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Customer's 20-Year-Old Email Account Shut Down Over Unusual Address (www.cbc.ca)

A Halifax man is facing the daunting task of going through almost two decades of email messages after his email provider served notice it was deactivating his account in 30 days because of his email address: noreply@eastlink.ca. From a report: "I had it since the late '90s, probably 1998 when I really started getting online," Steve Morshead told CBC News. "I asked for it, it was available and they gave it to me without hesitation." He said he picked the handle "noreply" because he wanted an unusual address -- and back in the '90s, it was. Morshead never expected to lose his email address, which he uses for communicating with everyone from friends to banks to lawyers. He is in the process of selling his home and says this couldn't come at a worse time. "My email address is a personal identifier for banks, eBay, Kijiji, and hundreds of other places I've logged into -- so many I can't count," Morshead said. He said he wouldn't be in this situation if Eastlink had addressed the issue when he applied for the email. "Now, after all these years, 20 years almost, I find it reprehensible they want to pop out of bushes and just give me 30 days to go through 20 years worth of emails and decide what I want to keep," he said. Morshead said he was given 30 days notice on June 7 that he would lose access to his email address and all of his emails.

365 comments

  1. 20 years worth? by FudRucker · · Score: 0, Troll

    what an email packrat, reminds me of those hoarders that fill their house from wall to wall & floor to ceiling with every piece of junk they find even if they have no use for it or just a piece of junk,

    i dont keep email longer than a week or two, when i am finished with it i delete it,

    --
    Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
    1. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Pray you never get divorced, sued, have a need to sue someone else, audited, or are suspected of a crime.

    2. Re:20 years worth? by bhcompy · · Score: 1

      Well aren't you special

    3. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's a good thing he did keep them, because now he knows who he's communicated with and what accounts he has linked to it. He can inform the various people/services of the change.

    4. Re:20 years worth? by MBGMorden · · Score: 3, Informative

      Digital data isn't the same. As long as you're not paying for storage space it's not worth the time to delete it - old emails certainly don't get in the way of reading new emails and their contents often times can come in handy.

      That said - 30 days is plenty of time to setup a new account and use an IMAP transfer utility to migrate every single message - even if it is 20 years worth. It's also plenty of time to change all of his online accounts for services (about 6 months ago I decided to switch primary email addresses and I was able to list and transfer every account I could think of within 2 evenings).

      The only real problem would be personal acquaintances that contact him via that address. In that case though I'd setup an "out of office" or the equivalent immediately and just have it respond with a message indicating that his address will be changing soon.

      --
      "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
    5. Re: 20 years worth? by PaulCottingham · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Well, aren't you special? So...because you can keep email organized, everybody should be able to? Just because you don't need old emails, no one else should?

    6. Re:20 years worth? by breagerey · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I've got emails going back over 20 years.
      I bet a lot of other people here do as well.

      Being able to pull up an email thread from years ago has been useful on numerous occasions.

    7. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Pray you never get divorced, sued, have a need to sue someone else, audited, or are suspected of a crime.

      Ah, but now his retention policy is on-record and SLASHDOT will be responsible for it.

      The guy is saved from any subpoenas.

    8. Re:20 years worth? by MightyYar · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You can try to sell me on wasting my time picking through and sorting email, but it ain't happening. It stays in the inbox forever, and storage is dirt cheap. If I run out of Gmail space, I'll drag everything into a new archive using a IMAP client and start fresh. If I need to find something - anything - I can just search the huge pile. Need to fill out that apartment address from 5 moves ago on a lease application? No problem. Want to email aunt Martha and for some reason didn't put her email into your address book? No problem. Want to see that picture you sent mom of you and your brother with grandma? No problem. Hell, you can even read your Best Buy spam from 1996 if you are so inclined.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    9. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I keep all of my email because it takes no physical space and I might need/want to search for a particular bit of information in them.

      That's what this guy should do. Set up an IMAP client and download everything.

    10. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i dont keep email longer than a week or two

      I have emails dating back to 1983, complete with bang addresses. (Net-newbies collectively go, "huh?") And why not? It takes fuckall space to store. At this point it's a historical curiosity, so I saw no reason not to carry it along from system to system over the years.

      It's all stored locally of course. I've never stored email on a remote machine for any serious duration, because that can go away at any time.

    11. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Should you wish to insult, do so properly. Trump, like Hillary, best serve themselves by having no records at all.

      Now I shall wipe my memory of you away, like with a cloth.

    12. Re:20 years worth? by Trax3001BBS · · Score: 3, Interesting

      what an email packrat, reminds me of those hoarders that fill their house from wall to wall & floor to ceiling with every piece of junk they find even if they have no use for it or just a piece of junk,

        i dont keep email longer than a week or two, when i am finished with it i delete it,

      Windows came and I started using Forte Agent at .98 and I've used nothing else, I've been using that program when or before running Win98 Or NT/W2K, and keeping my Emal for some odd reason. I have that email from 1998 and almost every one received as well as all i sent out . I can't really explain why unless it's an example of never having to install Agent other than that first time after it's pulling an Icon to the desktop (Agent installed on Drive D).

      Maybe keeping them was because of (forget hierarchy Alt.~.Microsoft.nt.misc (?) that was one fun times on Usenet, very helpful group. Just a bunch of users given a new OS and sharing tips and tricks with each other. (Microsoft sent anyone who asked NT - having a Win95 client/Outlook server/ Exchange Server/SP2 - being important we all had it within two days hot rush (I had asked many months earlier)) Nobody above the others and it was all about shareing, tricks I learned at that time I still use to this day - the who cares type: a selection isn't selected until you release the mouse key - the open a clear run command 15 paths in grab a file and drop it in the run command you will have the entire path to file (I use this one a lot and was told of it way back then.

      Whatever the reason (the above was reminiscing that hated to quit. I have them all, one would think it a huge security risk legal as well as personal if all are stolen. Not what I post or email about :) drives have been imaged by one looking to screw me :) nothing came about it.

      True facts. 1998 Email upon request, headers only if of a personal nature.

    13. Re:20 years worth? by Trax3001BBS · · Score: 1

      being important we all had it within two days hot rush

      To explain we were all normal Joe's, That offering from Microsoft told me MS wanted me to have all it's OS's money not being a requirement. and my line since that time (I've still got that 4 disk set) for whatever reason...

    14. Re:20 years worth? by JudgeFurious · · Score: 1

      Besides, if it's really important I'm sure the NSA has a copy of it somewhere.

      --
      Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars.
    15. Re:20 years worth? by antdude · · Score: 1

      You toss important e-mails too? I keep all for about a year and only keep the important ones forever when still needed.

      --
      Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
    16. Re: 20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

      Mrs Clinton , is that you?

    17. Re:20 years worth? by msauve · · Score: 1

      "i dont keep email longer than a week or two, when i am finished with it i delete it,"

      We understand. You don't have a real world life, and would like to forget any of the embarrassing social interactions you've had. Especially if they happened over a week ago.

      But, surprising as it may seem to you, some others actually have a meaningful existence and and would like to document it.

      --
      "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
    18. Re:20 years worth? by Megane · · Score: 1

      So do I, but I don't keep the only copy on my ISP's e-mail server.

      I don't get if he's mad about losing the address or losing the mails. But if it's the latter, he's an idiot, since you can just drag them across between servers if you have a decent mail client that supports IMAP.

      If he had them in something like an AOL database file, then he might deserve some sympathy. Holy hell, the local database for the Mac version was "designed" by a madman.

      --
      #naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
    19. Re:20 years worth? by Idimmu+Xul · · Score: 2

      Reading the article and having the tiniest bit of empathy, its quite obvious he's mad about the former, losing the address, as now he has to go through 20 years worth of contact communication and account data and transition everyone and all the services involved. My 1Password has 2800 sets of credentials the majority of which are associated to the same email address. If that suddenly was taken away from me that's 2800 password resets I can't do, 2800 accounts I can't confirm ownership of via email.. 2800 headaches.

      --
      The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
    20. Re: 20 years worth? by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      ISP's in Canada were often merging, going tits up or changing business models. For him not to anticipate this over a decade ago is retarded. He's selling his house. If he plans on moving to another city, did he think Eastlink operates everywhere? Thinking he'll have exact same ISP all this time is also stupid.

    21. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I misread your comment and thought you meant you delete email accounts after a week or two. With a 6-digit /. UID, I was about to call bullshit.

    22. Re: 20 years worth? by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      You're the snarky one, asshole. You can't see usefulness in timestamped information? You're fucking dumb. Just fuck right off.

    23. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 3

      I do to, but only a sadist or retard would still be tied to an ISP based email address in this day and age. can't feel any sympathy for someone that has let themselves get into such a situation.

    24. Re:20 years worth? by slazzy · · Score: 1

      Same here, there's a great many times in business where it has come in handy, and a few in my personal life as well. Storage space is cheap, searches are fast!

      --
      Website Just Down For Me? Find out
    25. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You just need to be careful what you keep. It is perfectly acceptable to tell a court or police, sorry I only keep 12 months of email if they want your history. But if you keep everything for 20 years then they can demand it all. never know when that can get you in the poo, e.g. my parents divorce involved court orders to hand over 2 decades of email history as they too kept everything. many other unexpected scenarios can happen from Tax Audits to criminal investigations that can suddenly see your entire personal history handed over.

    26. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 1

      That is a double edged sword. keeping the email when sued/investigated/audited means they can get it. Many people say dumb stuff in email to family and friends that can easily be misinterpreted by a 3rd party when they are looking for something. If you are going to keep it and those items you mentioned are a fear then you need to ensure everything you say in email is something that can't be taken the wrong way.

    27. Re: 20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Eastlink or more specifically the Bragg's are an odd beast. These are the retards who started their own cellular carrier and are just now realizing they can't compete. They'd never sell.

    28. Re: 20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i mean, the man is obviously just stupid, so, so stupid. how could anyone be so stupid?

    29. Re:20 years worth? by KGIII · · Score: 1

      That is kind of impressive, actually. I retained none of that. I don't have all sorts of things that were once considered valuable, to me at least. I don't even have copies of many of my papers, almost none of my old programs, and very little source code. I don't even have all my old text books, journals, or even copies of stuff I published.

      I am impressed that you've managed to keep that stuff. There's a slim chance that I have some of that, but I'm not even sure which drive(s) would be the best place(s) to start.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    30. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You'd rather be at the whim of a non ISP based email because nothing will EVER happen to them? right?

    31. Re:20 years worth? by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      what an email packrat, reminds me of those hoarders that fill their house from wall to wall & floor to ceiling with every piece of junk they find even if they have no use for it or just a piece of junk,

        i dont keep email longer than a week or two, when i am finished with it i delete it,

      Define hording. My 20 year old email collection is still smaller than a high-def movie.

      It's less hording and more like storing important stuff. As for you deleting everything after 2 weeks, if I did that I likely would have been fined during my last tax audit. Or ... do you print out all your emails so you don't need to horde the bits and a too easily searchable manner?

    32. Re: 20 years worth? by FutureDomain · · Score: 1

      I used to, but my webhost SmarterASP.NET decided to store their backups on the same SAN as the actual data, so I now have no emails. You are either extremely OCD and manually archive anything important or don't use your email for anything noteworthy that you want to keep for future reference.

      --
      Hydraulic pizza oven!! Guided missile! Herring sandwich! Styrofoam! Jayne Mansfield! Aluminum siding! Borax!
    33. Re:20 years worth? by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 1

      Hell, you can even read your Best Buy spam from 1996 if you are so inclined.

      Pine has an export command?

      --
      If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
    34. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 2

      you don't have to be at the Whim of a non ISP based one to fix the problem idiot. spend $50, buy a domain name and have mail routed to your ISP. This protects you from them being bought, going broke or you simply moving. alternatively route your mail via a webmail service (again preferably from your owned domain). being at the whim of any provider when easy technical solutions exist is moronic.

    35. Re: 20 years worth? by koomba · · Score: 1

      Your 1998 emails available on request? Yeah, that's what everyone here has just been dying to do, read all your 20 year old emails. Thank you SO much for the opportunity! I love wasting time reading emails from a random stranger on the internet, how did you know???m

    36. Re:20 years worth? by tepples · · Score: 1

      spend $50, buy a domain name and have mail routed to your ISP.

      And then what 3 years later once your $50 domain will have expired? Is it yet another expense to renew until you die?

    37. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yes, is that really such a massive cost for something so fucking critical in this day and age? mind you during sales it won't be 3 years, depending on domain that will get you 5-10 years

    38. Re:20 years worth? by tepples · · Score: 1

      yes, is that really such a massive cost for something so fucking critical in this day and age?

      Was "fucking" necessary?

      Are you claiming that every man, woman, and child in the developed world ought to own a personal domain?

    39. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 1

      not sure who you use, 3 years for $50 is at the pricier end of town, personally I pay $45 for 5 years. regardless even at your inflated price that is all of $17 a year for unlimited email addresses that you can route to any account anywhere at anytime and that is assuming you don't use the domains for anything else worthwhile. For something that I rely upon for so many services nowadays that is chicken feed compared to the effort of changing should my provider go tits up or my account get compromised/blocked for some reason. 2 years ago when I decided gmail sucked balls I had my mail routing to outlook.com in under an hour, should I get fed up with some change their I can reroute it to anyone else I like at zero extra cost, so I get all the benefits of whatever provider I am using without the risk of being locked into them, seems a cheap price to pay to remove the potential nightmare of an address change,

    40. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yes fucking was necessary, you were whining about the cost for something so cheap, easy and critical to modern online life when the cost of losing your address is several orders of magnitude higher for most people and yes every family should have at least one domain name in the modern world. it is cheap, easy and given the critical nature of email addresses nowadays it seems sheer lunacy not to own one for your family. you can spend weeks combined with many website, bank problems and phone calls to get this all fixed, personally $10 a year is cheap insurance for what would be weeks of agony and problems should an issue arise and if you are foolish enough to be using an ISP email address that issue could be as simple as moving house.

    41. Re:20 years worth? by tepples · · Score: 1

      I own a domain through Gandi. So does one of my cousins. I'm not aware of anyone else in my family who does. I concede that my family is too small of a sample for any rigorous statistical inference, but I'm curious as to how many others in the developed world understand the benefits of owning a domain.

    42. Re:20 years worth? by tepples · · Score: 1

      Thank you. What is your domain?

    43. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 1

      personally I use namesilo.com (cheap with free privacy and with built in templates for routing your mail for no extra charge) I would say most don't understand the benefits, that doesn't make it any less important. Most simply aren't aware of how cheap and easy it is but many will tell you the agony of going through a house move or ISP change and having to get access to everything again. everyone in my family has their own domain and I am the only one that is technical but after explaining it to parents, brothers etc I walked them through setting up their own years ago.

    44. Re:20 years worth? by ls671 · · Score: 2

      Be nice and just create sub-domains for them. It is free and you can create as many as you want!

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    45. Re:20 years worth? by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Why didn't you just create sub-domains for them?

      It cost nothing like in free beer.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    46. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why didn't you just create sub-domains for them?

      It cost nothing like in free beer.

      exactly, we do this. one domain for our family name and we simply allocate sub domains to the various families and branches to cater for those that are less than technically competent. e.g. @familyone.sharedname.com and @familytwo.sharedname.com. Obviously this does run the minor risk of what happens with a massive family rift, unlikely to happen in our family but it is something to consider for others, especially when it is hardly expensive or technically demanding to set up separate domains.

    47. Re:20 years worth? by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Yes! It is called: cp

      I am still using pine, well alpine now, great tool and secure too. My emails get moved to relevant folders automatically once read. I have about 75 folders:
      google, family, paypal, recruters, etc.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    48. Re:20 years worth? by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Well, I delete cat pictures and stupid videos people send me to somehow save on disk space. I keep most emails although.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    49. Re:20 years worth? by basicasic · · Score: 1

      We'll see how 'meaningful' your existence is when you snuff it and your 50 years of obsessively stored emails documenting your 'meaningful existence' are flushed down the wazoo with the press of a key by some relative keen to have your laptop. Yes, nobody gives a fuck about your emails but you; when you're gone nobody is going to be poring over them, rifling through them trying to piece together your illustrious and unforgettable existence. They'll be deleted and forgotten before your coffin lid is closed. Save them the bother and delete as you go I say!

    50. Re:20 years worth? by spire3661 · · Score: 1

      So the only person that doesnt have a copy of your emails is you. good plan.....Its like when i erase my call history on my phone, all im really doing is denying myself access to it, not anyone else.

      --
      Good-bye
    51. Re: 20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I agree. It's as meaningful as shit. Delete it now .... Your family will not wade through it! Unless it was actually pointed out

    52. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Email fills no physical space, so why would I care if it hangs around for 20+ years? When email arrives I label it, read it, act on it if required, hit archive and forget about it.

      And on the plus side it can be handy sometimes to be able to search for stuff. Like: what was that hot girl's name 2 years ago, or what are my mother's cousin's uncle's grandson's 5 kid's names.

    53. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't mind Tepples, he's a master of coming up with ridiculous, unlikely excuse scenarios for every possible outcome. He's pretty much a joke around here.

    54. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I guess you've never tried.

      I lost my ISP email account a couple of years ago, and my Blizzard (Battle.NET) account is still tied to it. I can't change it without having access to my old e-mail account, and I can't get through to support without having access to my old e-mail account.

      (Actually, I suspect that I did manage to get through to support, and they changed something and sent the reply to the address I don't have access to, because at some point it changed from "click the link we have emailed you" to "there is no account connected to that e-mail address")

    55. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah but at least he doesn't waste his short lifetime deleting mail.

    56. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Work on your literacy. He never said that they would be meaningful after death.

    57. Re:20 years worth? by msauve · · Score: 1

      WTF are you babbling on about?

      Buy stuff over the Internet and get receipts via email. Receipt, date of purchase for warranty claim, documented. Someone at work asks via email that some job be done in a certain way. Later there's an issue because of how it was done. Documented.

      There are lots of examples of why someone with a real life might want to keep emails around, completely unrelated to their death. But you're obviously not someone whose life has any significance.

      --
      "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
    58. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Silly rabbit... there are a number of excellent email archive programs that are no cost for personal use. I have been using 'Mailstore' for a long time to gather and file emails from the various services I have used -- including for a while my own domain/mail server. So if I need to find something, its a query across the archive. Run it at intervals to collect what is there and keep the online stuff trimmed down. Makes it easier to use cellphone email I think. So changing an email address is not a crisis, more of a nuisance, really. Contacts are more of a pain, but dumping them in vcard or csv eases the transition. And an archive backup to USB is always prudent.

    59. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      hording

      hoarding

      hording

      hoarding

      horde

      hoard

    60. Re:20 years worth? by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 2

      What? You told me you loved my cat pictures! Mr. Frizzles is funny. You said to yourself.

      Now I see how you are. Well no more feline beauty pageants for you mister.

      And I'm going to tell Frankie to stop sending his skateboarding while drunk videos too. Once he's out of the hospital, of course.

      --
      If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
    61. Re:20 years worth? by Cro+Magnon · · Score: 1

      That said - 30 days is plenty of time to setup a new account and use an IMAP transfer utility to migrate every single message - even if it is 20 years worth. It's also plenty of time to change all of his online accounts for services (about 6 months ago I decided to switch primary email addresses and I was able to list and transfer every account I could think of within 2 evenings).

      The only real problem would be personal acquaintances that contact him via that address. In that case though I'd setup an "out of office" or the equivalent immediately and just have it respond with a message indicating that his address will be changing soon.

      The problem isn't the accounts you can think of. The problem is the accounts you don't. According to Murphy's Law, I would remember several important accounts on Day 31.

      --
      Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
    62. Re:20 years worth? by basicasic · · Score: 1

      Nope my life has no significance. Neither does yours - you just haven't realised it yet.

    63. Re:20 years worth? by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      You don't need anything fancy - even Thunderbird will do. Just create an offline folder and drag your IMAP stuff in.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    64. Re:20 years worth? by MightyYar · · Score: 1

      You jest, but I switched to Eudora at some point in the 90s, which happily used my existing Pine folders. Then maybe 10 years later Gmail got IMAP and I dragged all of my Eudora mail into Gmail.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    65. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The other side of that argument is the other party in the email may have already provided it to the investigation. By deleting your copy you are less prepared.

    66. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ah yes, the "never change anything unless we can go to immediate perfection in one step" argument.

      Goit.

    67. Re:20 years worth? by phorm · · Score: 1

      If you're worried about that, then relying on your ISP to hold mail records is probably not the best idea. I know tons who have lost mail or accounts, and they don't really have any guarantees that they'll hold the data indefinitely.

      If you want the old mail, connect with POP3, such it down into a box you own, and archive it.

      You can even move mail between ISP's by setting up two IMAP accounts and copying from one to another (or POP3 to IMAP).

    68. Re:20 years worth? by phorm · · Score: 1

      Also, 20 years ago or even 10 IMAP was not nearly so common as it is now. Around a decade ago the first iPhone came out, and arguably smartphones were one of the major things that started the push for IMAP versus POP3.

      Prior to that, I'd be surprised if he was getting his mail by IMAP and not a POP3 account with Outlook Express, Thunderbird, or something else similar.

    69. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's cute you think any miniscule proportion of his "20yr of email contacts" are going to decide to mail him in the next 30days to get the "hey my address is changing" bounce back...

    70. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have an ISP based email address that I've been using since '98.
      For years it was my main email address.

      Since the advent of some many free email providers down through the years, I have collected many emails addresses.

      I use different addresses for different things, and could easily migrate things to whichever makes the most sense.

    71. Re:20 years worth? by strikethree · · Score: 1

      That said - 30 days is plenty of time to setup a new account and use an IMAP transfer utility to migrate every single message - even if it is 20 years worth.

      It is not the current messages that are an issue! So many people fail to show a basic understanding of the issues that this guy has now.

      Every single company or person who he has given that email address to, over the past 20 fucking years, will need to be contacted to ensure that future mails go to the new address.

      Seems like it should be simple to just tell everyone you have a new address but it is actually not that simple. Remember that website that you registered with 9 years ago? Yeah, EVERY SINGLE ONE of those needs to be REMEMBERED, contacted, and all negotiations COMPLETED (they will surely send at least one more email to the old address to verify that you are you) within the next 30 days.

      Meh. I am too jaded now. Fuck him. Let him suffer. We can say it was his own stupidity and throw it all on him; after all, he should have known that "nonreply@" was going to become a standard years later.

      We should just let everyone suffer instead of being hypocritical and only trying to show compassion when it is a subject seen to be as important to offer compassion for (those poor poor women who are constantly abused need their own fucking music concert without any men (except performers!) being present.)

      --
      "Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
    72. Re: 20 years worth? by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      There are plenty of people who keep their old email address when a company is bought out. Remember rocketmail, hotmail, yahoo, aol? It was really handy because you know that if you received something from someone with an @aol.com email address not to expect them to be able to know much technical stuff.

      My computer isn't working.
      Is it turned on?
      I can't tell - the power is out.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    73. Re:20 years worth? by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      Next they'll claim that everyone should have their own area code so that nobody can take away their phone number. This is slashdot - where more and more, logic goes to die of loneliness.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    74. Re:20 years worth? by silanea · · Score: 1

      Is it yet another expense to renew until you die?

      Do you get to fill up your car for free? Do you get free replacement batteries for your gadgets, or free electricity to charge them?

      Email, web hosting etc. are services, and services need to be paid for, one way or another. I run my own mail server and cloud storage, using my own domains, to the tune of about € 100 per year. The machines are overpowered for my modest needs, to be honest, and they still cost me less than what I spend on chocolate annually.

      --
      Rudolf Hess edited Mein Kampf. He was the very first grammar nazi.
    75. Re:20 years worth? by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      And when there's a family feud? Or someone keeps trying to email ISOs? Or misuses it to spam their new get-rich-quick scheme? Or gets caught with kiddie pr0n? Or keeps forwarding infected chain emails? Or their computer gets hacked? Or the person running it dies, or is in the hospital for an extended period just as the domain comes up for renewal, and someone else grabs it after it goes back up for grabs?

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    76. Re:20 years worth? by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      Problem is that many of the people he hasn't contacted in years probably didn't notify him of their new email address ... so if he want's to look up an old co-worker or school chum, he may be out of luck.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    77. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There's compassion but there is common sense too. No way is an address on someone else's domain a "permanent" address. No person has an even far-fetch fantastical barely-believable reasonable expectation of having an address on someone else's domain forever. When you sign up for someone else's email service, you know in advance that you're going to have to someday extremely-likely change your address.

      This guy knew what he was getting into and knew he had 99% chances of not being able to keep the address for his whole life. Every single person who does what he did, knows this.

      He should look on the bright side. You don't have to go update everybody on the planet; you get to think about whom to update and whom to let go. I bet that's one of the reasons people use hotmail and gmail addresses; so you can occasionally more-easily shed your contacts ever decade or two.

      Also, there is definitely a lot of lying on the article too. This guy doesn't have to lose any old emails if he doesn't want to. Just copy the whole IMAP tree if you want. Maybe I do feel less compassion once, he starts with all the lying.

    78. Re:20 years worth? by Cederic · · Score: 1

      Hell no. They should own at least two. One for personal use, one for professional use.

      $50 every three years? Shit, wish I could get it that cheap. $100 for three years for one of mine, $50ish each for another two, and another $120/year for some other bugger to host them all.

      Sure, some people can't afford that. Most people can, and while you may be happy with a gmail account I don't trust Google to keep providing those forever.

    79. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think that calling someone a retard for not buying a whole domain just for their email is a bit harsh.

      They used to be called "vanity domains" for the very reason that it was a bit excessive. I'm one of the few people I know who use one.

    80. Re:20 years worth? by networkBoy · · Score: 2

      This is what I do too, with the added bonus that I actually have a catch-all for a subdomain that goes to a single email address, thus if someone random wants my email address I give them:

      their.company.name@handler.example.com

      It is easy then based on the send to email address to determine who's sharing/selling email lists and blackhole them.

      --
      whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
    81. Re:20 years worth? by networkBoy · · Score: 1

      And when there's a family feud?

      My domain, I win this part of the feud, suspend email.

      Or someone keeps trying to email ISOs?

      my domain, see above

      Or misuses it to spam their new get-rich-quick scheme?

      my domain, see above, and add filter

      Or gets caught with kiddie pr0n?

      presumably I know where they live, burn their house to the ground (or turn over to FBI as if I was an ISP, which strictly I am at this point)

      Or keeps forwarding infected chain emails?

      help fix/suspend email

      Or their computer gets hacked?

      help fix/suspend email

      Or the person running it dies, or is in the hospital for an extended period just as the domain comes up for renewal, and someone else grabs it after it goes back up for grabs?

      There's this awesome thing called auto-renewal.

      --
      whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
    82. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have emails from people who are no longer part of this mortal coil. Tell me again why you think a piece of text is not meaningful?

    83. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      people still send those through email? I thought that stuff was what facebook was used for?

    84. Re:20 years worth? by gmack · · Score: 1

      Alpine is fantastic. Nothing lets me read through and deal with masses of emails as efficiently as Alpine, plus I get to see people's freaked out looks when they see me reading email via SSH.

    85. Re:20 years worth? by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      So, your advice sucks because you can arbitrarily end service, same as any telco. They're making the same argument you do - their domain, their rules.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    86. Re: 20 years worth? by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      Yes, he just fucking said so. Reading fail.

    87. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      2800 sets of credentials? I have 7. Over 35 years.

      I think you love registering for things too much!

      When the marketroids use the euphamism "Log on to stupidwebsite" they do not mean logon -- they mean navigate too.

    88. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My domain was owned by me since the beginning of domain names. Before being "the Internet" as it came to be known when the great unwashed were permitted access, it was long before in the UUCP maps ...

    89. Re:20 years worth? by networkBoy · · Score: 1

      Well, If as the GP post had suggested, that I as owner of a domain make email accounts for family, and PP had posited the "what-ifs" making the case of why not create the addresses, this was my response.

      If I am offering a pro-bono service (to anyone) and it becomes prohibitive to me to continue doing so (cost, legal, blacklisted domain, etc.) then I would stop service.

      Generally the /. community is only pissy with telcos when they are taking money and not giving the service the money was for, or acting against the better of the community because they are monopoly providers. In this case when taking no money to provide something that is available from literally hundreds of providers for costs from $0.00 to $stupid.high it's not really the same ballpark (or even sport).

      Of course the alternative would be PP point of don't provide it in the first place.

      --
      whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
    90. Re: 20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lying tends to remove any feelings of compassion

    91. Re:20 years worth? by gravewax · · Score: 1

      While family feuds or problems aren't an issue for any of my direct family or extended family, you need to think about the issues of divorce, separations, family dysfunction etc otherwise you can end up in the same situation as you have with an ISP. No one in my family is so poor that $10 a year is any sort of imposition, by default I look after all my direct families domains but they could easily take them with them should something happen. I use my domains for many things apart from just my email, my brother owns a business so maybe if it grows he might want some other person to manage it etc etc. for such a tiny price I consider owning my domain names as cheap insurance (and tax deductible). back in the mid 2000's I learnt the importance of this the hard way when I changed ISP's, it took weeks to change my Address everywhere and even a year or so later I kept finding places I had the old address, The sheer number of places that have my email as a primary method of communication or authentication/userid nowadays is mind bogglingly huge, it would take months to sort it all out, I value my time far more than $10 a year.

    92. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I would consider someone that relies upon others with no rights or ownership to something that is so critical in modern life to definitely be a retard. This is not the 90's anymore, email is not a vanity or convenience to most people, it is an essential service.

    93. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      would rather spend $10 a year and have unlimited addresses, complete freedom and guaranteed ownership. I setup different addresses for different purposes e.g. Netflix@mydomain.com, xbox@mydomain.com etc etc. Gives me freedom, flexibility and easy knowledge of which fuckers have decided to sell/share my private information as because I own the domain I can use any address I like and tie them individually to services for easy tracing while they all deliver directly into my single inbox.

    94. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Happy people create significance in their lives. That's the whole point.

      Then we have sad little maggots like you who never grew out of their nihilistic teen edgelord phase.

    95. Re: 20 years worth? by Trax3001BBS · · Score: 1

      Your 1998 emails available on request? Yeah, that's what everyone here has just been dying to do, read all your 20 year old emails. Thank you SO much for the opportunity! I love wasting time reading emails from a random stranger on the internet, how did you know???m

      I expected no takers, I always try to cite a quote or article. It reduces the "prove it" replies; an old email was my only option for a citation, no matter the apparent absurdity of the offer :)

    96. Re:20 years worth? by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Could we please relax? I have been placed in similar situations many times and I never abused my power. You have a point although, case resembling the scenarios you have mentioned have occurred more than once, indeed.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    97. Re:20 years worth? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No more a joke than RMS, who has much the same shtick.

  2. If they must have it, by Fear+the+Clam · · Score: 5, Funny

    trade it for abuse@eastlink.ca

    1. Re:If they must have it, by mykepredko · · Score: 1

      I wonder how many people today would get:

      selfabuse@eastlink.ca

      This would be a case where 20 years ago, it probably won't pass the censors, but today?

    2. Re: If they must have it, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Look up the Mr Grabher fiasco in the same province. Yes; censors.

    3. Re:If they must have it, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      trade it for eastlinksucks@eastlink.ca
      It's not like eastlink can't come up with an alternative noreply address for their own nefarious porpoises. no-reply@eastlink.ca probably isn't taken.

    4. Re:If they must have it, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I was thinking, mr-noreply@eastlink.ca so he could send out updates that say "that's Mr-noreply@eastlink.ca to you."

    5. Re:If they must have it, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm inclined more to something like foodf@eastlink.com. Replace the "food" part with something sufficiently "otherwise", of course. It is just an example.

      Maybe goatsexf?

  3. Re:he's an idiot by MightyMartian · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I suppose 20 years ago "noreply@" wasn't really standardized as an email bit bucket for domains, so I'll give him a pass on that, but yes, in general it really doesn't seem a suitable email address today. It will be some work, but get a new address, update all the important services and move on. Want to actually own an email address, buy a domain and host it with a company with email service. That's the only guarantee.

    --
    The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
  4. Lavabit by iYk6 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Something like this happened to me. My email address was with a company called "Lavabit." Except they didn't give me 30 days, they shut down with 0 notice. After they shut down, they even lied to us, saying that our emails were safe, that they were having technical problems and would be back up in a couple of days.

    It was a huge mess, I would have appreciated 30 days, but I still would have been upset like this guy.

    1. Re: Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Can't tell if this is a troll. Is that you Edward?

    2. Re:Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Given that they had to hand over the keys to the feds, the next time you would have logged on would have given the feds full access to all your emails. They shut it down to protect the users.

    3. Re: Lavabit by Brockmire · · Score: 0

      The lying part was the back up in a few days (they legally couldn't tell you the truth). The truth part was your data was safe (by them closing down). You sound like a jerk. Maybe just uninformed, but I doubt it.

    4. Re: Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You sound like a jerk.

      WTF??? Did I miss something?
      Who the fuck modded you up?

    5. Re: Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They should have anyway.

      And also closing without warning isnt an acceptable way to treat users, and not telling the truth either.

    6. Re:Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They were legally required to. they didn't had to.

    7. Re: Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So you would have preferred they gave you 30 days knowing that this would likely force you to yield your keys? Smart

    8. Re: Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It seems a rather contrived not particularly funny troll.

    9. Re:Lavabit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


      Something like this happened to me. My email address was with a company called "Lavabit." Except they didn't give me 30 days, they shut down with 0 notice.

      That's because Lavabit was an encrypted email service that promised to protect it's customers privacy. In 2013 they received a national security letter to reveal the SSL key of Lavabit, so they could monitor Edward Snowden's email.

      So they decided to shut down the service entirely to protect their customers. Giving 30 days notice would have let the government snoop on all it's customer for those 30 days. They couldn't give any other explanation because they were under a gag order.

      They did the right thing.

    10. Re:Lavabit by slashrio · · Score: 1

      An idiot is someone who doesn't backup his data, or does so without exercising full control over it.

      --
      "Trump!!", the new Godwin.
    11. Re: Lavabit by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      Yes, he shut down his business, losing out on that venture and spending tens of thousands on lawyers to safeguard your data. You're an unappreciative cunt. It's pretty clear.

  5. Pop by Master+Moose · · Score: 4, Insightful

    20 years almost, I find it reprehensible they want to pop out of bushes and just give me 30 days to go through 20 years worth of emails and decide what I want to keep

    He keeps them all online? Does his provider not have a pop3 option to download everything he has been hoarding on their servers and sort from there at his own leisure?

    --
    . . .gone when the morning comes
    1. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yeah its too bad gmail doesn't have an archive feature or anything that you can use to dump your entire mailbox.

    2. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You're joking, right? You can, and should, do monthly "data extraction" dumps of all your things google. That includes all email.

    3. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Wait till you hear about this new thing called Gmail...

      My ISP provides about half a dozen e-mail addresses, included with my internet service so no extra charge. My VPN (Torguard) offers a secure e-mail account with optional features to make encryption easier to manage, also at no extra charge. Like Gmail, these have web interfaces and also support standard POP3 or IMAP protocols.

      Why would I ever want to depend on Google or any similar service, knowing they can do whatever they want to my account at any time, knowing that they will spy on me? Is this a situation where the brand name is supposed to appeal to me? Or what? I just don't understand the fascination.

    4. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your ISP is as secure if not less secure then gmail... with the exception of if your isp is not located in the USA. The number of email addresses they provide is irrelevant.

      There is no such thing as a secure anything now a days, there really isn't. The only thing you can secure for sure is a direct link between you and the next hop. Sure you can use all the vpn's you want, it doesn't change the fact that your doing so under the assumption that your ISP is not doing any deep packaet inspection/analysis and/or man in the middle attacks...

      Man made it so man can break it.

    5. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Your ISP is as secure if not less secure then gmail... with the exception of if your isp is not located in the USA. The number of email addresses they provide is irrelevant.

      There is no such thing as a secure anything now a days, there really isn't. The only thing you can secure for sure is a direct link between you and the next hop. Sure you can use all the vpn's you want, it doesn't change the fact that your doing so under the assumption that your ISP is not doing any deep packaet inspection/analysis and/or man in the middle attacks...

      Man made it so man can break it.

      So because no solution is perfect, we should just give up and bend over? No, thanks.

      My ISP does not subject my e-mails to automated scans to target me with advertisements. If they are lying to me and are secretly doing that, they definitely forgot the "actually advertise something" part. They don't have to do that - I'm paying them with $$. That makes them better than Google. Beyond that, no plaintext email is secure. Remember the old analogy? It's a post-card, not an envelope.

      No one who knows the slightest thing about security would ever tell you that there is such a thing as "perfect security". No, you take reasonable measures that you are able to take. If most people did as I do, it would dramatically increase the cost of massive surveillance. It might even go back to something that only happens to "persons of interest" and not to EVERYONE all the time. That would be a huge win for freedom and privacy all by itself.

      Also, my VPN has an option to use an SSL tunnel to carry the (separetely encrypted) VPN tunnel. To DPI systems it just looks like an https session. MITM attacks would get them another encrypted stream. This is good enough for the Great Firewall of China, and I don't live in China. I don't usually use it because I don't care about my ISP knowing that I use a VPN - they have no idea what happens after the traffic leaves their own network so I am satisfied. They don't get my browsing history, they don't get my DNS queries (I run my own, also behind the VPN), they don't get any sort of metadata except that I use a VPN. Using a VPN is not illegal. It's not even unusual. There are lots of legit reasons for it, such as not trusting Wifi.

      Beyond that, if you have state actors specifically targeting you, well you've got much bigger problems. Someone discovering that you have a VPN would be the least of your worries.

    6. Re:Pop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why would you ever want to depend on your ISP? Let's say you have to move house and your ISP doesn't serve the area of your new house. Or there's another provider that introduces a much better offer. Never tie your critical services to your ISP.

    7. Re: Pop by Brockmire · · Score: 1

      ISP'S can be shitty and not being tied to your ISP allows you to get the better service. I go back and forth between Shaw and Telus. When I experience a few outages, I jump to the other guy. Also, a lot of ISP's have low mailbox sizes or shitty anti - spam filters.

    8. Re:Pop by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Is that the site Outlook gets when it reaches for pop.gmail.com?

    9. Re:Pop by Walking+The+Walk · · Score: 2

      He keeps them all online? Does his provider not have a pop3 option to download everything he has been hoarding on their servers and sort from there at his own leisure?

      Yes, they do, and I agree that's the obvious answer.

      --
      A recursive sig
      Can impart wisdom and truth
      Call proc signature()
    10. Re:Pop by AcquaCow · · Score: 1

      It's not a matter of downloading the emails... it's a matter of making sure he has valid logins to every site he's using and that he can change his email on each site to a new one in that time.

      I know it would take me close to 30 days to change my profile on every site i've created a login on in the last 20+ years...Most of them have email confirmation when you change your address. Not to mention requiring email for password resets.

      --

      up 12 days, 22:30, 2 users, load averages: 993.20, 994.21, 994.56
      *makes note to limit user processes...
  6. Regardless of the decision's validity by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 3, Informative

    I'm not sure why 30 days is problematic. Nor do I understand the claim that he's going to lose his mail. He says the company won't help, while they say they've offered to help.

    In any case, migrating email from one IMAP server to another is simple. And, if it's still POP3 for some reason, anything he wants is already on his computer - nothing needs to be downloaded.

    Heck, Gmail has a tool that'll do exactly this for both protocols, doesn't it?

    --
    #DeleteChrome
    1. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In any case, migrating email from one IMAP server to another is simple. And, if it's still POP3 for some reason, anything he wants is already on his computer - nothing needs to be downloaded. Heck, Gmail has a tool that'll do exactly this for both protocols, doesn't it?

      So sayeth the elitist asshole who doesn't grok that not everyone is as tech savvy as you
      Thank god for Trump and North Korea -- Ignorant and Arrogant Elitists such yourself are about to disappear en mass

      *toodles*

    2. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I just checked - eastlink.ca does provide IMAP

      He should be OK unless he is using webmail. In which case, it is a good time for him to learn to use Thunderbird or some other such.

    3. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Getting and retaining the mail isn't the problem. It's all the businesses, online accounts, and who knows what else linked to that email address. If he doesn't change them all then someday he may be locked out of an account that wants to verify him by email at an address he doesn't have access to.

    4. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Trying to sort through all the emails to remind yourself of all the online services you're registered to that you need to update your contact information with is not trivial. Archiving it and sorting it after the email address is shut down isn't an option as many/most services will need to send a confirmation email to the old address. Doing all this during a stressful time such as moving house (as is actually the case here) makes it all that much harder.

    5. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

      Actually, you and the guy who replied before you make a good point. I was focusing on his statement about losing mail, but getting everyone notified and all your accounts updated would be a pain.

      This is also why I've used an alumni email address for the past 20+ years... I don't have to worry about changing it. I just have to remember to update the forward to who ever my new ISP is, when that changes.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    6. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't think the issue is importing all of the email into a new account.

      The issue is remembering every site, service, and group that has your email address and updating. Hell, for me just making the list would take a few weeks and I would miss a number of them. On top of that some sites make changing your email address a pain, and a few just don't let you do it without reaching out to the Help Desk. This could take up a lot of time and I imagine he has a job and a life that demands at least some of his time.

      They should agree to forward the email for another 30 days at least so that he can find out any that he has missed.

      Even if he uses a password manager that would not cover any subscriptions, groups he works with, and other such things.

    7. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by dbIII · · Score: 1

      The not immediately obvious thing is usernames tied to an email address. When you no longer have access to the address any confirmation hoops you have to jump through get sent to somewhere you can no longer find. That's how I lost my first slashdot username (annoying but no loss - only a couple of years older than this one) and I can appreciate that losing multiple logins would be extremely annoying.
      The other is informing a lot of people that they can no longer contact you on the same address that's been active for so long, and have most of them ignore it and have forgotten by the time they try to contact you again.

      Compared with those downloading the emails is trivially easy.

    8. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is also the change of contact address problem. Specifically those that use the old address for confirmation.

    9. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They've offered to help, but all the emails they send have his address in the From: header.

    10. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So sayeth the elitist asshole who doesn't grok that not everyone is as tech savvy as you
      Thank god for Trump and North Korea -- Ignorant and Arrogant Elitists such yourself are about to disappear en mass

      *toodles*

      There's that anti-nerd sentiment we've seen so often since the rise of social media. There's no place for nerds in the world any longer. Tech jobs belong to jocks now. Nerds go back to your basements and never come out again.

    11. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by wildstoo · · Score: 1

      Although from TFA it appears he would lose access to his actual emails - I assume they're stored online - from the summary I'd say his bigger concern is that he has used this email address to communicate with just about everyone for 20 years. It's like being told you're being evicted and you have 30 days to find a new home and tell everyone you know and every company you deal with where you'll be living from now on.

      It would take days for me to change the registered email address for every site and service I use, and that's just for ones where I can actually log in and update my records. Then there's the personal/business contacts where you would have to actually contact them personally. It's a huge inconvenience.

      The main injustice here is that the whole situation is entirely unnecessary. Clearly Eastlink have never bothered with this before, but suddenly they want this address. You could argue noreply@ has some functional use as a descriptor, but since it's intended as a black hole you could just as easily use donotreply@ or unmonitored@ or bananamilkshake@ and the result would be the same.

    12. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And if it is only accessed through their web portal? There are still tons of email providers which don't let you access your email anyway except through their web interface. Gotta have somewhere to display the ads to keep the service running. You would need to manually copy your address book and save the HTML page of any email you wanted to keep. Yeah, a random person isn't able to automate that so he's fucked.

    13. Re:Regardless of the decision's validity by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Thanks to the genius that thought email address == login name and that used that value as a key otherwise it would be trivial to change.

      A customer of mine insisted to use email as login name and I didn't use this value as a key so it is still possible to change emails thus login name, spooky isn't it? The user is permanently mapped to a UUID, that's all.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
  7. Yahoo by TheRealMindChild · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Wait until Yahoo! mail shuts down. So many website accounts will be toast

    --

    "When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
    1. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      verizon hasn't exactly a good track record here. they bought aol. another company with a long and glorious history in fucked-up corporate decision making. they are migrating their existing mail accounts over to aol. then they go and buy yahoo, yet another company known for brilliant corporate decisions; even after yahoo handed them a big giant get out of jail card in the form of previously undisclosed security breaches. are they fucking nuts? yes. they all deserve one another. but if they migrate yahoo mail to aol's platform.. it'd be the smartest thing they have done since the old bell atlantic bought nynex twenty years ago.

    2. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't even bother trying to use a Yahoo account if you have a dynamic IP address that changes every minute and each IP address geolocates differently (not uncommon on mobile networks). Yahoo will detect "some unusual activity" and you will be locked out of your account forever.

    3. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      gmail pulls that shit on me all the time. even if i'm on the same pc, same browser, and same dsl connection as alway

    4. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, the new yahoo mail interface at least is the best it has been in *years* ... since the classic web 2.0 interface actually. When I click delete... it actually works... it didn't in the old ajax interface. It also loads in a reasonable amount of time even on my AMD e2-1800 which is no speed demon...

      And yeah... I use the yahoo mail account as my catch all, most important stuff is on a different account.

    5. Re:Yahoo by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      After paying that amount for a company and then dropping the brand (intellectual property) do you think Verizon will proceed to delete the only remaining part of their purchase?

      Wait don't answer that.

    6. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The fact that Verizon sold off their management of their customers' verizon.net email addresses (https://help.aol.com/articles/verizon-move-to-aol-mail-faq) suggests that yahoo mail is one of the key assets they wanted.

    7. Re:Yahoo by ls671 · · Score: 1

      What kind of "mobile network" is that? I guess it must be hard to ssh into anything as well.

      Anyway, here is a solution:
      Use openvpn so your public exit IP never changes. I can hop networks with different different public IP transparently because everything goes through openvpn.

      I can even keep a VOIP call up without any glitch while switching network, ssh and anything else doesn't even have a clue of what is going on. It is completely transparent, openvpn adapts almost instantaneously.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
    8. Re:Yahoo by mccalli · · Score: 1

      Oh god please shut it down. So many DMARC issues if you're running a mailing list.

    9. Re:Yahoo by omnichad · · Score: 1

      But even AOL's webmail is better now. Seriously, go try it.

    10. Re:Yahoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have a bellsouth.net email address that is handled by Yahoo.com. I've had the bellsouth.net email address ever since I signed up for dial up service back in 1992 or 1993. Bellsouth.net was taken over by ATT.net When AT&T got out of dial up service it was handed over to Yahoo.com.

      So, I've had the bellsouth.net email for almost 25 years.

  8. From TFA by viperidaenz · · Score: 5, Informative

    "I just want to tell people be aware that your email address may not be your own,"

    If you want an email you own, register a domain and use that.
    From Eastlink consumer terms and conditions

    7. Your telephone numbers and identifiers
    7.1 You do not own any identifier (e.g. telephone, account, calling card or PIN number; email, IP or Web page address; access code, etc.) assigned to you, and we may change or remove any identifier at any time upon notice to you and we will in no way be required to compensate you for such changes. You are permitted to use (but not register with any organization) only those IP addresses we have provided to you.

    Those conditions are from 2014 but you can be sure there were similar provisions back in 1998. Probably back as far as Eastlink has been providing telephone service in the 70s.
    It was never "your" email address Steve

    1. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Very unlikely those provisions were the same back in 1998 & you can not change the terms retroactively.

    2. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah I doubt that existed then. There's been a number of services I've signed up for and their T&C page was "404 not found"...

    3. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually you can changed terms RETROSPECTIVELY. generally most terms come with the provision that these terms may change and the new terms will supercede any existing terms, the only priviso depending on country is you have to provide some notice of change so that the consumer has a chance to cancel their agreement with you.

    4. Re:From TFA by ooloorie · · Score: 1

      Very unlikely those provisions were the same back in 1998 & you can not change the terms retroactively.

      "We are changing our terms. If you want to continue your service with us, you have to do it under the new terms. You're free to cancel if you don't."

      They can also simply terminate the contract.

    5. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just because they say things like "and we will in no way be required to compensate you for such changes" doesn't mean it must be true. This is similar to the any contract that contains a preventative a priori summary judgements.

    6. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you want an email you own, register a domain and use that.

      Right up until someone social engineers your domain from you, or some court in Kentuckystan yanks it because the registrar happens to be on US soil, no matter where you are or where you do business, if any.

      I agree it's the better option, but it's no panacea.

      From Eastlink consumer terms and conditions [...]

      There's the letter of the Ts&Cs, and there's the 20 years of "no no it's fine you can have this email address", that establishes a pattern of expectation. To the point that a judge might well side with the guy despite the Ts&Cs. Now I'm no judge but I'd say that 30 days simply isn't enough to disconnect a well-used email address of 20 years from somenone's life and all the accounts it's tied to. Move house and forwarding snail mail for six months is pretty much standard. And, of course, I'd also expect eastlink to come up with a clear and pressing reason, not just "oh yeah we made an error back then". If it was that much of an error surely you'd've noticed sooner than only after 20 years.

      In short, it really doesn't matter what the Ts&Cs say, this is completely gratuitous. IOW, a dick move.

    7. Re:From TFA by PPH · · Score: 1

      If you want an email you own, register a domain and use that.

      And make sure that you actually control it. Some domain hosting companies will offer to 'manage' the domain for you. Which gives them the ability to withdraw it and sell it to someone else. The original domains were sold off to a squatter, who wanted some outlandish price for them (probably a Microsoft front company).

      Anecdote: A friend of mine owns her own business and set up a domain (her business name) through one of these services. Then Microsoft (MSN) bought them out and announced that all domains of the form ABC.com would become ABC.msn.com.

      I own my own domain. And I'm the administrative and tech contact for it. Back in the late last century, a bunch of us geeks were talking about buying our own names. But I figured mine wasn't available, as it happens to be the name of a company that is (among other things) in the telecommunications business. But it was still available, so now it's mine. I've had one offer from the company to buy it (not interested) but numerous offers by 'third parties' to take over 'management' of my domain (also not interested). I'm pretty sure that these are just attemts to take it over.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    8. Re:From TFA by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      New terms superseding old terms is not changing terms retroactively. The new terms only apply from that date forward. For example, you can't say "our new rate is 2x the old rate, and we're applying it retroactively for the last 3 years".

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    9. Re:From TFA by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      Contracts of adhesion ("take-it-or-leave-it" contracts) are subject to various consumer protection laws that try to limit abuse.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    10. Re:From TFA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      no but you can add conditions that clearly state you do not own an address to clearly articulate what is fact even prior to it being in their. this in effect means it is retrospective as it applies regardless of whether you got your email before or after the condition was explicitly stated.

    11. Re:From TFA by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      If that wasn't clearly stated, it would be up to a judge to decide.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  9. Why doesn't Eastlink just preserve the emails? by printman · · Score: 1

    OK, so why the hell can't Eastlink just rename the account or move the emails over to the new account? (for that matter, so can this guy with a few clicks...)

    --
    I print, therefore I am.
    1. Re:Why doesn't Eastlink just preserve the emails? by xlsior · · Score: 4, Insightful

      OK, so why the hell can't Eastlink just rename the account or move the emails over to the new account? (for that matter, so can this guy with a few clicks...)

      I doubt that's the problem -- it's that he's used that email address to register for other services for the past 20 years, and he may not remember to update his contact info /recovery address on every single one of possibly hundreds of other websites like gmail, expedia, his bank, his cable company, netflix, xbox live, Steam, EA, etc. until it may be too late.

      Very easy to overlook a few of those, and depending on the site in question you may be screwed if you don't think about them until the 30 day transition has passed.

    2. Re:Why doesn't Eastlink just preserve the emails? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Me too. The online account attached to the email address.

        It would be annoying to lose all my emails, but the real problem is there are so many things that use my email address as my account name. Almost all of those don't matter (Like Toyota Supra forums), but other things like my Sears online account have accumulated discounts attached to them.
      And to change the account info, you have to logon with that email address. To reset passwords, you need to use that email address. To make changes to the account, you need to answer a verification email.

      Here's the other problem, and to me an even bigger issue. If they take away that email address from him, then I bet someone else will be able to either open an account or give themselves an alias email address of noreply@eastlink.ca and thus have access to everything he has not managed to get converted to whatever his new address is. Eastlink needs to guarantee that email won't be used again during his lifetime without his permission due to their failure in letting this go on for 20 years.

      Personally, I think the guy was an idiot if he didn't see this coming during the 20 years. But I agree with the eastlink people that his email address is inappropriate.
      I also think the email providers are idiots for making user email accounts be email@ISP company.com as if they were employees of the ISP.

      In any case I would have immediately gotten my lawyer to ask for an injunction to extend the thirty days to something more reasonable, and also get a guarantee from the company that the noreply address is never used again.
      If this were between two corporations, the court would grant such an injunction with no question.

    3. Re:Why doesn't Eastlink just preserve the emails? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      This, for heaven's sake I can't figure out how so many users of a supposedly "nerd" forum are overlooking the real inconvenience. Your email address is basically your proof of identity for a whole lot of online services. If you lose access to it, you can't verify that you're you anymore.

      I went through this last year with my bellsouth.net email address. I'd had it probably as long as the guy in this article, it originally came attached to a dial-up internet account. Over the years, I switched over to cable internet, BellSouth ceased to exist and was aggregated into AT&T, yet the email address continued working and I kept using it. I liked it, because it was <my first name>@bellsouth.net, kind of an old school geek status symbol. Last year I switched my cellphone service from AT&T to Sprint, and a few days later my bellsouth.net email stopped working. I couldn't login, and messages sent there would bounce.

      As it turns out, despite having cancelled the BellSouth dial-up internet service many years ago, during the intervening time I had always continued paying some monthly fee to AT&T. For the copper lines until I discontinued those, and also for my cell service. These were all tied into a master account in the AT&T system and that account being active is what kept my ancient email address alive. As soon as I stopped paying anything to AT&T, boom, it was gone. It never occurred to me that changing my cellphone carrier would terminate an email address, unrelated to my cellphone, that I'd been using for nearly 20 years.

      It's been more than a year and there are still things I can't login to, because I can't reset or recover the password, because the password reset feature wants to send email to an address I can't use. Even if I'd had 30 days notice, there's no way I would have remembered "every site I've ever registered for, ever" to be able to go change the email address on all of them. Fortunately the really important things (bank, credit cards, etc.) I was able to change in person or over the phone.

      So, I feel bad for this guy. noreply@ is a clever username and they don't seem to have a valid reason to take it away.

    4. Re:Why doesn't Eastlink just preserve the emails? by apoc.famine · · Score: 1

      ...you may be screwed if you don't think about them until the 30 day transition has passed.

      That's not my experience anywhere it matters. If it matters, they have customer service reps that routinely help old people who just lost their AOL email address or threw out their computer because it was infested with spyware. Changing email addresses will likely require some time on hold during business hours, but it's not the end of the world.
       
      The places where I've found it impossible to update an email address without access to the old one are always free or very cheap internet services that don't have customer service staff. And most of those places you should be able to just open a new account without losing anything but some internet points. I'd be a bit surprised if this guy wasn't able to pretty seamlessly purchase his house, even with a change in email address in the middle.

      --
      Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
  10. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    I think he's brilliant

  11. Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the handle by mykepredko · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I just did a quick boo at Eastlink's website and no where are there guidelines for email handles.

    Maybe if the handle meant something different 20 years ago than it does now they could come back and say something, but I suspect the real reason is that "noreply@eastlink.ca" is a damn useful email address for eastlink.ca

  12. True meaning of the cloud by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Once again, someone finds out the hard way that "the cloud" means "someone else's servers."

    Of course, I don't expect him to run his own mail server. That's a bit of a technical challenge. But I do expect people to continue to suffer from putting their stuff on other people's servers.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    1. Re:True meaning of the cloud by CanadianMacFan · · Score: 1

      There's no challenge to it. I have my own domain up at Zoho.com for free to accept and send messages but at home I have a Synology NAS which has a mail server as a package. Turn it on, answer a few easy questions, and you are running. I use that one to store all of my messages that I want to keep.

      I have my email client configured with the public (currently Zoho.com but it can change easily) and my private. If there's a message I want to keep I just drag it over to a folder that's on my private server or for some things such as email lists I just have a rule that moves it over automatically.

      I've had problems in the past with my mail provider so I just get a new one. I switch the DNS entries over myself (I host it with freedns.afraid.org). I still have access to the mail even after the switch so I move everything over to my private server and after a week I tell them to close my old account down.

      I don't send any mail out using the server on the NAS. It's just there to store messages. It doesn't receive any messages either. I have it behind a firewall which I haven't opened the ports because I don't need to access the messages away from home. If I know that I will need an email I'll just leave it on what I'm calling my public server. Basically the server on the NAS is an archive.

      My setup probably won't work well for everyone but it meets my needs perfectly.

    2. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There's no challenge to it.
      <snip>
      My setup probably won't work well for everyone but it meets my needs perfectly.

      Which is it? If it won't work well for everyone then there are challenges.

    3. Re:True meaning of the cloud by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Of course, I don't expect him to run his own mail server. That's a bit of a technical challenge. But I do expect people to continue to suffer from putting their stuff on other people's servers.

      So nothing new then? I mean this has been the status quo with how we used the internet for 20 years. People in general haven't suffered. Even as the hordes of Geocities sites disappeared into the Ether the internet and associated online services have only become more popular.

    4. Re:True meaning of the cloud by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Domain... NAS... let me stop you right there. Because you've just lost 99% of the internet population with your fancy and super complicated IT talk.

      If I can't setup the account complete with email address when I'm first prompted to turn on my new smartphone, or I'm not just magically told I have this thing called email when I join a company or an ISP then it's too complicated for nearly everyone.

    5. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't send any mail out using the server on the NAS.

      And that's where you fail to understand the issues. Home ISPs block outbound mail unless it goes through their servers. They regularly change the auth method when dealing with SMTP, they throttle and cap outbound email, and they'll silently drop it if there's a problem - you'll never get a bounce-back. Some ISPs are better than others, but thanks to SPAM, they all do their bit to discourage their customers from running mail servers at home.

    6. Re:True meaning of the cloud by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      You wouldn't have known that, hearing all the screaming last time AWS went down.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    7. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is actually incredibly easy to do even for someone without IT knowledge. plenty of services will do all the work for you. The problem with ISP's and smartphones etc etc is they don't want you to know how easy it is as then you aren't emotionally and technically tied to an email address that they own and control.

    8. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

      Once again, someone finds out the hard way that "the cloud" means "someone else's servers."

      I run my own cloud though... How is that "someone else's servers"?

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
    9. Re:True meaning of the cloud by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      Now your just using buzzwords.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    10. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

      Now your just using buzzwords.

      I'm serious, I run my own IaaS, PaaS and SaaS solutions internally - Some as you might imagine, are nested cloud solutions even.

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
    11. Re:True meaning of the cloud by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      There is only one possible meaning to that.......the singularity has arrived and you are using self-reproducing data centers. What do they eat?

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    12. Re:True meaning of the cloud by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

      What do they eat?

      They feed on the tears of millenials.

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
  13. Auto-delete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    I've set up my mail system to auto-delete anything that comes from noreply@*

    I use mail to communicate, not to be told things.
    It's just bad manners if companies only want to talk and not listen.

    1. Re:Auto-delete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      That's a terrible idea. Just checked my email, and three different banks use noreply@ their domain name. Also, REI (a great sporting goods store) replied to my equipment rental appointments with noreply@. Finally, LinkedIn emails for jobs I applied to used that username.

    2. Re:Auto-delete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Uhh...being told things is an aspect of communication.

    3. Re:Auto-delete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How stupid does one have to be to use a noreply address for customers or potential customers?

    4. Re:Auto-delete by omnichad · · Score: 1

      If the system sending it needs a dedicated outbound address. You set the Reply-To: header for replies.

    5. Re:Auto-delete by Solandri · · Score: 1

      It's also bad manners to just hit reply without actually reading the email you were just sent. Pretty much every email I've received from noreply@ includes in the body of the email a different email address you should reply to if you need to contact customer service. noreply@ is companies' version of brown M&Ms - it filters out people who just hit reply without actually reading to see if the answer to their question is in the email they're replying to.

    6. Re:Auto-delete by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But what if the guy in this post wants to talk to you?

  14. It's going to be OK by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    He is in the process of moving all of his email to Yahoo's servers. Should be good for another 20, right???

    1. Re:It's going to be OK by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Even paid five years in advance yahoo hosting mightn't last a day.

  15. Re: This is why you must own a personal domain nam by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Trump disagrees.

  16. I wonder about one of my domains... by aaarrrgggh · · Score: 1

    One of my domains seems to fly under the radar, but it has 2-4 curse words depending on how religious you are. Had it for about 20 years now...

    If it wasn't for character length, I would love to shift my main email address back to my own domain names... but securing things properly is a pain.

    1. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      but securing things properly is a pain.

      If you want, you can have your DNS set up to forward your email to a gmail account. Then in gmail, you can set the "reply-to" email to be your desired email address.

      That is the lazy way to get your own email address, without running your own qmail server (I assume you'd run qmail if you want security).

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    2. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you're running Windows, you can just use hMailServer. It's really easy to set up and configure for security.

      Just need a router with a firewall, a domain, access to a pair of name servers, a static IP address and an outbound SMTP service from your ISP.

      Easy peasy.

    3. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      Just need a router with a firewall, a domain, access to a pair of name servers, a static IP address and an outbound SMTP service from your ISP.

      If you have all that, you're better off with qmail tbh

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    4. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by aaarrrgggh · · Score: 1

      Yes, but then you are paying Google for another domain to be hosted; my preference would be to have email forwarded to my account-du jour, ideally with basic spam and content filtering before the forward.

      It isn't that big of a deal, but it is a little barrier compared to zero public facing services today.

    5. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      my preference would be to have email forwarded to my account-du jour,

      Gmail can do that too, lol.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    6. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by CanadianMacFan · · Score: 1

      If you only want to have a couple of users at most there are a few places that offer free email hosting and let you use your domain. I'm currently with Zoho.com and use my domain for mail. Only had one problem with them in a few years. They have a feature that you can assign one user to act as a catch all for any email addresses in the domain that aren't set up instead of having them being returned as no such user. I use it because I sign up to every site with a different email address in order to tell which sites have had leaks or sold my info. For some reason this option got turned off in an update and I lost some emails because they were returned as no such user. But for free they have been very good other than than.

    7. Re:I wonder about one of my domains... by KGIII · · Score: 2

      If you don't mind Putin reading your email, you can host a domain's email for free (with up to 1000 addresses) via Yandex. You just change your records at your registrar and the propagate almost immediately, and you can configure quite a few things from there - including a fairly robust web interface, IMAP, POP3, SMTP, etc...

      They had excellent uptime, when I played with them. They weren't in blacklists or anything. I seem to recall you can do SPF and all that jazz. If you're paranoid, you can encrypt messages. They don't mine them for adverts, so I am not sure what the economical model is - unless they hope that you'll upgrade to a paid service. I guess they could mine them for intelligence, but that seems like a large fishing adventure without a great chance of payback.

      Still, 'tis worth looking into - if you're needing to do something like this. It's pretty easy to change your records at the registrar. You can even configure it so that you're able to get your mail at mail.example.tld and more. It's kinda neat.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  17. Re:he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 0

    I suppose 20 years ago "noreply@" wasn't really standardized as an email bit bucket for domains, so I'll give him a pass on that, but yes, in general it really doesn't seem a suitable email address today.

    I worked at Fujitsu's WorldsAway virtual world division that had five Davids in 1997. If you ever read "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson, David #5's username was "da5id" and that pissed off all the other Davids. Especially since David #5 was a graphic artist and not a programmer.

  18. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Ironic comment considering the name of this website.

  19. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  20. Re:This is why you must own a personal domain name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    What if you're not serious about email?

  21. Nuked mine last month. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    20 year old yahoo! account down the tubes.

    Was the only one still active after the era when all the providers switched to 30 days or we delete on free acounts a decade or so back.

    I have actually given up email as a media as a result. Everything I need is done via IRC or XMPP now and if others don't have it, I don't need to associate with them.

    1. Re:Nuked mine last month. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have actually given up email as a media as a result. Everything I need is done via IRC or XMPP now and if others don't have it, I don't need to associate with them.

      That's fine, I'm sure your Mom can hear you from downstairs anyway.

    2. Re:Nuked mine last month. by ls671 · · Score: 1

      Yes, his solution seems pretty universal, planned and designed to handle any possible case that may arise.

      --
      Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
  22. Is Nova Scotia the weird province? by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

    Wasn't that where the long-standing vanity plate GRABHER, the owner's name, was suddenly classified as a gender slur?

    1. Re:Is Nova Scotia the weird province? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, I don't think thats been settled yet.

  23. Decide what to keep? by fustakrakich · · Score: 2

    Please... Just download all of it.

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  24. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Want to actually own an email address, buy a domain and host it with a company with email service. That's the only guarantee.

    Domain names have been seized before.

  25. Pop til you drop. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Be nice but the POP3 option is the second best. I remember when Nokia mail quit and I had to move everything over. I believe I used a forwarding feature till everything was cleaned out. I also remember when a mail service by Novell up and left about eight years back. That was a pain but at least they had archives.

  26. Address he should choose. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    donotreply@eastlink.ca

    1. Re:Address he should choose. by TechyImmigrant · · Score: 4, Insightful

      donotreply@eastlink.ca

      The email he needs is noreply@his_own_domain_name.whatever_TLD_he_chooses.

      Using your provider's domain name is going to mess you up sooner or later, most typically when you move house.

      --
      I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
  27. Nuked mine last month-local mail. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This kind of situation is one reason for running a personal email server. You can still run everything through the main mail provider, the local is for backup, features, and integration if you have multiple accounts.

    1. Re:Nuked mine last month-local mail. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This kind of situation is one reason for running a personal email server. You can still run everything through the main mail provider, the local is for backup, features, and integration if you have multiple accounts.

      The spammers really killed most of the usefulness of running your own e-mail server. Unless you want to pay extra for a dedicated IP address and jump through several other hoops, your IP block will immediately be found in various RBLs and it will be difficult or impossible to send e-mails to most recipients.

      The burden of running your own server just to have a local copy of old e-mails doesn't seem worthwhile. There are much easier ways to do that (c.f. a prior post confirming his old ISP supports IMAP). But if I've misunderstood your post, please explain - I would like to hear about a workable solution if you have one.

      {See that, Slashdot? Instead of telling him how stupid I think he is, I consider that I may have misunderstood. Really not hard!}

    2. Re:Nuked mine last month-local mail. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, you did, but that's OK. You can either set up your server as a full-blown E-mail server with all that entails, or you can set it up as a client to your ISPs server. In which they do the heavy lifting for you, and all you do is have a central spot that collects the E-mail (one account, or as some do multiple accounts), features (better filtering, and displaying), and of course backups. The one problem none of this solves which the original author mentioned is the address being registered to multiple sites for the purposes of communication, and identification. That's where a good password manager comes in, which can record that information for you. It's still a pain, just not as big as one thinks.

    3. Re:Nuked mine last month-local mail. by omnichad · · Score: 1

      You missed this:

      still run everything through the main mail provider, the local is for backup

      I do the same. I use my provider for SMTP, but proxy everything to a local Dovecot server for access. It's the best of both worlds.

      I agree that running your own outbound server is next to impossible these days.

  28. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    David #5's username was "da5id" and that pissed off all the other Davids. Especially since David #5 was a graphic artist and not a programmer.

    Could you maybe elaborate on why that pissed them off? Also, why does it matter if he's a graphic artist?

  29. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Informative

    It's a creimer post. It rarely makes sense, but it has Amazon affiliate link spam.

  30. Kind of brings me back by Presence+Eternal · · Score: 2

    I remember back when Aol bought Netscape they took my netscape.net email address and gave it to the aim user with the same name. I hope the office troll who came up with that plan died of scabies.

    1. Re:Kind of brings me back by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are lucky if they never tried to take your accounts/identity.

      That shit would be worse today if the same happened.

  31. Hillary, is that you? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I still won.

  32. Re:he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Could you maybe elaborate on why that pissed them off?

    david, david2, david3, david4, da5id...wtf?! who does this noob think he is?!

    Also, why does it matter if he's a graphic artist?

    Programmers thought the graphic artists were a bunch of assholes. Graphic artists thought the programmers were a bunch of assholes. I managed to gain the respect of both teams from my hard work as the intern.

  33. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    probably they hired a Pottering devotee. Someone who blew a gasket at seeing "do-not-reply@" email in all their bulk mail systems, internal monitoring systems, etc., and threw a bit of a fit about it and how it should be just "noreply@" instead, and then wait what a luser customer has been using it? and it went to 11 at that point.

  34. Exactly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not to mention as long as they're online the ISP is granted more and more permissions to them as our freedoms are lost, and they become a liability more than convenience

  35. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Could you maybe elaborate on why that pissed them off?

    david, david2, david3, david4, da5id...wtf?! who does this noob think he is?!

    Also, why does it matter if he's a graphic artist?

    Programmers thought the graphic artists were a bunch of assholes. Graphic artists thought the programmers were a bunch of assholes. I managed to gain the respect of both teams from my hard work as the intern.

    Doesn't make sense, they should have started at david0

  36. Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    You toss important e-mails too? I keep all for about a year and only keep the important ones forever when still needed.

    I keep all of my e-mails - STORED LOCALLY, on my hard drive (and backed up like the rest of my data). My ISP provided email account is just a transport. Once my client grabs the e-mail it is deleted from the remote server. Now it's under my control. This is very easy to do with most any modern e-mail client.

    Is this really so uncommon?

    1. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      All of the plebes use webmail now.

    2. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      only people stuck in the past rely on an ISP provided email. It is a death sentence waiting to happen. Anyone with even the slightest bit of technical knowledge has migrated away from ISP based mail systems.

    3. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      All of the plebes use webmail now.

      Then they need to act like adult people and understand that they made a decision, and that decision, like all decisions, involved trade-offs. The failure to do that is what makes them "plebs".

      If you talk to old people for any length of time, or watch old black-and-white TV shows and movies, you might notice that reasonable responsibility was once considered a basic fact of life. Any adult person who didn't understand that was viewed as stupid or inadequate. I don't know what happened to that, but it must have been nice. I like that better than the "victim culture" we've adopted since.

      If you depend entirely on someone else to perform a service for you, then you should have considered what you'll do if/when they stop. Especially if it's important to you. There's nothing technical about that, it applies to any dependency.

    4. Re:Downside of needless dependency by omnichad · · Score: 1

      Yes, that's becoming uncommon. IMAP makes it easy to keep read status and folders synced between any and every device, phones included.

      I'd rather not sort through emails on my phone as if they're a separate entity with no idea which ones are new without looking closely.

      I store my emails locally too, but on a Dovecot server that I can sync everything with. It does not run the actual email address, but it proxies it for me through some sort of IMAP sync tool.

    5. Re:Downside of needless dependency by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      If you depend entirely on someone else to perform a service for you, then you should have considered what you'll do if/when they stop. Especially if it's important to you.

      What a total lack of insight into the modern world. It would be a full-time job to consider every single service you use, and what you'd have to do it they stop. Police, fire, water, electricity, drug manufacturers, inspectors of all sorts (even if you don't fly, you don't want a plane dropping body parts on you). Think of any part of the economy that goes on strike, and how it can affect you directly or indirectly. You going to waste time wondering about a possible truckers strike, rail strike, highway maintenance strike, police strike, garbage strike, doctor's strike, ambulance strike, fireman's strike, meteor strike?

      Or are you just going to deal with it when you know it may happen soon?

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    6. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Which is all the more reason to keep your dependencies low.

      What you're saying is like telling a fat person "ah screw it, you should eat more bad foods because you're already fat".

    7. Re:Downside of needless dependency by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      You can't "keep your dependencies low" unless you devote so much time to that you can't do anything else. There was a time when that's pretty much how people lived - and almost everyone was a farmer. Their life revolved around it. There wasn't the surplus human capital to develop all the stuff we enjoy today, including modern medicine - I'd rather live longer.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    8. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can't "keep your dependencies low" unless you devote so much time to that you can't do anything else.

      And yet here I am keeping my dependencies low without exerting any additional energy or time on doing so. I guess that proves you wrong.

    9. Re:Downside of needless dependency by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      Really? You running a farm, making your own electricity, medicines, and ISP connection? Weaving your own cloth to make your own clothes. Making your own shoes? Not buying anything from a store, wholesaler, etc? I doubt it.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
    10. Re:Downside of needless dependency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Learn to read, dearie. I said keep dependencies low, not eliminate them. But to answer:

      You running a farm

      I have a vegetable garden, an apple tree, an orange tree, a lemon tree, two plum trees and five kumquat trees.

      making your own electricity

      Yep. Been on solar for years.

      medicines

      Doesn't even hit my radar. I have "needed" medicine maybe twice in my entire life.

      The world isn't black and white, kid.

    11. Re:Downside of needless dependency by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

      Your dependencies are far from low, for any reasonable value of low. And if you think a garden and a few fruit trees makes you independent, why don't you try living on just that for a year.

      Also, solar panels degrade with time, as do storage batteries. You going to manufacture new ones or are you going to buy some magic "solar panel" and "battery" seeds? You are totally dependent on the continued existence of both being available when the time comes.

      As for medicine - you're either getting older or you're dead. It's only the latter case that you can be confident of never needing doctors and medicines.

      You're the one who is looking at the world in black and white, figuring that you have a small measure of independence, you've reduced your dependencies to a low level, when in fact you've reduced them by maybe 1%.

      --
      "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  37. Re:he's an idiot by MangoCats · · Score: 1

    Like registering fuck.com - maybe you get rich, maybe you just get burned - you know you're playing on the edge.

  38. Any news on his mothers maiden name? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Any news on his mothers maiden name?

  39. Re:he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

    Doesn't make sense, they should have started at david0

    That really depended on the IT department, as there were no best practices for usernames 20 years ago. The first David would almost always use "david" as the username. The next David would either get "david1" or "david2" (it was "david2" at Fujitsu). The fifth David is usually the smart ass out of the bunch, as I've seen a few "da5id" over the years.

  40. If you don't control your own domain... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...you're at the mercy of the people who do.

  41. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    "and likes mangina"

    FTFY

  42. Re:he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

    I'm sure they all respected the fat man wearing a corset and "formal" sneakers, who has never had sex, has an AA degree, lives in a studio apartment, is a member of a weird Christian cult, and likes manga.

    Twenty years ago in 1997... I wore white New Balance training shoes as the dress code at Fujitsu was blue jeans and t-shirts. I got my first AA degree in 1994 and the second AA degree came in 2007. I was living in three-bedroom apartment with five other guys. Because we belonged to the same church, we took care of another roommate who had Lou Gehrig's disease and he died in April 2000 after his 39th birthday. After I left the church and got my studio apartment in 2005, I got into manga.

  43. Apparently you never met a real elitist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So sayeth the elitist asshole who doesn't grok that not everyone is as tech savvy as you
    Thank god for Trump and North Korea -- Ignorant and Arrogant Elitists such yourself are about to disappear en mass

    Most of us "tech savvy elitists" don't really know how to do a given task, either. What we know how to do is look it up and apply step-by-step instructions. If that doesn't work, maybe then we'll ask for help. Then, others are more willing to help you because then you're showing respect for their time and you're not just being lazy. They tend to respect that you want to learn and be shown how instead of demanding to be coddled.

    It's "elitist" now to expect someone to Google a topic with obvious search terms and then apply very simple (typically illustrated) step-by-step instructions? It's "arrogant" to expect him to ask the company (the old one or a new one) "how would I migrate the e-mails to another account, got any simple ideas?" That requires "tech savvy", really? I don't see how it requires anything more than basic literacy. It certainly requires less time than contacting the media and convincing them to make it into a news story.

    I guess you drive a car and have no idea how to change a tire, right, because that would require a "mechanical expert"? Clearly that's exactly the same thing as rebuilding an engine or repairing a transmission, right? Do you really want to validate the idea that a grown man with no diagnosed mental retardation just plain can't handle this? In order to what, justify your own laziness and lack of initiative? That's the world you want? Think carefully about that.

    1. Re:Apparently you never met a real elitist by KGIII · · Score: 1

      Come to think of it, I bet there's a way to do it from the terminal - maybe even in Vi. ;-)

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  44. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I'm sure they all respected the fat man wearing a corset and "formal" sneakers, who has never had sex, has an AA degree, lives in a studio apartment, is a member of a weird Christian cult, and likes manga.

    Twenty years ago in 1997... I wore white New Balance training shoes as the dress code at Fujitsu was blue jeans and t-shirts. I got my first AA degree in 1994 and the second AA degree came in 2007. I was living in three-bedroom apartment with five other guys. Because we belonged to the same church, we took care of another roommate who had Lou Gehrig's disease and he died in April 2000 after his 39th birthday. After I left the church and got my studio apartment in 2005, I got into manga.

    Thank you for the explanation. So, what month and year did you get into spamming Slashdot with your Amazon affiliate links?

  45. Re: he's an idiot by Brockmire · · Score: 0

    Because a 5 is not a v. Fuck people putting numbers in names. Fuck you Deadmau5.

  46. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    not only is it not a suitable address for today it also falls into the major fail bucket of being a local ISP address. Anyone that has been on the web that long knows that is a major no no that was common back then that anyone with half a brain has moved away from. use a web mail provider or get your own domain name so it is easy to move. Hard to feel sorry for someone that has dug his own grave and is now upset someone is burying him in it

  47. Re:he's an idiot by Nostalgia4Infinity · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I can't imagine spending an iota of effort or time worrying about someone else's username. The phrase "get a life" comes to mind.

  48. I just by aliok80 · · Score: 1

    I just want to tell people be aware that your email address may not be your own

  49. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Omg, is his name "dead mouse" or "dead mauve" ?

  50. Re:he's an idiot by ma1wrbu5tr · · Score: 2

    Why would anyone want to keep that address anyway?

    If he'd have copyrighted it, he could be shakin' down a whole lotta people. Just sayin'.

    --
    Why can't we go back to using jumpers to configure slot adapter cards? Why? I say!
  51. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    The idiot part is that he hasn't figured out he can archive his existing email, send a 'change of address' notice to important contacts and basically be spam-free for a few months.

  52. Re:he's an idiot by ffreeloader · · Score: 2

    If I still had some moderator points I would mod this up.

    Who cares what someone else's user name is? Only the petty and the spiteful.

    --
    "while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude." de Tocqueville
  53. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by evanh · · Score: 1

    Yep, they all but said they wanted the address for themselves. It is pure and simple bullying for sure.

    And I suspect their entire offer to help was also spelt out as telling him what he has to do (Lots of tedious work for him) rather than them actually doing anything for him.

    Typical asshole corporate action.

  54. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by thegarbz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    but I suspect the real reason is that "noreply@eastlink.ca" is a damn useful email address for eastlink.ca

    Why? The express purpose of that email is to catch those you don't want to talk to. There's no difference between making it noreply@eastlink.ca vs noanswer@eastlink.ca, noreply1@eastlink.ca, no.reply@eastlink.ca

    By it's nature they aren't expecting people to use it so what's so valuable about the specific name? I understand webmaster@eastlink.ca has a general pattern for people who want to contact someone, but what's the pattern if you don't want to contact anyone? Worst case this dude ends up with some really stupid spam from rely stupid people.

  55. Easy to fix by prefec2 · · Score: 1

    Well this is somewhat a funny story. However, you just download all your mail to your PC with your email client. Then you get a new email account and move up all the mails to that. However, if the mail system has only a website frontend then this might be complicated. Anyway, the provider could provide an image with all the mails.

  56. T-bird download by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This isn't hard.
    Install Thunderbird and download it all. The last time I installed Tbird after an Ubuntu reinstall I told it my email address AND IT FIGURED OUT ALL THE REST. Pop3, Imap, whatever, all it needed from me was the address and password. Win.
    You should NEVER leave the only copy of all your email on some cloud server, even if you're paying; the company can get hacked, flooded, bankrupt, or whatever. Download it, backup to detached storage, cloud provider, or whatever. You can leave a copy in the cloud if you don't care who sees it, but you should have copies you control.
    Sucks to lose your email address though, that's a lot of people and institutions to remember and update in a month.

  57. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Probably sometime after that second AS, probably an "internet marketing" degree he found through an affiliate link.

    It's not a pyramid scheme, it's a recursive business model!

  58. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Obviously it's Dead Mau V, the 5th Dead Mau. What I don't get is why they say it's dead when it seems he's still alive and kicking.

  59. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    "Who cares what someone else's user name is?"

    Those of us who like to keep track of idiocy, spammers, scammers, and frauds on this site.

  60. Re: he's an idiot by lannocc · · Score: 5, Funny

    Because a 5 is not a v.

    The Romans would disagree.

  61. slashdot did the same sort of thing by at10u8 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    originally my login here was @10u8 until that stopped letting me login because suddenly the slashdot id became an e-mail address and the new code would not tolerate my old id

    1. Re:slashdot did the same sort of thing by Ash-Fox · · Score: 2

      Have you tried using the following username to login?

      %4010u8

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
    2. Re:slashdot did the same sort of thing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I used to have a really low slashdot id. But I can't use it because my old email went away and any attempt to reset the account goes to my old email. Changing the login id to an email is yet more stupidity because that can go away.

  62. Re: he's an idiot by drewsup · · Score: 2

    We have the same problem, Zathros liked his email address, my brother Zathros liked his, my other brother Zathros wanted to keep his also, our law firm Zathros, Zathros and Zathros was a mess for email , Sheridan was most displeased!

  63. Wow! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What's wrong with unusual email addresses? I kinda like mine: bitch@completeunix.com

  64. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    V is five, but five is not V.

    In Latin, 5endi 5idi 5ici is not even gibberish.

  65. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If Pottering was involved, noreply@ would be a synonym for root@

  66. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    captain hind sight what should he have done?

  67. Re:he's an idiot by MrL0G1C · · Score: 1

    Those of us who like to keep track of idiocy, spammers, scammers, and frauds on this site.

    Damn, you've got your work cut out for you there, you must be at it 24/7.

    --
    Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
  68. I used to work for Eastlink's upstream... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If I had seen this 15 years ago, I would have made them change his address. Oops.

  69. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe the 5 is silent like in Sa5m.

  70. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Is there an alternative universe where this post makes sense?

  71. Re:he's an idiot by jandersen · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why would anyone want to keep that address anyway? I would think it would cause all sorts of problems with people assuming that it was an unmonitored account. I don't have a lot of sympathy.

    No, I don't expect you do. It seems to be a common misconception here that it is somehow 'tough' to be uncaring and express you contempt for the plight of others. The fact that you haven't got the courage to show your face, but post as an AC, suggests that you are not really all that tough.

    But back to the question: If you have 20 years' worth of important contacts, who have your email address, then you have plenty of good reasons for not wanting to change that address. Figuring out who has your address and who is important is very hard work, which you would know if you had ever had to do it. and getting everybody to change the contact details they have for you is even worse. Should he have chosen a better name back then? Perhaps - but he didn't and it has worked for 20 years, so what is your point actually? His ISP could let him continue using this address without breaking into a sweat, and it is not actually their business interfering in what kind of imagine their customers want to impress on their contacts - they are in the wrong, simply.

  72. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    By it's nature they aren't expecting people to use it so what's so valuable about the specific name?

    First it looks official enough for phishing, which is something they might want to prevent. Second just because noreply is in the name does not mean that people won't send replies there.

    There's no difference between making it noreply@eastlink.ca vs noanswer@eastlink.ca, noreply1@eastlink.ca, no.reply@eastlink.ca

    I would be quite suspicious if I got an email from noreply1@eastlink.ca and you should be too, that you list it as acceptable makes me wonder for how many scam mails you fell this year alone.

  73. Re:he's an idiot by Kidbro · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I guess he got the address around the time you were born. Those of us who were on the internet when he got the address can tell you that no, there was no "standard" (which it's not) of putting noreply in the local part of the address to indicate that replies were not wanted. People back then mostly adhered to proper standards, not bogus customs invented when marketdroids discovered the net. It was, and should still be, a perfectly good address.

  74. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The fifth David is usually the smart ass out of the bunch, as I've seen a few "da5id" over the years."

    Why? That doesn't even make sense! If it was "d4vid" that would make sense, but "5" is not leet for the letter "v"! As usual, your little stories leave the reader confused and baffled.

  75. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If you set the reply email address of automatic messages as "noreply@eastlink.ca", some people will reply there. It's unavoidable.

    For example, someone may use password recovery, get the recovery link, and email "thanks" back before changing the password. If the "noreply" address is some random person's address, he will have a chance of compromising the account.

    It just isn't acceptable for that to be possible on a consumer level service. "Require users to be less stupid" is not a solution for security matters.

  76. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The only problem app that I can do with my app does it work on my computer accounts app is a problem I don't need it for now I can do not that it does work for a couple months and I have no idea what I can use it to use it is not working on it until it works again until it is done to fix this app problem app does it again again please do it for now please email me for free this is not working on this article I don't think that this app does have to do a problem with it being an app for a personal app

  77. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    5 is not leet for V, it's an Arabic numeral representing the number five. V is a Roman numeral representing the number five.

    Da5id = DaVid.

    Christ. The intelligence level of this place really tanked post-9/11.

  78. Ridiculous by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have some sympathy for this guy, but mail addresses aren't for life. My ISP merged and decided to get rid of individual accounts and be B2B only. Gave us 30 days notice, which was more than reasonable. It simply wasn't that big a deal.

  79. Re: he's an idiot by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1

    No. The confusion was all the baggage in the explanation.

    It mattered that it was the fifth David.
    It mattered that he was a graphic artist.
    It mattered that people are assholes.
    It mattered that it was 1997.
    It mattered that it's Creimer.
    And, most confusingly, it mattered whether I read "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson.

    By the way, the letters 'D' and 'i' are also Roman numerals. Are we to assume the employee was actually called "Five-hundred-a-five-one-five-hundred"?

    --
    If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
  80. Re:he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Pfft, it makes perfect sense! Just like the movie Se7en!

  81. Re:he's an idiot by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1

    That was my first reaction as well. Ask Mr. Nissan how hard he had to fight to keep his own.

    --
    If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
  82. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If he has it, he can impersonate official-looking emails from eastlink.ca.

  83. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Exactly. Creimer's anecdotes are just like him: too much padding.

  84. Almost everybody here is missing the real point by Zontar_Thing_From_Ve · · Score: 1

    The real point is not "Don't trust other companies", "The cloud isn"t what you think it is" and so on. The real point is this - Man chooses stupid, ill advised, misleading email name at a domain he doesn't control and then gets upset when domain owners take away his name. Honestly, I don't know why he hasn't been getting crap from people for 20 years on the use of "noreply" in his email. Some of us do actually pay attention to that.

    1. Re:Almost everybody here is missing the real point by Cro+Magnon · · Score: 1

      Maybe the people who noticed that didn't reply. ;)

      --
      Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
    2. Re:Almost everybody here is missing the real point by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You know how I know you're an Agile duhveloper?

  85. Interesting... by sycodon · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Email addresses have almost become the equivalent of a physical address. All your bills can come to it,all your correspondence, almost every business asks for it, some even require it. This has been encouraged by internet providers in a sense (they'll want your email address too). I wouldn't be surprised t learn that there is significance legally in contracts and other agreements.

    So now you have people who have setup much of their life around an email address in pretty much the same way they've done with their physical address and it has become an integral part of their life and business.

    Forcing a user to relinquish an address for whatever reason is kind of like a city renaming your street or changing your house number. I wonder what that does to legal devices such as mortgages, etc. Is mail still delivered or does it come back as invalid address? How long does it take for the address change to percolate it's way through the system? Will SWAT show up at the wrong house (again)? Will emergency services not find your place?

    I bet some lawyer could make a go at this.

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    1. Re:Interesting... by Pascoea · · Score: 1

      I bet some lawyer could make a go at this.

      I'd be willing to bet that eastlink as a "we can terminate your e-mail for any reason at any time" clause in it. But you have an interesting point. Normally I would take the "you get what you pay for" stance, for companies like Google, Yahoo, etc. where you get "free" e-mail, and would have less sympathy when they booted him. But being that he IS paying for his e-mail as part of his Internet service, that makes it potentially a little more interesting.

    2. Re: Interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, it's more like a landlord telling a renter that the lease is up and they have to move. Perfectly legit.

    3. Re:Interesting... by kwbauer · · Score: 1

      When a city changes a street name, the post office will continue to deliver mail addressed with the old street name for a period of time but will send out "change of address" notices to any senders subscribed for it. This happened to the street I grew up on just after I moved out for college. It really isn't a problem for deeds/mortgages and such because they describe the property as located in section x of township y and currently using the address of z. The address is simply acknowledged as a common but secondary (and only semi-official) identifier of the property. Sometimes deeds will use lot w of subdivision j.

    4. Re: Interesting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It would be legit. If he had more time. The company's @fault for allowing it. But 20 years and only 30 days to go through. That's horrible business

  86. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I can imagine a worse case.

    A new password recovery system gets implemented by Eastlink. When a user goes through the forgotten password process, they receive an email with a link that takes them to a page where they can enter a new password. Unfortunately, the people responsible for the drafting the requirements for this email aren't aware that 'noreply' is a user's account and use that as the originator of the recovery email. Also unfortunately, some people reply to these emails, quoting them, giving this user the change password link.

  87. Re: he's an idiot by queBurro · · Score: 1

    it's a roman numeral joke? it seems a bit s15050y to me.

    --
    sag
  88. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I worked at a place in the mid-90s which had 8 Davids out of about 50 people.

  89. Re:he's an idiot by omnichad · · Score: 1

    And then you put an onion in your belt?

  90. Re:he's an idiot by Spamalope · · Score: 1

    Yes, one with Babylon 5.

  91. Re:he's an idiot by codeButcher · · Score: 1

    Is there a next one in the queue? Because "DaVIid" would totally mess this up.

    --
    Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
  92. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by omnichad · · Score: 1

    Not using an email address that belongs to one of their customers for outbound emails would be a good start. There are so many substitutes you can use. Even as simple as no-reply instead of noreply will work fine. When sending outbound email with a no reply address, it has to be appear as a real delivery address to some mail servers before they'll even accept the email.

    If you want to accept replies despite sending from a no reply email, you set the Reply-To: header and most email clients will use that address.

  93. Re: he's an idiot by Sandb · · Score: 2

    Are we to assume the employee was actually called "Five-hundred-a-five-one-five-hundred"?

    That would be "Internal Server Error a Gateway Timeout" for you webdevs out there.

  94. Re:he's an idiot by Urinal+Pube · · Score: 1

    . Graphic artists thought the programmers were a bunch of assholes. I managed to gain the respect of both teams from my hard work as the intern.

    This sounds like something an asshole would say.

  95. Re: he's an idiot by Maritz · · Score: 1

    And, most confusingly, it mattered whether I read "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson.

    It was so clumsily wedged in there that I nearly laughed out loud. That looks like an affiliate link. Pretty desperate stuff.

    --
    I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
  96. On the other hand... by Kazoo+the+Clown · · Score: 1

    If eastlink goes out of business, I guess that would be OK then, it's only if they want to keep from going out of business by upgrading their software, it's an issue. I've had old addresses that went away because the companies who owned the domains went belly-up and stopped paying for those domains--or sold them to people who decided to use them for some other purpose. Get used to it, emails on SEDs (Someone Else's Domain) are subject to unexpected change.

  97. Re:he's an idiot by Maritz · · Score: 1

    I don't believe for a second that they did get annoyed. It is more likely that the anecdote is about 88% bollocks.

    --
    I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
  98. Re:he's an idiot by Maritz · · Score: 1

    Keep track of the rest instead, smaller job.

    --
    I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
  99. I think he's funny by slashrio · · Score: 1

    They have no right. One of their products, what he pays for, is email with an address that he chose and they approved.
    That's all there is. When they actually disconnect him there's a big chance he'll win a huge amount if he goes to court.

    --
    "Trump!!", the new Godwin.
    1. Re:I think he's funny by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

      They have no right. One of their products

      Operative word. It's their product, and they're changing it. It's no longer to be available to this customer in its current form. Does a company have "no right" to stop offering POP3 mailboxes just because some people might want to continue to pay for them?

      Imagine a world where companies were forced to continue to offer exactly the same products for as long as people were paying for them.

      --
      systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
    2. Re:I think he's funny by slashrio · · Score: 1

      What you say makes sense in essence, but is beneath the point.
      What's at stake here is that they agreed with his choice of email address and now suddenly no more.
      At least, that's the reason I think they gave, although still offering the same kind of service for others.
      It's his address that is going to be revoked, not the product itself.
      He chose an address, they accepted it, and now they don't have the right do damage his interests so much only because for some reason they suddenly don't like his address anymore.

      --
      "Trump!!", the new Godwin.
    3. Re:I think he's funny by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

      What's at stake here is that they agreed with his choice of email address and now suddenly no more.

      People lose email addresses all the time, for various reasons. I doubt his contract with them specifies that the address was to be immutably his for all time.

      and now they don't have the right do damage his interests so much only because for some reason they suddenly don't like his address anymore.

      Sure they do. It's their service and it's provided at their discretion. They're not discriminating against him. Things have changed since he registered that email address. noreply@ is now a de facto standard, and there may be all manner of technical, possibly even legal (depending on what contracts they have with others), reasons why they are no longer willing to let him use that email address.

      --
      systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  100. Re:he's an idiot by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1

    noreply@ is probably the least spammed address - I bet most spam lists remove it in an automatic pass. I can see why he wants to keep it...

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  101. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "It was so clumsily wedged in there"

    That's what she said!

  102. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Use IMAP tools to transfer to a real provider like Google apps. How about noreply@eastlink.io?

  103. Re: he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1
  104. Re:he's an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

    This sounds like something an asshole would say.

    Which is why I work in IT today.

  105. Re:he's an idiot by Pascoea · · Score: 1

    Who cares what someone else's user name is

    As someone who has had to try and match up user's real name with their user name as part of a system migration, I care. When "Johnson, Robert Francis" turns into frank.johson@whatever.com it makes things a significant pain in the ass. I hate that my IT department allows nicknames on user names.

    Allowing Da5id because it's "cool" or "edgy" (is it really though) is just dumb. One could also argue that having to resort to david1 through 4 is also dumb, if I have to e-mail Dave Johnson, is he David1, David2, David3, David4, ore Da5id?

    Outside of a work environment, I'm 99% on board. Could care less if someone goes by David5554882, DavidJonson, NoReply, or Da5id,

  106. noreply email addresses should be outlawed by fred6666 · · Score: 1

    And by that I mean I should be able to hit "reply" on any email I receive and expect someone will read it.
    I find it especially full of hypocrisy when I get an email from noreply@corporation.com ending with "don't hesitate to contact us".
    Yeah sure, if you wanted me to contact you, you wouldn't be using a noreply email address in the first place.

    1. Re:noreply email addresses should be outlawed by hey! · · Score: 1

      And by that I mean I should be able to hit "reply" on any email I receive and expect someone will read it.

      You can and you can. You'll just be disappointed on that second one, but that could happen anyway.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  107. Re: he's an idiot by Topwiz · · Score: 1

    He once found a dead mouse in his computer while working as a programmer. Later when his musical career took off, he adopted deadmau5 as his stage name.

  108. Re: he's an idiot by Dynedain · · Score: 1

    As a security measure to prevent account hijacking, most services these days require a confirmation email sent to the original address when you change the email address one file.

    Kinda makes it hard when you can no longer access the original email.

    --
    I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
  109. It's not about the messages by Fencepost · · Score: 1

    Even if all his messages are stored online (unlikely), it's not about downloading them which is what comments seem to be focusing on. As everyone else has noted, there are tons of options for downloading or migrating your messages.

    The bigger issue is all the places where he's either using that email address as a login (particularly ones where there's no provision for changing userid/email address) and the sites that he's registered on with some other ID but which also use that email address for messages, account recovery, etc. There's no real big technical issue with identifying and changing logins on those sites except that it's likely to be a hell of a lot of work under a deadline when he's already unusually busy (normal work + house purchase + "Cripes, now THIS???") and there's no real shortcut for the manual part of that.

    --
    fencepost
    just a little off
  110. Re:he's an idiot by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

    Maybe businesses should stop sending out emails without a valid reply address.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  111. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Guess what, the email headers are easily forged and they, the spammers, can use any email address they want. I get quite a number of spam emails that are using my own email address. So Eastlink needing noreply is really rather silly.

  112. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Dead Mow Five"

  113. Re:he's an idiot by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 1

    No, the sick part is that it is child's play on the server side to move the email folder, and 20 years of email can be a lot of email. They're just being dicks. Or maybe they can't do it because they don't have their own email server either, having farmed it out to "the cloud" through some 3rd party or something.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  114. Re:he's an idiot by mysidia · · Score: 1

    I suppose 20 years ago "noreply@" wasn't really standardized as an email bit bucket for domains

    It's Not standardized. The Reply Address field is required by the RFC for a reason.
    "Noreply@" is a convention adopted by some marketers trying to skirt the internet standards which require that all E-mail have a return path to communicate responses, error messages, and other technical issues: back to the person responsible for having sent the original e-mail. Providing this responsible sender information and the responsible party handling Notifications about technical issues with your e-mail delivery or Warnings/Abuse reports/complaints back to you is not optional.

  115. Re: he's an idiot by feufeu · · Score: 1

    The Romans wouldn't be able to tell the '5' from an 'S' so I'd say they would agree me thinks.

  116. Re: he's an idiot by whopis · · Score: 1

    No, but in L4t1n it lets n00b5 know you are a 1337 h4x0r,

  117. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    that was Zathras, you insensitive clod

  118. Re:he's an idiot by grub · · Score: 1

    Was David #6 "Da6d"?

    --
    Trolling is a art,
  119. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Except for the fact that now noreply@eastlink.ca is going to see an epic surge in spam and other shit like he's never seen before.

  120. It's not yours by holophrastic · · Score: 1

    If it's that important to you -- it gets you into banks, you store decades of personal stuff in it -- then you should be owning it, not renting it. Doesn't cost much to own a domain name.

  121. "Your email address may not be your own" by hackel · · Score: 1

    Uh, yeah. Of course it's not "your own" if you don't run your own email server and have your own domain. How can anyone not understand this?

    What Eastlink is doing is absolutely ridiculous, for sure. They are worried about people sending messages to a "noreply" address? Huh? Isn't that the whole point, that messages sent there won't receive a reply or even be looked at? And who would even think of manually typing in an address like that to send a message to? Unless they are using it as a from address for their own correspondence, in which case it would be entirely their fault. In that case, I think the customer would be entitled to file a complain t against Eastlink for potentially flooding his inbox with garbage!

  122. losing emails vs address by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    he's not losing emails. that problem is easy to solve.

    losing the address is a pain but if he hasn't already put an auto-responder on his current address notifying of his new address he should really do that fast. he should also go and change the email address on all his important accounts that use that email addy.

    Eastlink should give him 90 days though. 30 seems a bit stingy.

  123. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by camperdave · · Score: 1

    If I got an email from noreply1@eastlink.ca, there's no way I would reply to it. Hence, mission accomplished.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  124. Re: he's an idiot by Brockmire · · Score: 1

    Show your face? Courage is signing up on /.? Fuck off, you snobbish cunt.

  125. The actual real problem by redcliffe · · Score: 1

    Is that companies still do this "don't reply to this email" stupidity. No email, automated or not should be sent with a no reply from or reply-to address. You should encourage customers to reply to emails if they require support, that's just good customer service.

  126. Sue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Stop the whining and sue the bastards.

    Nuff said.

  127. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > I would be quite suspicious if I got an email from noreply1@eastlink.ca and you should be too,
    > that you list it as acceptable makes me wonder for how many scam mails you fell this year alone.

    What difference does it make? Any moron can make any email address and name appear anywhere at any bloody time they please.

    You are the moron for thinking that there is *ever* any "trustworthiness" whatsoever associated with an email address. Unless of course the email address resides on a properly configured server -- and there is only 1 or 2 of those on the entire solar system. One happens to be mine.

    eastlink.ca certainly does not have any. Nor does any other Telco, CableCo, or FreeMail provider.

  128. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yep, they all but said they wanted the address for themselves. It is pure and simple bullying for sure.

    And I suspect their entire offer to help was also spelt out as telling him what he has to do (Lots of tedious work for him) rather than them actually doing anything for him.

    Typical asshole corporate action.

    Cases like this show the insight of services that looked like jerks for reserving a secondary domain for their client addresses back in the day.

    I always hated being limited to verizon.NET, or gmail.com (instead of GOOGLE). I mean, sometimes you want to have the prestige of the original organization especially if you want to flaunt your harvard.edu address, right?

  129. Non-affiliate link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Snow Crash: A Novel by Neal Stephenson https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FBJCJE

  130. Re:he's an idiot by Swave+An+deBwoner · · Score: 1

    Da6d?

  131. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No they wouldn't; they would ask what a 5 is.

  132. Re:Eastlink's Reason is Bullshit/they want the han by thegarbz · · Score: 1

    Second just because noreply is in the name does not mean that people won't send replies there.

    My point is that email replies to this address would be solicited. I wouldn't go out of my way to think. hmmm I need to contact eastlink, the best way would be to go to noreply@eastlink.ca. That would be incredibly stupid, and likewise who cares if people then accidentally send an email to some address with the specific purpose that it wouldn't be read anyway.

    I would be quite suspicious if I got an email from noreply1@eastlink.ca and you should be too, that you list it as acceptable makes me wonder for how many scam mails you fell this year alone.

    Zero, because the reply to address on email is not a controlled element and should never be used to judge for scams. You are FAR more likely to get phishing emails at a legitimate noreply@eastlink.ca. But you know what you're not likely to ever happen to you? Getting scammed by replying to an email address called noreply, because why the hell would a scammer monitor an email address for something he expressly doesn't want a reply to.

  133. Re: he's an idiot by jandersen · · Score: 1

    Show your face? Courage is signing up on /.? Fuck off, you snobbish cunt.

    Snobbish? Oh, you mean, because I use polysyllabic words? That is because of something that happened to me when I was a child: education. And no, it doesn't take a lot of courage to sign up on /. - but apparently more than what some have.

  134. Re: he's an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And this is exactly why "most services" do not, in fact, require this.

  135. BOYCOTT eastlink.ca by martinfb · · Score: 1

    This is pure bullshit!

    He's already been granted it, and has been using it just fine for decades.
    I'll bet it is just another totally incompetent middle manager that saw this and went anal over it!

    This just more proof if an idiotic, uneducated pool of humans! Get off your high horse, bozo!

    --


    Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.
  136. Re:he's an idiot by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

    I don't have a lot of sympathy.

    Tough shit. For you.

    He probably has it for the same reason that I use a USERNAME@goatse.cx email for a large number of things. It's a completely valid email address which was accepted by the provider on set-up. If they didn't think through the potential problems (specifically, the email provider might want a "noreply" address of their own at some point in the future), that is their tough shit. The human reviewing the application 20 years ago should have thought a bit more. If there was a human. And if they saved themselves the cost of employing a human 20 years ago, then they're going to pay the costs of that now.

    I guess that they've got a new service (or program to service an existing service) and TFM suggests using a "noreply" address. And they don't know how to work around this (e.g. "ISPnameNoReply"). Which is itself an indication that they're dangerously incompetent.

    They're doing a fine demonstration of the Streisand effect.

    --
    Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"