Why You Need a Better Email Address

By John Hobbs

In the April 22, 2009 issue of the Globe and Mail, Patricia Best reported that Bell Canada was advising its Sympatico Internet customers that their email addresses are changing. Everyone with an email address that looks like username@sympatico.ca should change their address to username@bell.net as part of Bell's re-branding strategy.

This is just one example of the potential problems associated with your email being provided by your Internet provider. If your email address ends in @ followed by your Internet provider's corporate name, your email is being held hostage.

In the past few years, many Internet providers have sold out or been forcibly acquired, resulting in customers scrambling to maintain email capabilities. I used to get my high speed Internet access through Shaw Communications and their cable connection. Then Shaw and Rogers did a region swap deal and my service was suddenly provided by Rogers. People in my area quickly had to change their email address. The impact varied from a minor nuisance to a major headache.

Those affected had to advise everyone who corresponded with them by email to please start to use their new email address. They had to change their email address on on any news group or email list of which they were a member. They had to change their profile on any web site (like Facebook or LinkedIn) to which they may have been subscribed. They had to remember to change the email address in their profile for every online service they used (like their anti-virus subscription from Symantec/McAfee or their e-bay account). Sometimes this meant closing their old account and opening a new one since many online services use your email address as your login name.

Rarely does this go without a hitch. You forget to notify someone or you forget to change your profile on some site. This could cause you to loose touch with a friend, miss a business opportunity or be unable to benefit from a service that you depend upon. One of the hidden "kickers" that we stumbled across is among some genealogists. They occasionally post queries on genealogy web sites, leaving their email address for helpful responses. It is impossible for them to find all of the places they had left their queries. And furthermore, in most cases there is no way to edit the query to adjust the email address in any event. A response that might have helped their research would be lost forever.

This kind of problem can be triggered by your action as well. For example, if you get your Internet service through a cable company and you move to an area serviced by another cable company, your old email address will no longer be viable. Or if you become dissatisfied with your current provider and decide to switch (e.g., switching from Rogers to Bell -- or vice versa) you face the same set of problems. The Internet providers like this situation because the hassle of switching provides incentive for you to stay with your current provider.

Another situation that is similar is using an email address provided by an employer. What happens if you resign, get laid off or if the employer is bought by another company?

A few years ago, my Internet provider (DSL.ca) was bought by another company (Magma Communications). But I never changed my email address. A couple of years later Magma was bought by Primus. Again, I never changed my email address. For me, the change in Internet provider was a non-issue. My email address did not say @magma.ca or anything similar.

You need an email address that is independent. One that is yours and not held hostage by your service provider or employer. Never, ever use an email address supplied by your Internet provider.

Start planning NOW. Do not wait until the day your Internet service provider gives you a few days notice (or less).

There are two options for dealing with this issue.

• The most obvious is to obtain a free email service from a major provider such as Gmail (Google Mail), Yahoo Mail or Hotmail. My personal preference is Gmail.
• The second option, and in my book a much preferred option, is to get your own domain name.

Using Gmail

If you decide to go the Gmail route, go to gmail.com and set up an account right now. Then start using the Gmail account for all of the email you send out. When someone asks for your email address, give them your new Gmail address.

Continue to check your old email account frequently. As each message is received there, reply using your Gmail account and ask the person to start using your new Gmail email address for future communication. Copy your address book entries from your old account to your Gmail account (Gmail has some tools that may help with this process). If your old email provider has the capability, go into the account management area and have all of your incoming mail on your old email account forwarded to your Gmail address automatically. The Gmail Settings area has some other tools that could help with migration.

Then go to all of the web sites where you have an account, and every business or organization you deal with that has your email address, and change your profile in each one to your new Gmail address. It may take a while to get to all of them, but as you encounter one that you forgot make the profile change right away.

Your Own Domain

If your name was James Black, why would you want an email address that ends in "@sympatico.ca" or "@rogers.com"? Would it not be better to have and email address that ends in "@jamesblack.ca"? What about "james@jamesblack.ca" or "jamesb@theblackfamily.ca"?

Obtaining your own domain name is surprisingly easy. All domain names are available on a first-come first-served basis. At this writing, "jamesblack.ca" is available. But if it was taken, consider inserting your middle initial, to become something like "JamesQBlack.ca".

Once you have your own domain name, you can create thousands of email addresses and share them with family members. For example, James Black could have james@blackfamily.ca, his wife could have margaret@blackfamily.ca, while jessica@blackfamily.ca could be assigned to their daughter.

The best thing about registering your domain name is that you own it. You can pay someone to run the mail server for you (which is very cheap to do); but if that company goes out of business, you can easily switch the mail server to a different company and continue to send and receive email without changing your email address.

To register your domain name, go to a domain name registrar. I use EasyDNS (a Canadian-based registrar) but you can find others with a Google search for "Domain Registrar". EasyDNS charges $35 per year (plus GST) for a .ca domain name. Many web hosting companies offer packages that include domain name registration, email server hosting for several email addresses, as well as space for a web site using that domain name (e.g., www.blackfamily.ca) for a very modest monthly or annual fee.

Remember that a domain registration fee is an annual fee. You must pay every year for the service. If you don't, you can lose the domain name.

The technical expertise required to register a domain and to configure email accounts is not huge; but you need to be familiar with the terminology involved. It can be confusing to someone who has not configured such things before. If you are not comfortable with it, I suggest you seek assistance from someone knowledgeable in this area.

At such low prices, domain registrars are not in a position to provide much technical assistance. Do not expect too much help from their support lines.

If you would like assistance with any of this, feel free to get in touch. Send a message to me and I will try to help.

Acknowledgement: The idea for this article (as well as some of its content) came from a set of posts on the subject that appeared in Dick Eastman's blog. If you are a genealogist, I recommend that you subscribe to Dick's newsletter.