I still have a weird email friend who refuses to chat over any apps and I totally can respect that. :)
asynchronous
Any form of text based communication is asynchronous
as in the server chats with another
Centralized servers in which 2 users talk can be considered “synchronous” because they get the message nearly instantly, but yea, we often use NoSQL async calls for instant messaging apps
I guess that’s why someone decided to build a chat app on the email protocol and infrastructure.
You can do it from a terminal. Us Linux kids will never let it die.
yeah, aerc and neomutt are two decent options
telnet email_server_ip_addr 25
Helo server.net
ehlo
Mail has the big advantage of being totally cross platform. And it works, basically everywhere.
All the application protocols were supposed to be cross-platform! It’s something the corporatisation of the net undermined to an extent
Sidenote: Remember when having an email address was enough, you didn’t have to have a fucking phone number as well? Stop trying to de-anonymize the internet, you’re making more problems than you’re solving
They’re not trying to solve any problem beyond their own, potential resistance to false authority.
or at least fill out the online forms for us
why put it on my web browser since they have us all pretty pretty pretty pegged my friend
I’m using cpanel email and it’s terrible. Can someone recommend something cheap but better than cpanel?
What’s wrong with cpanel?
Some places block email coming from my cpanel email.
Reality is everyone has an email, and everyone will keep having an email. My 10 year old has an email so they could sign up to epic and steam. You basically need it to use the internet at all. So of course it will survive.
Outside of business though, when was the last time you sent an email to someone you know?
My mother uses email for nearly everything. I’m 31 now, but in high school she’d email me from the basement that dinner is ready.
Just last month I received this… we chat on WhatsApp and phone calls regularly as well.
That’s cute. She treats it like writing letters or maybe postcards given the length of the message.
I forwarded tickets to my wife. But for “normal” communication I emailed the city about a citation they gave me for my yard.
My ex emailed me from a new account when he thought I’d blocked him everywhere else. I hadn’t, but I did after that!
Work Accountant Lawyer Contractor Community org
Yeah basically just for transactions, management
It’s why SMS still exists too. It’s from an era where everyone just used open standards instead of trying to create their own thing for money. Big tech conglomerates like we have now didn’t exist. The state of the tech industry and it’s proprietary standards is absolutely fucked.
SMS was never intended to be available to end users. It was built as a side channel to help field techs with diagnostics. When consumer handsets started to add features, it was co-opted to provide what we know it as today.
That explains why way back when I tried to read the GSM (1.x) specification out of curiosity, it turned out SMS were going via a “control channel”.
Always wondered why the data for those was going via a control channel rather than some kind of data channel.
Google is trying to kill SMS. My new android by default has sms disabled, defaulting to RCS with “try sending sms instead if rcs fails to send” option being off by default, which makes no sense from user perspective
RCS is actually a huge improvement over SMS, as it is fully encrypted. One of the few times I’ve ever approved of something Google did…
If only it was an open standard…
It… is? It’s an open standard that anyone can use and implement. The main provider is Google and there has been a huge push from them to get Apple to adopt, which they mostly have. It’s not ‘owned’ by any company. It’s predominantly serviced by Google, but is in fact an open standard. Google and others have their own format which is how they and their apps interpret and interact with each other, but it is an open standard. There are some backend and requirements for it which stops most from setting it up and implementing off the shelf and just going with Google, but you absolutely could use and make your own format with the standard.
Yep, main reason it’s associated with Google because they bought a company (Jibe Mobile) making one of the main backend service offerings and offered cloud hosting of it, so providers just went with that rather than rolling out their own software.
Also with Apple ignoring it in favour of iMessage, Google was the only one supporting it on handsets. Google client + Google backend = people think it’s Google’s iMessage competitor.
which makes no sense from user perspective
I’d say it does have some merit from a security perspective though.
I agree it should be something that’s at least more clear for users to enable/disable on setup, but I personally don’t think having it enabled by default is ideal, considering how insecure SMS is.
…but I can literally send infected files thru RCS to my grandma.
True, as is the case with almost any messaging service. But the benefits of RCS do include:
- Not having a government/telecom company be capable of snooping on your messages
- Branded messages that clearly distinguish real companies from fake ones, which can prevent an untold number of scams as it becomes more commonplace
- Uses more modern protocols instead of still being capable of sending over old, insecure ones like 2G.
It’s purely an improvement over SMS in terms of security and privacy, and personally, I don’t think users should be defaulted into having their phone downgrade to insecure protocols. It should always be an opt-in decision they have to make. (although they could definitely make it clearer that someone could enable it if their messages are failing to send with RCS)
It’s from an era where everyone just used open standards instead of trying to create their own thing for money.
SMS is literally from a time when every mobile phone manufacturer had their on charger plug. And some tried pushing proprietary headphone jacks.
Vendors LOVE vendor lock-in.
Yeah that’s because vendor lockin for hardware had already started. It’s kind of a miracle we got everyone to agree to USB. Look at cars, same thing. Everyone agreed to the same gas pump, but it’s been decades and we can’t agree on a standard for electric car chargers. That’s what happens when industries mature under capitalism
The GSM protocol was an actual standard enforced on operators across Europe, which is why back when mobile telephony took off, it very much exploded in Europe (in turn propelling companies such as Nokia and Ericcson) but was much slower to take of in the US were there were various private and competing mobile telephony protocols.
The vendors didn’t agree on anything on their own, they were forced to agree as part of the conditions of the various radio spectrum auctions all over Europe. The US then finally followed at around GSM v3.
You see a similar thing for USB - it’s an international standard and standardization around USB 3 and the USB-C connector it is being forced on vendors by the EU.
Rather than build for humanity they build for the demon capital.
IRC and forums as well to a lesser extent.
Much much lesser. IRC has basically died to successors. Everybody still uses email sometimes.
IRC is still a pretty strong backbone for Twitch chat. At least it was a couple of years ago.
Forums are still banging around however. Lots of places still use them, and thank god for that.
Not so much though.
There was a moment when forums were the only kind of community but now forum use is dwarved by discord and reddit.
IRC is mainly a thing for hardcore 2000s re-livers and lobste.rs users nowadays lol
Everyone has to provide an email to make an account somewhere, if they don’t do the whole integration with Google/Facebook/etc
It’s reliable, it’s simple, it’s free, and virtually everyone who uses the internet has one. Email won’t be replaced for a LONG time.
To be fair, if it is “free” you are probably paying your mail provider with your data.
My mail server is in the cabinet above my desk.
I guess you’re right - my mail provider does have all my data - but my mail provider is Me!
I assume he meant free like speech, not free like beer.
There are no gatekeepers to email, anyone can get a domain and their own server.
There are definitely gatekeepers. Even if your hosting provider isn’t blocking port 25 by default, SPF, DKIM and DMARC will see your emails going straight into the recipient’s junk folder/spam filter if not correctly configured. Hosting your own mail server at home is also a fantastic way to piss off your ISP, lose emails to downtime, have your IP blacklisted from many services and open up your environment to exploitation. It can be done but let’s not pretend that it’s easy or that there aren’t barriers to entry.
Mail servers are like filo pastry. Sure, you could go to the inconvenience and effort of making it yourself and I’m sure it’ll be very satisfying to do so. But 99% of professionals use the store bought version, and for good reason, because it’s a lot of effort for an end result that is no better and in all likelihood probably worse.
Mostly agree, but as someone who has been hosting my own email for years I can tell it is, in fact, better.
Quick note for hosting one on a residential IP - that would no longer piss any ISP off. You would simply not deliver anything anywhere due to IP being blacklisted by default.
SPF, DKIM, and DMARC would like to have a gatekeeping word
Blacklists, greylists, whitelists. All just a big fuck you from the big vendors to anyone trying to self host.
If you don’t know what you’re doing, hosting an email server will not be a good time. It’s very easy to produce an environment that is easily exploited.
A somewhat inexpensive shared hosting plan allows you to host your own email though. I get it done for <$100/yr. and have little to no limitation over self-hosting.
You try that once, but it doesn’t last.
Or your ISP just provides you with one when you sign up.
Can never trust ISPs with that data.
They’re marketing companies too. And imagine sending critical health emails to a company who wants to also sell you services, and suddenly, you get ads for it.
critical health emails
If you’re concerned about privacy, then that’s a no-no. Unless your clinic accepts PGP encrypted messages.
And we both know they don’t.
Not all of them anymore. Verizon doesn’t, for example.
Their point still stands
I mean, not necessarily in that case I’d imagine, since one presumably pays the ISP for internet services, so any “free” things bundled with it could also simply be priced into that contract already.
That ToS definitely gives them the right to sell whatever data you provide to them though, at least in the US.
Sure, but won’t that happen regardless of if you use their email service or not?
Yes. The point I was saying stands is the “paying with data” bit more than the “free (as in beer)” bit. I know youre still paying to use an ISP :p
Not necessarily. My university provides a mail box for every student and their privacy policy is quite transparent and honest. The only limitations are related to the rate you can send emails, to prevent spam.
Wouldn’t recommend it.
That’s like using your company email.
Ive met a bunch of people who deeply regret sending everything to their university email to have that inbox shut down after a few years. Heck, had a junior hire recently complain that her university email was the primary for her banking, and once it was shut down, she was struggling with trying to reset her password.
Well this discussion has turned from “there’s no free emai!” to “I don’t recommend using free email from your university because I heard this caused trouble to somebody else once” which is not the point, so I’m not sure how I’m supposed to reply.
Generally email that’s tied to your school or job is only active as long as you are a student/employee there, and given how many services don’t let you transfer email accounts at all even if you know you’re about to lose access and start migrating away you might not be able to.
Best practice is to separate out business, personal and academic into separate accounts and separate devices. No personal crap distracting you from your studies, no personal stuff that might endanger your job on your work email, and no sharing your personal email with randos at your job
I also have a work email address, but I use it for work stuff and I lose it if I end my contract. Can you keep your university address after you graduate?
I can keep the basic “user@university.br” one, I can’t keep the optional department-specific ones like “user@bioinformaticslab.university.br” if I quit my position or graduate.
deleted by creator
I wouldn’t call it reliable at all but it works good enough. All the other points are so big that they make up the flaws more than once.
Finally someone who understands email is a best effort model.
This is why I kind of hate microblogging platforms. This could just be part of a conversation, but shown of context every post is turned into a soundbite and takes on levels of faux-profundity that they can’t possibly support. Yeah, email has been around forever; so what?
What faux-profundity is on display here? Sometimes people just talk. Sometimes this includes observations. Kinda like what you did with your comment. I don’t understand why you’re bringing hate to a tea chat, but I suppose it can be good to get off your chest.
Thousands of years after humanity has destroyed itself with nuclear weapons…
As the sun peeks through the gray clouds and lights up a solar panel…
A long-forgotten server hums to life…
And sends an email…
“Attention Required: Your Order is Delayed”
We’ve been trying to reach you about your car insurance
See my h0t n4ked body here ---->
getallmylinkscom/usr/urieoop0oooojwhwhfb
It’s because it isn’t a silo?
Discord, Slack and a bajillion similar apps do not meld with other apps. Email just happened to hit critical mass before “let’s try to get a monopoly” became the slogan of all tech, and collectively Big Tech is too stupid/hostile to replace it with some cooperative protocol.
iMessage is another pure example of this.
There are tons of open messaging protocols that have been replaced by closed ones. For instance, Discord shouldn’t be a thing since IRC exists, but Discord exists and is very successful.
For some reason, likely tied to how it is used, email survived as an open protocol.
For instance, Discord shouldn’t be a thing since IRC exists, but Discord exists and is very successful.
IRC lacks a massive amount of features that discord users typically want. Screensharing, VCs with group and camera support, built-in history (don’t need to use a bouncer like on IRC), built-in online GIF searcher and sender with one click, huge community of bots that use discord’s API to do anything from games to moderation.
It isn’t even close.
ICQ and AIM managed to draw a huge crowd in the early (ish) days of home Internet.
It’s not about features…it’s about ease of use.
Also, IRC wasn’t as decentralized as email to begin with, there were several isolated networks that would not communicate with each other (dalnet, EFnet, undernet, etc)
It’s not about features…it’s about ease of use.
Its absolutely about both features and ease of use. If your program doesn’t do what people want from it, then good luck.
Its also irrelevant to talk about considering I have used IRC and highly doubt that people are going to consider it easier to use than discord.
Yeah I’m giving the ease-of-use points to Discord.
I’d agree that both are big, sure…but ICQ and AIM didn’t have attachments or GIFs or screensharing, They barely had text formatting. Yet they were still bigger than the semi-decentralized (but at least standards-based) IRC. The features weren’t the big lure, it was the ease of use.
Discord (to me) has better UX than any IRC I’ve ever experienced.
Email, on the other hand, is total baloney if it’s not interoperable. It’s why SMS/MMS is like a zombie that just won’t die, and telecoms are more cooperative than most of Big Tech.
I highlight IRC because being an open protocol doesn’t mean it gets adopted.
Yeah, it’s the widespread adoption/necessity that made email what it is. Discord was able to largely replace IRC because not a lot of people were using IRC. Everybody has an email account though-- you need one to order a pizza ffs
E-mail barely hanging on between spam, broken HTML and an oligopoly of providers.
Yeah email is one thing I don’t bother to run on my own server, because all the oligopoly providers mark unknown servers as spam by default, so you can’t send emails to anyone anyway…
