Proto said:
I don't remember it then but might I ask what is the purpose of
Hotmail these days? I know I must be missing SOMETHING but don't most
ISPs allow several email accounts? Why would one want to use an
outhouse Hotmail or Netscape or any webmail? Do people think they are
posting anonymously?
Proto
I'm not sure Yahoo, Hotmail, and other webmail users believe they are
anonymous or not. Most webmail providers will include the sender's IP
address in the headers. Even anonymous.to that lures users to a
supposedly anonymous e-mail account will put the sender's IP address in
the headers (and if you read their policies you will see that you agree
to let them release your personal info to 3rd party spammers!).
Having multiple "member" e-mail accounts with an ISP is a relatively new
feature. A couple years ago, lots of ISPs gave you only one e-mail
address. And to delete that one and make a new one required you call
them to make the request. While broadband providers have been quicker
to allow multiple e-mail accounts, dial-up providers have been slower to
adopt. It is still often easier to discard a disposable webmail account
with Hotmail or Yahoo than to kill an existing e-mail account and create
a new one with your ISP.
A web-based interface to your ISP e-mail account is also relatively new,
showing up within the last year or two. That required you have access
to computer with an e-mail client installed that you knew how to use and
were allowed to reconfigure it to add your e-mail account, get your
e-mail, and then delete your personal e-mail account. Webmail provides
access all over as long as you can find a platform that provides a web
browser. However, even today most webmail interfaces provided by ISPs
pales by comparison to the feature set available with more established
webmail providers. I have webmail with my ISP but no rules that I can
define to help filter out spam (beyond their included anti-spam
filtering) or to sort incoming e-mails.
ISPs that do offer multiple e-mail accounts will max out at some small
number, like 2, 3, or 6. Sounds great until you start to target your
e-mail accounts for specific purposes, like one for one news server,
another for a different news server, one for a particular chat room,
another for your personal e-mails, another for home office e-mail,
another that is used simply to receive faxes that are received at, say,
Faxwave and then show up as e-mails, one that you release to untrusted
recipients, and so on. Using disposable webmail accounts makes having
multiple e-mail accounts easy. Perhaps you like to funnel all incoming
e-mails through one or a few accounts but lots of us like lots of e-mail
accounts that target specific uses. Of recent availability is to use
e-mail aliases which are easier to manage, like from Sneakemail, SpamEx,
and SpamMotel.
Hell, there are even dial-up providers that do not even include e-mail
accounts. They have no mail servers and all they provide at dirt-cheap
prices is Internet access only. So the user of that ISP will have to
get an e-mail account somewhere else, so they can pay for premium mail
services elsewhere or they can get a webmail provider for free (assuming
they can live with the spam promotional signatures that get appended at
the end of their e-mails) or pay for one.
So, yes, you are missing something. A LOT of something. Not all ISPs
provide multiple e-mail accounts. Changing your username can be quite a
hassle. Your ISP may not even provide e-mail services. You might want
multiple accounts for multiple purposes. Your ISP may not provide
webmail access so you need to use a webmail provider so you can use
e-mail from wherever you travel. Your ISP may not use any anti-spam
filtering, so some filtering at webmail providers is better than
nothing. And I've seen lots of users that simply like the easier
interface provided by webmail providers (whether their ISP provides
webmail or they need to go elsewhere) than to learn yet another product
fraught with instability and hoards of features they won't use.
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