www.fastmail.fm Hmm, get this instead of .Mac? (or Hotmail/Yahoo)??

[coolbreeze]

Well, through my endless research into whether .Mac is worth it, I came across http://www.fastmail.fm . I understand it doesn't integrate with OS X at all, and it may seem a little shady, but read what it includes (10MB for a free acct, up to 150MB for $39/year). And the free account includes IMAP and POP access. Hmm.....who compares?

I mean the only drawback I see is the domain.... dot FM? Seems off to most people (used to .com, etc).

I've signed up with my desired name just in case...

What do you guys think?? A fad or the next hotmail? If nothing else, this may raise the bar for mail services (especially free)...

-Breeze

 

[rainman::|:|]

there are probably a hundred thousand free email services. nothing really special about any of 'em, unless you *really* like the domain, i wouldn't pay for it...

pnw

 

[coolbreeze]

Thanks for the response. I have been seeking a free/inexpensive email provider for sometime now (since my overpriced 10MB hotmail account expires this month). I was inches from signing up for .Mac, when I found this site.

Sure there are hundreds of email services out there...but I have not found a single one that offers this level of service/features/bargain etc. The only drawback I do see is the domain. But the benefits almost seem to outweigh this. Once you are in someone's address book, what does it really matter?

You may wonder why I am comparing this to .Mac (when .Mac is much more than email). Well, I'm not. I was simply intrigued by the level of offering by fastmail. By the way, I found this service through this macworld article fastmail mention enclosed

Anyhow, just wondering if anyone has used this service (especially if it was in lieu of mac.com). $100 seems like it's much more than free....but do you get enough to justify it?? (15MB?)

Thanks
-Breeze

 

[irmongoose]

Just remember .Mac is not only email... you get 100MB of web space, give you Backup, Virex, sync your Macs, give you an online Address Book, integrate with the iApps, publish your photos online as a screensaver, give you online bookmarks which you can access from any browser, and gives you free software almost every month. I think that's worth $100.

Besides, you get a mac.com address. How cool is that?



irmongoose

 

[therevolution]

I have free .mac account from Apple's Learn and Earn program, and I'm not that impressed with it. If all you need is email, .mac is serious overkill. I have been using Fastmail for the last few months, and I think they're great. I actually paid the $15/one time to become a member just to throw a little money their way. If the @fastmail.fm bothers you, they have lots of other domains to choose from... I use their @ftml.net domain myself. See this page for their full list of domains.

I'm very impressed with them. They're quite generous with what they give in the free account. I don't think it gets any better for free webmail, and there are some nice options available if you decide to upgrade your account later. I definitely recommend trying it out.

 

[Flowbee]

Re: www.fastmail.fm Hmm, get this instead of .Mac? (or Hotmail/Yahoo)??

Originally posted by coolbreeze
Well, through my endless research into whether .Mac is worth it, I came across http://www.fastmail.fm .

One might ask if "endless research" into a 99 dollar service is actually worth it.

I would think the .Mac 60-day free trial is all the research you'd need.

 

[arn]

Well, email addresses are hard to adopt and drop.

If you're really serious about a long term email address, you should just register a domain of your liking, and you can forward that to any free-email host you want.

If that host runs into problems, you can point your email address elsewhere.

arn

 

[scem0]

Right now I'm using nyc.com's free webmail service.

It is quite nice, but I mainly got it for the domain name - my email address is really easy to remember - emo@nyc.com .

But there are a million free email services, including POP, IMAP, Webmail, and everything else.

scem0

 

[billyboy]

I was surprised at how much more useful .mac became after I paid for it. Like many people have posted, trial .mac doesnt seem that impressive. Maybe that has something to do with attitude towards free stuff. If there´s no commitment, then why make something jump through hoops.

From the point of view of services on offer, if you pay you get 100MB of iDisk space as an extra, but nothing much else changes in .mac when handing over the money - apart from in my case, the concentration of the mind to get my money´s worth. Suddenly the options that had always been there opened up and the list of functions is very useful to me now, especially getting my own space on the web with the ease of getting my files on there too. And not an ad in sight.

 

[scem0]

And I hope that you are enjoying every $1 megabyte to your heart's content.

Yes, it is a great service, but $100 is over doing it....

But if you wanna spend the money then I guess I can't do anything about it.

scem0

 

[Abstract]

.......all I want is the email addy.

I'll try this fastmail.fm place out right now. I have 3 hotmail accounts, one school account, and another possible school account coming soon. Another email account won't hurt me.