domainkeys configured properly in my experience. Pretty trivial stuff, really.
  - Accacin 10y ago
    Yeah? And where is your server hardware located? If it's on a VPS somewhere, well, how can you trust them? If it's at home, it's extra space and electricity that's being used. At the end of the day, email IS NOT secure. If you're paying for a service and they can say they're not reading your emails and they will respect your privacy, well that's good enough for me.
    - ultramancool 10y ago
      Why do you think they'll respect your privacy any more than gmail? I think that's a serious misconception. They have no way to guarantee that to you, so believing it is a rather bad idea. They could be sitting back and reading the latest issue of your personal emails and you'd have no way to tell, so I don't see how it can be argued that FastMail is at all superior in that regard.
    - bisby 10y ago
      At home servers are extra space and electricity, AND potential outages if your ISP isn't 100% stable. I had outages sporadically for 2 weeks because a squirrel chewed through some coax outside my house. Im glad I didn't sporadically bounce emails for 2 weeks during that time. I'm sure a major provider has redundancy and controls in place for failovers... a single server in your house probably doesn't.
daphreak 10y ago
The post specifically mentions the maintenance overhead associated with running a self hosted server.
- ultramancool 10y ago
  Maintenance is minimal, it's pretty much set and forget, add a cron job to update spamassassin, I get maybe 1 piece of spam in my inbox a week. Configuration (at least using dovecot and postfix) is easy too once you get started.
bluGill 10y ago
Because I have interests other than running my own email server. I am capable of running my own email server. I'm also capable of taking my own garbage to the dump every week. I'm capable of removing my own appendix if that is required (under self administered local anesthesia). I hire those things done because I have better things to do with my time. I got tired of keeping up with the latest anti-spam best practices. I can pay someone $15/month to make the weekly trip to the local dump saving me an hour every week (I believe the dump charges a dumping fee as well which makes the math more in my favor). I can pay someone else to go to medical school thus saving me the time it takes. I would rather play with my kids, and if I can ever get them to sleep I have plenty of other things I enjoy doing. FastMail is a cheap and easy option to email. They provide some services that I value over what free accounts have. It is a compromise, but everything is. I freely admit that I was failing at administering my own email servers: I never did get some anti-spam thing in place so a few domains rejected everything I sent. I got about 100 spam messages in my inbox every day (my filters caught 3 for each they let through). With Fastmail everyone accepts my email, and I get about one spam message a week which I can handle.
- ultramancool 10y ago
  > FastMail is a cheap and easy option to email. So is spinning up a docker container with this all already configured... I just don't see the argument I guess, it's just too easy to do yourself. Instead you're getting ripped off and losing privacy. There's no reason to believe fastmail is any more private than GMail, staff can just as easily read and deliver your mail to whomever they please. A medical degree takes years to get, this takes 10 minutes for a basic setup, an hour or two for a more advanced one, assuming you're in the industry already and know your way around.
  - JohnTHaller 10y ago
    And ensuring it stays running and updated and secure and backed up. Docker isn't magic. A server instance and the associated apps still need to be maintained. And you're either trusting the creator of that Docker image or digging into every security setting anyway.
hueving 10y ago
The author mentioned in the beginning that maintaining a server and fighting to keep it off of spam lists was too painful.
brightball 10y ago
I've always wondered about using OS X Server to handle my email on a Mac Mini. Looks like a pretty clean solution to run your own.

Avshalom 10y ago

because if you run your own mail server apparently you have a 50/50 shot of having literally none of your mail ever delivered.

ultramancool 10y ago
I bought a house and run all my bills from my own mail server, so that certainly hasn't been my experience. You just need to configure it correctly and make sure your IP doesn't have a bad rep.
CaptSpify 10y ago
Not really true. I've been running my own email server for years, and it's actually really easy. After the initial setup, I don't think I've ever had and email end up non-delivered.

keysergalt 10y ago

Security, Spam Filtering, Better web interface, native apps, two-factor auth, DR, etc. These are just some of the reasons.

fiatjaf 10y ago
Spam filtering?

lorenzhs 10y ago

Gmail scans your email to show you ads. That's how Google makes money from it. Fastmail doesn't show ads, you pay them money to do your email. Moving email off Google could also be a move towards not putting all your eggs in one basket. I think there's a valid incentive to move away from Gmail. That, and all the complications that running your own email server brings with it. If you read the article, the author explains it very well.

ultramancool 10y ago
> That, and all the complications that running your own email server brings with it. If you read the article, the author explains it very well. I have to disagree, it sounds like he just had a crappy provider, avoiding blacklists is pretty much just a matter of having your RDNS, SPF and domainkeys configured properly in my experience. Pretty trivial stuff, really.
- Accacin 10y ago
  Yeah? And where is your server hardware located? If it's on a VPS somewhere, well, how can you trust them? If it's at home, it's extra space and electricity that's being used. At the end of the day, email IS NOT secure. If you're paying for a service and they can say they're not reading your emails and they will respect your privacy, well that's good enough for me.
  - ultramancool 10y ago
    Why do you think they'll respect your privacy any more than gmail? I think that's a serious misconception. They have no way to guarantee that to you, so believing it is a rather bad idea. They could be sitting back and reading the latest issue of your personal emails and you'd have no way to tell, so I don't see how it can be argued that FastMail is at all superior in that regard.
  - bisby 10y ago
    At home servers are extra space and electricity, AND potential outages if your ISP isn't 100% stable. I had outages sporadically for 2 weeks because a squirrel chewed through some coax outside my house. Im glad I didn't sporadically bounce emails for 2 weeks during that time. I'm sure a major provider has redundancy and controls in place for failovers... a single server in your house probably doesn't.

daphreak 10y ago

The post specifically mentions the maintenance overhead associated with running a self hosted server.

ultramancool 10y ago
Maintenance is minimal, it's pretty much set and forget, add a cron job to update spamassassin, I get maybe 1 piece of spam in my inbox a week. Configuration (at least using dovecot and postfix) is easy too once you get started.

bluGill 10y ago

Because I have interests other than running my own email server. I am capable of running my own email server. I'm also capable of taking my own garbage to the dump every week. I'm capable of removing my own appendix if that is required (under self administered local anesthesia). I hire those things done because I have better things to do with my time. I got tired of keeping up with the latest anti-spam best practices. I can pay someone $15/month to make the weekly trip to the local dump saving me an hour every week (I believe the dump charges a dumping fee as well which makes the math more in my favor). I can pay someone else to go to medical school thus saving me the time it takes. I would rather play with my kids, and if I can ever get them to sleep I have plenty of other things I enjoy doing. FastMail is a cheap and easy option to email. They provide some services that I value over what free accounts have. It is a compromise, but everything is. I freely admit that I was failing at administering my own email servers: I never did get some anti-spam thing in place so a few domains rejected everything I sent. I got about 100 spam messages in my inbox every day (my filters caught 3 for each they let through). With Fastmail everyone accepts my email, and I get about one spam message a week which I can handle.

ultramancool 10y ago
> FastMail is a cheap and easy option to email. So is spinning up a docker container with this all already configured... I just don't see the argument I guess, it's just too easy to do yourself. Instead you're getting ripped off and losing privacy. There's no reason to believe fastmail is any more private than GMail, staff can just as easily read and deliver your mail to whomever they please. A medical degree takes years to get, this takes 10 minutes for a basic setup, an hour or two for a more advanced one, assuming you're in the industry already and know your way around.
- JohnTHaller 10y ago
  And ensuring it stays running and updated and secure and backed up. Docker isn't magic. A server instance and the associated apps still need to be maintained. And you're either trusting the creator of that Docker image or digging into every security setting anyway.

hueving 10y ago

The author mentioned in the beginning that maintaining a server and fighting to keep it off of spam lists was too painful.

brightball 10y ago

I've always wondered about using OS X Server to handle my email on a Mac Mini. Looks like a pretty clean solution to run your own.