

Ask HN: What do you use for your mailhost? - Sealy


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rdl
I self host (work: Kerio (ironically, hosted on a Mac, although if I set it up
again, probably on a VM on ubuntu or bsd); personal, homebrew postfix,
procmail, z-push, ...) on ubuntu. mutt is my preferred MUA, although I've
tried Mail.app and use the iOS mail client too.

mbsync to sync maildirs over imap for laptop/desktop machines; exchange
activesync for mobile where I want push.

I set up DKIM and SPF and enforce TLS internally (and have real certs and TLS
= "may" on the edge).

Over the next year, I'd like to figure out a way to require TLS on certain
domains, and maybe set up some kind of WoT and maybe even a standard for how
to do that.

I'd probably set up/run mail for people if they paid reasonable amounts.
$50/yr/mailbox isn't really a reasonable amount. $500/yr/mailbox isn't, either
(from the other direction). So maybe about $120-240/yr/mailbox +
$100-250/domain.

~~~
Sealy
What are your thoughts on Google's corporate mail service?

[http://www.google.com/enterprise/apps/business/pricing.html](http://www.google.com/enterprise/apps/business/pricing.html)

$5 a month / $50 a year.

~~~
rdl
Right, that's specifically why I said "$50/yr is too little".

I would never use Google for my mail (I do have a gmail account for when
necessary, but I hate using it). They're probably more technically competent
than most shitty mail hosters, but from a privacy/security perspective,
outsourcing your mail to a company which will happily turn it over seems like
a bad choice.

The only way I'd outsource my mail is to someone who can operate the server
but not see the contents; this is technically difficult but could be done
(relatively straightforward if you're willing to pay enough for dedicated
hardware; conceivable with a better VM system someday).

Ideally also with options in free countries like Hong Kong and Switzerland
(which I don't currently have).

For a regulated US company who was fully at risk to the USG already, Google
Mail might be an ok choice. You still end up with the potential for civil
discovery, but a document retention policy (i.e. destruction policy) of 6mo or
less would address that, and Google does that for hosted mail if you want.

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dangrossman
Rackspace Mail. $2/mo/mailbox, 24/7/365 support, 100% uptime SLA, big
mailboxes, configurable backups, good spam filter. I use IMAP and native
clients for reading/composing.

~~~
ElongatedTowel
If only there wasn't a minimum of five mailboxes.

~~~
dangrossman
$10/month is an absurdly cheap amount to pay for a professional service.

~~~
Sealy
Agreed. This and google's offering seem the most professional.

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dripton
Dreamhost. Since 2000, when they were the cheapest IMAP provider. I do have to
click through SSL errors sometimes (because reverse DNS doesn't match forward
DNS), and they broke my procmail setup when they upgraded something a few
years ago, but I'm mostly happy with them.

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mike-cardwell
Self host. Exim for SMTP, Dovecot for IMAP. I use a number of clients
depending on circumstances, Evolution, Thunderbird, K-9 Mail and Mutt.

