What email provider do you use and why?

[Bodsda]

Title says it all

[Cybie257]

Yahoo! Email

Why?:
Yahoo! has been around for years and have had the same email address(es) for 10-16 years. One of them was for about as long as Yahoo! has existed. So long ago, can't recall when they came to light.

I use some others, but not as my mainstream mail account. But, if Microsoft ever succeeds in buying Yahoo! out, then I will forward all (saved)emails in my box to my Google account and cancel my Yahoo! account(s). :-)

-Cybie

[sekinto]

Gmail. Yahoo! Mail and Windows Live Mail are crap compared to it.

You want to know why?
No IMAP support, that's why.

[durand]

I used to use hotmail and yahoo when I had no idea what emails actually were. When gmail came out, I switched to that part time and when hotmail stopped supporting pop3, I switched to gmail full time. Not really sure why I stopped using yahoo. I guess one email address is enough...though I used to have at least 6 different ones at one point....

[RiceMonster]

Gmail. Was using Hotmail a few years ago, and it sucked. Someone invited me to gmail (it was invite only then), and it didn't suck, so I've been using it since.

[myusername]

gmail. i've tried everything else and its no contest

[OutOfReach]

Gmail, pretty much the same exact story as RiceMonster (except the invite part, I created my gmail accound last year). I also love Gmail because there is no spam, I only got spam 1 time in the past 11 months of usage.

[lisati]

I've had a hotmail account for about 10 years now, hardly ever use it.
Have some gmail accounts, hardly ever use them either.
The email account with my ISP is kind-of Yahoo (they teamed up with Yahoo a year or two back in preference to MSN: major hassles for many customers at the time during the change-over)
My other accounts (and I have several) are with Yahoo, mainly for interacting with mailing lists at Yahoo Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) & a couple of web sites @ Geocities (http://www.geocities.com).

[Joeb454]

I use Gmail, I've had the account since October 2005 :)

I use it to aggregate all of my email accounts too, so I can send FROM them as well as receive mail TO them. It just suits my needs perfectly :)

[Newuser1111]

GMX, Not really any reason.

[Tibuda]

Gmail. It groups all messages in threads just like this forum.

[RiceMonster]

Gmail. It groups all messages in threads just like this forum.

Hotmail doesn't do that? Man that would be annoying!

[samjh]

I use Gmail. I'm also trying out Yahoo Mail for some things, but Gmail seems better.

I used to use Hotmail, but the amount of spam was staggering. On one account, I was receiving over 90 spam emails a day.

[Tibuda]

Hotmail doesn't do that? Man that would be annoying!

I have used hotmail a decade ago, and it didn't. I still use the account to chat in MSN, so I can check it.

[blueshiftoverwatch]

What is System76's email service like? Do they include IMAP support?

[arsenic23]

I've had a hotmail account since the first week it existed, WAY before Microsoft bought it. I use it for signing up for stuff.

All of my actual email goes through a server owned by my workplace.

[RPG Master]

I am just using my cable providers email service (Its the only place I could get rpgmaster@ as my email because its taken everywhere else) and check my mail with Evolution.

I never understood why everyone gets spam and I've never gotten spam once?

And is their any reason for me to switch to GMail?

[-grubby]

Gmail. Because it doesn't suck like the others.

[Bölvaður]

hotmail : junk mail and other things if I need to sign up for something but dont want their spam

gmail : send files to people, launchpad and such

my university mail for sending and receiving mail from other students. This one is the only really active one.

[PacSci]

Gmail. I used to use Road Runner, but a 5MB inbox doesn't exactly sit well with me. When Gmail was just getting started, it seemed much better than any other mail provider. Now, I use it for two addresses and check them in Evolution.

I also have system mailboxes on Rockhopper and Adelie, my desktop and server. But I can't send mail from Adelie for some reason, so it's locally generated mail only.

Oh, and I have a mailbox at my college. It forwards directly into my primary Gmail account, though. I use it for academic business like e-mailing professors and opinion columnists. Other than that, it's not that great - still a 5MB inbox, and I never check it.

[smartboyathome]

Gmail. I don't get any spam really, and everything just feels... right. ;)

[Firestem4]

Gmail.

It is fast, good looking, easy and organized, lots of storage space.

And you don't have to deal with tons of picture ads that make the email so much slower...

[mamamia88]

gmail and yahoo which my isp provides me with

[pwnst*r]

gmail, definitely.

full session encryption
labels
lots of storage
text ads instead of ridiculous flash based ones
fast
uncluttered
video chat

[init1]

I use the one my gave me ISP most often, but I also have a Gmail account

[amingv]

Gmail.
I used to use Hotmail (had an old account I didn't want to change), but I think they actually degraded themselves when they started with the Live(R) services. I mean, come on, they don't even support POP, SMTP or IMAP!

I do use MSN Messenger though (registered my gmail account in MS passport), mostly because most of my friends still use Hotmail.

[bytor4232]

Gmail. IMAP support, plus it can manage all 8 of my mailboxes flawlessly in one single Inbox. Plus, storage I never have to worry about.

[chriskin]

hotmail because i had it since...i don't know, since when @msn changed into @hotmail. and gmail in order to send bigger attachments

[Mason Whitaker]

Gmail of course...no ads, spam, and I can send and receive mail from my Yahoo account as well.

[Giant Speck]

Gmail, by far.

1. It's easy to use.
2. It groups messages into "conversations."
3. It allows me to filter e-mail and label them by sender.
4. It includes chat. I don't use it, but it's nice that it's there.
5. I can color customize it.
6. I don't give into all the Gmail anti-privacy conspiracy theories.

[tuskenraider]

gmail.... i used to have yahoo and checked it via thunderbird and yahoopops aka ypops. but yahoo changed servers and the "new yahoo email" about a year and a half ago.. so i went Gmail. im very glad to yahoo that they changed everything because with out them i would have never known what i was missing.. gmail is the way to go...

pop access smtp access web based no adds no spam (unlike yahoo) chat on and on and on..... by far THE best email service around.

[lethalfang]

Gmail.
When I started using Gmail in its relative infancy, its spam filter was vastly superior to any of its competitors, and that's the biggest reason I used it and stuck with it.

[chriskin]

Gmail.
When I started using Gmail in its relative infancy, its spam filter was vastly superior to any of its competitors, and that's the biggest reason I used it and stuck with it.

that is true, if i manage to forget that out of three gmail accounts i have, one shows the paradox of having more than 10 spam emails per useful one, even though the others are totally clean :O

[sports fan Matt]

Att.net./part of Yahoo. Comes with my ISP...When I move I may move to gmail, depending if I can get u-verse tv (im looking at that and Verizon FIOS

[Phreaker]

I am on gmail
I never bothered to look at the other solutions

[HavocXphere]

Gmail. The hotmail and yahoo spam filters are no where near as good as gmail's. In fact my hotmail account started getting spam *before* I started using it. i.e. Registered waited 1 week and it was already getting spammed. uggh

[CraigPaleo]

Gmail. It was the only to offer pop at the time. I like to store my mail locally and use a local email client but it also offers web-based email for when I'm away. I didn't like having to change email addresses whenever I changed ISPs. That might have changed with the others but that's why I originally went with Gmail.

[Gizenshya]

I checked all of them :p

I use my university email for university stuff, yahoo as my main email, hotmail for chatting, I don't use my gmail acocunts too much, don't know why. Then I have my beloved offshore email accounts that I use for file transfers. It really sucks that there isn't a decent email service in the US that supports sending files any bigger than single jpegs. If I want to sendan album, I have to compress and split to such an extent that I'm afraid I'll get carpel tunnel syndrome or something... but some of my preferred email accounts in other countries are far more reasonable.

[pwnst*r]

I checked all of them :p

I use my university email for university stuff, yahoo as my main email, hotmail for chatting, I don't use my gmail acocunts too much, don't know why. Then I have my beloved offshore email accounts that I use for file transfers. It really sucks that there isn't a decent email service in the US that supports sending files any bigger than single jpegs. If I want to sendan album, I have to compress and split to such an extent that I'm afraid I'll get carpel tunnel syndrome or something... but some of my preferred email accounts in other countries are far more reasonable.

gmail supports 20MB attachments.

[gn2]

I voted other, I have my own URL e-mail.

I got this after the e-mail provider I had used for years, Lycos, stopped their e-mail service.

[ZarathustraDK]

Gmail for ordinary mail, Hotmail for spam and "register to access this content"-kind of sites.

[Kopachris]

I use Gmail because I like to test things that are in beta. I've been using Gmail for a few years now, and am totally satisfied.

[Chemical Imbalance]

Gmail. Best client I've ever used.

[speedwell68]

Yahoo, just because I always have. I seldom send a lot of mails and it's pop3 access works well. I see no real need to change.

[.Maleficus.]

Gmail. Plenty of storage for my spam, forum registration emails and Facebook updates.

[JK3mp]

Wow...i feel like such the ordinary. Gmail here. I have 2 accts one for my personal and one for my freelance business. I DO have MSN acct but most for spam. Though i do like the new "cleaner" look of it... i still love gmail more.

[Yvan300]

Gmail

Has this cozy feeling to it and 5 gb of storage space.
Don't delete your email, archive it :)

[geoken]

The first Email I signed up for was hotmail but it completely sucked back then (even more than it does now). Back then most people I knew weren't on the internet and I didn't get a lot of emails. Hotmail would close your account if you didn't log in for x amount of time (it was 1 or 2 months IIRC).

I then moved to Yahoo and had pop access because it was linked to my ISP. So myname@yahoo and myname@myisp where the same account. This was good for a while but when Gmail came out the huge storage swayed me (at the time others where offering 20 or 50mb while Gmail was giving 1gb).

One of the biggest reasons I stayed with Gmail was the SMTP account they give you. Before Gmail I had to constantly change the settings in my mail client because the ISP's at home and work were different and they would only allow use of their SMTP address from their own network. Gmail's SMTP address solved this problem for me. Then they introduced IMAP, which blows everything away.

I currently have my own domain and email address but I still have my MX nameservers forwarded to Gmail and I use their hosted apps as my online mail interface.

[caro]

I own my own domain and use that for most email.

However, I do have a yahoo! account and an email address from my ISP - I use those for junk mail.

[TheIdiotThatIsMe]

GMail. Signed up back in November of 2004. Have never deleted an email (unless there was a reason....) and it included POP3 support, for free. Love it.

[Scruffynerf]

Various

Home - my ISP's mail server.
Work - my work's mail server.
My main online sites that I frequent - GMail (which I collect at home generally)
Various other sites where I have to register something to see? Hotmail

[Greg]

I made a GMail account back around the first round of invites for the beta, and haven't gone back since. I also have an email account at my own website.

[Mister LinOx]

I've been using GMail since it first came out, about 4-5 years ago. I was lucky and my brother sent me an invite to it, since it was invite-only, and I liked it better than all of the mainstream clients at the time. I remember once I had my account there for so long, it started allowing me to invite people by giving me x amount of invites to send, so I started sending random people invites for it.

I actually think GMail might be coming out of Beta soon. xP

[Wiebelhaus]

gmail. i've tried everything else and its no contest

I second this.

Gmail is the bomb hands down , I can do anything my techie heart desires and then some.