

Show HN: Is this the end of emails? - iamjoday
https://docs.google.com/a/joday.com/forms/d/177YMHXbZiV5XK7UKuRSB_-e5GrQpVhi_KMaIrhBWw3w/viewform

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iamjoday
Hi Guys,

Sorry for keeping the click bait headline. I guess that's the new norm these
days.

I am working on email service prototype that is mainly focused on privacy.

If you can spend 2 minutes for following survey. It is 2 question survey,
takes less than 2 minutes to complete.

[https://docs.google.com/a/joday.com/forms/d/177YMHXbZiV5XK7U...](https://docs.google.com/a/joday.com/forms/d/177YMHXbZiV5XK7UKuRSB_-e5GrQpVhi_KMaIrhBWw3w/viewform)

Data privacy is biggest challenge of our time. Your personal data like email
is owned by service provider and that data is used for things like ads you
don't want.

Imagine UPS, USPS, FedEx etc reading your mails to send you ads and keeping
your mails with them? Sound bizarre, right? It is to us. We believe email is
your data and you should own it; not the service provider.

Imagine a email service(app) where you own the data (email data is not stored
on our servers nor we have access to it once delivered), So NO ads. Your
emails are securely stored with encryption. You can sync data between multiple
devices. Also, there is NO storage limits.

I would love to get your honest opinion about the idea. If it make sense or if
its not practical.

Thanks for your time.

\--Nash.

~~~
greenyoda
_" Data privacy is biggest challenge of our time. Your personal data like
email is owned by service provider and that data is used for things like ads
you don't want."_

Not everyone uses Gmail. I use Fastmail for my e-mail, and they neither show
me ads nor read my e-mail. (They charge a modest fee for the service instead.)
And as far as I know, they don't claim to own my e-mail.

 _" Imagine UPS, USPS, FedEx etc reading your mails to send you ads and
keeping your mails with them? Sound bizarre, right? It is to us."_

It is to me too. That's why I've never used Gmail (or other ad-supported web
mail providers). And I use Thunderbird to download e-mails to my machine, so
my messages don't stay on Fastmail's servers if I don't want them to. (I trust
them to not keep copies of my e-mails forever after I delete them, and they
have little incentive to do so.)

~~~
iamjoday
Thanks greenyoda,

Great to know that there are users who see value in it.

If I may ask, what is something more that you wish from the service provider
you already use?

appreciate your comment,

~~~
greenyoda
My e-mail needs are pretty simple, and can't think of anything else I'd need.

------
troymc
This is actually harder than it seems.

Are you familiar with The Dark Mail Technical Alliance?

[https://darkmail.info/](https://darkmail.info/)

~~~
iamjoday
No. but, I'll read about it.

~~~
iamjoday
Ok. I haven't started going into the specifics about the protocol
implementation but its about encrypting the message end-to-end. It still does
not solve the problem of ownership, privacy and ads.

Having said that, If implemented we would definitely take advantage of the
protocol.

~~~
troymc
Is there any large-scale email service provider who claims they _own_ the
contents of your email messages (i.e. own the copyright rights)? All they need
is a limited license to do those things they _must_ be able to do in order to
provide email service to you (e.g. make a copy on their servers).

As for ads, if the message is encrypted from end-to-end, then even if they
read it, they won't find anything useful for ad-targeting. I can already do
that today by sending encrypted text via existing email protocols. Moreover, I
can use an ad-blocker to block any ads they do try to send me.

The tricky part is keeping things like the address of the sender and the
address of the recipient (i.e. the metadata) concealed from eavesdroppers.

~~~
iamjoday
I believe no service claims of owning the email.

Also, you are right about end-to-end encryption. That would definitely help
the cause.

------
sebst
Could you de-activate public insights into respondents email addresses via
Google Forms, please?

~~~
iamjoday
done.

