I do not know why these two concepts are so frequently conflated and misunderstood, but they absolutely are.
Thanks for the solid clarification. At-will and RTW are two very different concepts, and off the top of my head, forty-nine of the fifty states are at-will. The 50th state isn’t all that different (MT), just a bit nuanced: “Montana defaults to a probationary period, after which termination is only lawful if for good cause”
I’m not sure I fully agree with your suggestion of CloudFlare, though your point is well-taken - ten year renewals with nine to fix billing issues is a best practice. Last thing I want is to lose my primary email because I missed a billing email after replacing a card six months ago.
Catch-alls are definitely a win, especially for people who sometimes forget to write down every single ephermeral email address they’ve ever used to sign up for anything with… I like subdomains for email, but only when planned/executed in an intentional way. Has the potential to get out of hand quickly.
I’ve elsewhere mentioned my preferred provider, but it seems to be fairly common that most email providers also offer DNS as part of the package, which makes the whole process much simpler.
Migadu is relatively private, dirt cheap, and dead easy to set up. Supports both web and desktop email clients of choice.
IMHO, TLD matters and always will - the problem is that it matters to varying degrees depending on the destination host, the remainder of your setup, etc. If you’re fastidious about configuring all of the requisite DNS records, etc., it will be less of a problem.
I mostly avoid the newer non-CC TLDs for that reason, and general personal preference. Deliverability is enough of a challenge without adding more work to it, which is why ‘actually’ hosting one’s own email is mostly a toy project, and not something generally done as a serious endeavor. Useful for learning and understanding, of course, but not particularly practical to literally host one’s own email server for ongoing usage in any critical use case.
You’ll find certain providers easier to get your emails through to than others - Hotmail and variants are notoriously difficult, and tend to drop inbound mail at the gate without sending a bounce message, as if the inbound mail just disappeared.
No reason it has to literally live ‘at home’ - you could just as easily use a VPS via LowEndBox for five or six bucks a month, though of course trust in providers varies widely.
Visible has worked well for me recently - it’s wholly owned by VZW as I recall, and exclusively uses their network. In most areas, VZW is objectively the best coverage of any carrier.
$30/mo and I have yet to see throttling, even with heavy use. It “just works”.
Yes, I’m effectively handing that data to VZW, but I have no illusions that any MVNO I chose would behave any differently. One way or another, they’re all reselling the same 3 carriers, who by definition must have some base level of access to your data.
VPNs go a long way towards mitigating that, but using a carrier is likely to leak some level of data. While I have a great deal of respect for RMS, my own life doesn’t really fit within his internet usage model and I’m forced to make choices. (Sacrifices, really, but informed ones.)
As far as function, they’ve got a nice little package all wrapped up and easy to use. Aside from the group text thing I mentioned elsewhere, it’s a pretty slick implementation. But for a user base of one, with privacy concerns, I’d rather use something that’s a bit rougher around the edges yet more configurable, and more private.
From where I sit, it’s a pretty decent email service from both user-side and admin-side, including for biz use in nearly any size org.
It’s all about the data, and not wanting to be the product for me - I have no direct beef with their implementation or abstractions of admin-side details. I just would rather pay a relatively small amount of money than pay with my data.
In years of using GV, group texts never worked correctly for me, and generally broke in unpredictable ways - some recipients would get some msgs, others would get other msgs, and others might just get dropped entirely. It was both weird and completely untenable for anything even remotely important.
Yes, remotely important business does get conducted via group text once in a while - is it ideal, probably not, but I meet companies/individuals I work with where they are in the mutually easiest format. That only works if I can rely on the SMS solution in the first place, though.
See voip.ms for voice. I can’t speak for specific non-European languages, but I’ve been quite happy with LibreTranslate for my on the fly needs. Setup was dead easy too. (And if you see a lack of coverage for particular languages, obviously your contributions to improve that would be welcome)
Seconding @Tazerface@sh.itjust.works 's suggestion of voip.ms.
I throw them a lil cash maybe once per quarter or so, they maintain a bunch of numbers that I may or may not utilize at any moment, but are just too good to give up, and anything I’m not actively using is set up to send inbound SMS to my email - that way I don’t lose access to multi-factor codes and such, but I’m not trying to juggle a bunch of numbers in some app or other either.
Dirt cheap, ‘just works,’ and they even made porting from GV easy.
Also, by the same token, to de-google your email, I’m a big fan of Migadu. Same sort of scenario - I prepay a lil bit once a quarter or so, have catch-alls set up so I don’t miss random crap from emails I’ve forgotten I created/used a decade ago, etc. A nice, simple solution that also plays well with on-the-fly outbound email addressing, Thunderbird for day to day needs, and webmail.
Haven’t seen RTFM casually dropped in conversation online in… um… a while…
You’ve been hanging out on the intartoobz at least as long as I have. Circa the paleolithic era, or so…
You and me both.
Not too many years after that nightmare, I was perfectly capable of enjoying thru-hiking, carrrying exactly same weight anyone else would have been, moving at same speed on rough terrain, etc. Still couldn’t run a mile - or much shorter distances - in my wildest dreams. Didn’t matter, I was in exactly the shape I wanted to be in, for the things I cared about.
Can’t do it anymore, my body widely conspired against me in various ways, but glad I was capable of it and have the memories. If I had been able to run a mile, but not hike any distance with weight, I’d be alot less happy about what I had achieved at that point.
Cap One 360 checking - free, and offers single use cards. Think they regen on each usage,and can get the number etc easily in app.
Edit:missed “credit” card. Believe Cap One does same for their credit cards, not entirely sure tho. It’s becoming more common on credit, but def not “most” cards doing that yet
Thought they charged something to put $ on temp card, via EFT though I may well be wrong.
Don’t recall the org name I conflated w them anymore u fortunately.
And from where I sit, yeah they pay me to some degree - the acct costs me nothing, and it’s got a handful of the usual “edge case” insurance benefits and such most debit cards don’t.
Not real useful to me, admittedly, but I do receive something.
That, and they reliably post direct deposit exactly 48h early, plus or minus fifteen minutes. Ability to plan my life around when exactly my check will show up has value. Seems to be very much a “best effort” basis to post early w/ most banks.
Lots of that stuff is useful because of my individual habits and patterns of spending I’m sure, might well not be for you.
Will check out privacy, now I’m kind of curious if there is something even more friction free for my scenario.
Pharm tech licensing varies wiiiiidely across the states. Some require natl very, some require basically on job training IIRC.
RPh not so much, but tech also has responsibility not to kill you with a misfill and more eyes are always good for preventing deaths.
The shit wages they pay in relation to being responsible in part for safety and accuracy (in retail) is a big part of why most retail is dangerously understaffed.
Same for insurance agents and real estate agents in many (most?) of US. HS, a couple weeks of “teaching to the test,” and a test is all it takes. Rote memorisation. - lots of those younger folks in insurance couldn’t define what they may/may not say/promise, or who is an “Insured” under a given policy.
Shame I stopped believing that BS from them circa winME…
sed harbors no demon beasts, in my experience.
On the other hand, by default using sed -i is where the demons come in.
No, sed, NOT in place. Not the first time. Show me what you want to do based on the instructions I gave you, and then we’ll talk about letting you play with the real data.
Revolut does that, but far cheaper.
Seems like it would be a nightmare to purify. Perhaps useful for agricultural applications, but for drinking and household use…. Most water supplies don’t have e.g., human bodies floating in them.
Not a scientist, happy to be proven wrong here, but that’s my gut.
I’ve worked side by side with RU devs who were both personable and damned competent. Never were their tech skills in doubt, and I retain quite a bit of respect for those individuals.
I’d not do the same today explicitly because of the political and compliance implications. It’s unfortunate, but necessary.