Indeed. If I try to offer non-gmail email options to people, even here on HN, people will go “Oh. But they cost money”, as if that’s something deeply unnatural.
Me, I’m happy to pay, because it means that I know I’m a customer, not a product.
Re:AMP for email is a terrible idea
by zerocrates on Wednesday February 14, 2018 @10:31AM
(#16376443)
This probably isn't so true for the pay email services, but I just wanted to note that these two things are by no means mutually exclusive. Plenty of services are more than happy to take your money and "make you the product." It's so easy to do on the web, few can resist.
For me, I confess paying for it has the risk of it being held hostage if I miss payments. Worse, my data can turn into leverage for increases price.
Which is why you should always choose a service which offers full access via standards-based protocols so that you always have the option of owning your own data.
Re:AMP for email is a terrible idea
by amdavidson on Wednesday February 14, 2018 @12:08PM
(#16377296)
And why I regularly download backups of my email from Fastmail.
The only concern I have with them raising prices or disappearing entirely is the service interruption of moving my DNS to some other email provider.
I'm assuming bitrot of your backups is also a concern. Or do you have a suggestion on automating integrity checks of your data?
Yes, email is such an important tool that it would make sense for all of us to pay for it. That said, the big internet companies trained millions of users to expect everything for free on the internet (intentionally or not). Many people seriously think "if it is on the internet, it should be free - I am paying for my internet connection, aren't I?". If you don't believe me, try talking to a non-HN, non-tech-savvy person about it.
The fault is on these companies as much as the users. It would take a big change in mindset to make non-advertising models work in consumer world