Recommend a web-based e-mail service, please

I use Gmail and like it. It is different in that it threads conversations so will appear different than Outlook but it is a good and dependable service. I have rarely had problems with it and the spam filter is good- I see very little spam in my inbox and have only caught two false positives.

I have tried Hotmail and Excite. Hotmail was a PITA as far as I am concerned and Excite was pretty good. I could get my home email to deliver to the Excite address which was very handy at times. I have also used Yahoo. They were pretty good as well but that experience was several years ago.

The SO's mom (read technologically challenged) has been using Gmail exclusively for a bit over a year now. She has had no problems with it.

I think that the real criteria is figuring out what you want in a service. Obviously, that will be different from person to person.

If you decide to go with Gmail and need an invitation, let me know. I have spares.

One for registering websites, one for what you described, one for work in case I can't get around my barrage of exchage filters and one for each girlfriend...that way they can't google you and find out you are a poligimist!

Kidding about the last part...

:)

I love gmail for personal use and for my small business. I get very little spam and some stuff as you described that are border line spam come through fine. That and it now has themes (the 3270 green screen emulator is kinda neat)and built in sms messaging so I ca text my girlfriend from my browser window at work without wearing my thumbs down to a nub.

Edit:

I also forgot to mention that their storage space keeps sky rocketing. My homepage shows I have 7.2 gigs of available mailbox space.

I've been using for several years with no major spam problems. Once I ID a message as spam, the filters usually catch all subsquent similar messages.

Hotmail is my "I know I'm gonna get spam from this" email.

If you need an invite (is gmail membership still by invitation only?), PM me and I'll send you one.

to look at.

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/networking/?p=763

2 web based free email services that will let you kill the spam that does show up.

... I've had a lot of success using SpamKiller to remove spam and even stop it from coming in.
A few years ago it was bought up by McAfee but I still use the free version I started using off & on for over 6 years.
Even at the $40 it now costs, I still recommend it.
It gives you a quick way to send a 'Mail Delivery Subsystem (MAILER-DAEMON)' message that makes it appear your email address is closed or doesn't exist. Spammers then remove your address from their list.
Whenever I have started to see spam slipping through my ISP's filters and into Outlook, SpamKiller has been very effective.
http://tinyurl.com/829v6

I have used HotMail, Yahoo Mail, and others over the years. The latest version of HotMail makes it much better than it was before, so I use that account when submitting an address on a site where it looks like it will invite spam. But GMail allows larger attachments and therefore is my choice for when I need to use a web-based email service semi-regularly.

In case you missed it...
This article by Michael Kassner of TR is very interesting and has an idea I think I'll try out.
'E-mail spam: How to stop it'
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/networking/?p=763

Good luck in the fight.
.

Here are some free email providers

hotmail.com
yahoo.com
email.com
etc

http://www.chrisranjana.com

I quite like it, and with google docs it's so damn useful it's hard NOT to use.

You can setup and share calendars, create documents and share them, do everything that costs you thousands (as a small business) for free.

although I haven't had the opportunity to try GMail.

Yahoo allows checking POP3 or Exchange accounts, so if your ISP email address doesn't have web based access, you can check your home email while on the road. My ISP has web based checking, but it's less than functional (POS). Work uses Exchange and we now have OWA to check that, but we used to host our own Exchange email and didn't have OWA to get to it from the road. Yahoo just plain came in handy. And, their SPAM filtering isn't too bad.

And, since many of my family/friends use Yahoo Messenger to communicate, Yahoo mail can show their online/offline status without starting up Messenger.

Of course, you always have the option to just go get an account at all of the services and see which one you like the best. Nobody can choose for you.

the free version does run under wine.

and using wine-doors gui makes it a click,click,click type install.

only issue, it doesn't detect the linux email clients, so you have to add the email account manually.