Of course, but that still relies on the SMTP server's support. If a provider goes out of business or simply refuses to forward messages, an email address is sti

Of course, but that still relies on the SMTP server's support. If a provider goes out of business or simply refuses to forward messages, an email address is still dead. That's why we'd need laws to regulate both scenarios: require operators to forward old accounts regardless of anything (including things like government sanctions) and set up a central email forwarder organization to take on email domains of defunct providers (and the legal framework to transfer domains to it). An ideal system would of course allow you to truly take your address with you to another provider and sever any link to your old one, just like you can with your phone number. The current semantics of email addresses don't allow that or require you to own your own domain name, which given the sad state of the business end of the DNS, isn't feasible on a large scale either.