All this talk of 'having a clue' - where exactly in my daily list of conflicting and competing daily priorities should I put "Worry about Google profiling me via my email content"?

Advertising aside, I also understand there's a valid argument that we should all use strong encryption and secure email to give (those of us that need it) the benefits of herd immunity against government snooping. However - once again it's a not terribly high up my list of things to worry about right now. That makes me a slightly worse person on par with not recycling enough and leaving my electronic devices on standby overnight.

I willingly - and I hope knowingly - accept the trade-offs in using GMail. At least 3 people in this thread think I'm lacking in clue. Can someone please explain to me why?

Sorry, I don't understand your reasoning.

Why do you trust your ISP more than Google? ISPs have much more shady practices and are able to match your online and real persona with 100% accuracy.

If you care about privacy, why do you use Android(non-cyanogen I assume)?

Note that he could be living in a jurisdiction where the law provides better protection for electronic communications (email being one of them), thus preventing his ISP from reading/analyzing/reselling his emails.

Which jurisdiction would you trust in this matter?

For all the problems we've manage to create, I'll trust Norwegian provider Telenor much more than I do Google. If only because they share my jurisdiction (Norway) -- where I have rights. I have no rights in the US -- at least when I'm not physically there.

>>Why do you trust your ISP more than Google?

Presumably because the ISP doesn't generate the vast majority of its revenue from targeted ads based on information it collects from them.

Theoretically the ISP is being paid for providing the service, while Google ... well...

The implicit suggestion that one stops "being the product"[0] if one is paying for the service has no roots in reality.

[0] This oversimplification has to die.

To me that's even worse. You are stuck with your ISP. What if you move home to a place where this ISP isn't available?

There are commercial email providers in jurisdictions that do respect privacy. And it usually only costs the price of a couple of coffees per year.

You're not locked in if you own the DNS registration.

This is an important point many overlook (despite being aware of Google Apps for Work (nee Business)) -- registering a personal domain in order to have at least one email that will follow you for as long as you want -- does not mean you have to run your own incomming/outgoing email servers!

Most domain registrars will forward email for free, and most offer some form of cheap, but reasonable email service (smtp+imap).

Right. I have several domains, and my email comes in via them. The IMAP server just aggregates them.

You're still depending on the ISP's archives.

Building your own Postfix server isn't hard. (It's certainly not easy, but it's not too hard either.)

If you're paying someone for hosting anyway it's a few days of extra work from a cold start to set up a server on Linode or Digital Ocean and become your own ISP/hosting co.

Remember that Digital Oceans’ ToS allow them to access "all and any information" in case they "consider it necessary".