They don't have to understand those words. My comment was written for hn, not for them. Non-technical people still understand accounts: bank accounts, email a

They don't have to understand those words. My comment was written for hn, not for them. Non-technical people still understand accounts: bank accounts, email accounts, netflix accounts, etc. Those among the technical illiterate, who absolutely have no idea, have gotten their mail account with the help of somebody. Chances are that they are not stupid and understand the concept of accounts by now. If not, they can get a domain account with equal help. The key concept is ownership. Whoever rents a property understands that he can be evicted. And most people who have bought a house also know that at first the bank owns it and that they could be evicted if they don't come up with their down payments. In other words: almost everybody understands that he can lose something if he doesn't own it. So it is not a great leap to understand ownership of email addresses. Calling it difficult just allows people to safe face when in fact they just couldn't be bothered.