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An interesting service, and very competitively priced. But for me, my email is fairly mission-critical. It's not something I'm prepared to endow in a one-man sh

by YPPH 2y ago

An interesting service, and very competitively priced. But for me, my email is fairly mission-critical. It's not something I'm prepared to endow in a one-man shop. I don't mean to offend, but it looks like something that might be used as something of a novelty. Were I to use it, I'd be backing up my email locally.

mariusor 2y ago
I've been using purelymail for multiple domains (with low traffic granted) for about ten years. I've never experienced an outage so far. Support has never failed to respond in the under 5 times I needed it.
sneak 2y ago
You should be backing up your email locally regardless, even if you use Google Workspace or Fastmail.
- YPPH 2y ago
  I don't agree with you. A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you. Fastmail is particularly good in that respect, since it takes periodic backups for you, allowing deleted items to be accessed. To put things in perspective, I dare say that many large commercial organisations who rely on Office 365 are not backing up emails locally. They do likely have fancy retention holds preventing nefarious actors who compromise access to the account nuking things. I think Fastmail's backup is limited to 7 days. Outside that is a risk; it's one I'll take. Maybe we have different perceptions of risk. But I think one can reasonably take the view it is unnecessary to have an independent copy in this scenario.
  - miles 2y ago
    >> You should be backing up your email locally regardless, even if you use Google Workspace or Fastmail. > I don't agree with you. A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you. Terraria on Stadia cancelled after developer's Google account gets locked https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26061935 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26061935 Google users locked out after 15 years' use https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24965432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24965432 I got locked out of my Google account for a month https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989146 Tell HN: Need help, locked out of Google account with 10 years of personal data https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42350245 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42350245 Android user locked out of Google after moving cities https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13004369 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13004369 Ask HN: I'm a small business and Google locked me out https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705122 Ask HN: Locked out of Google services with no recourse or explanation https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17428707 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17428707 ASK HN: Google account disabled. Oh what to do? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=350968 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=350968 Ask HN: Google just kicked me out of my account, no option to verify https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24709282 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24709282 Man locked out of Google Drive and loses 9 year old photos after SIM Swap attack https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41915523 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41915523 Ask HN: Locked out of Google Aps email with no recourse - advice? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9768593 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9768593 When you get locked out of your Google account, what do you do? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31070914 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31070914
    - Gud 2y ago
      Parent said reliable, not google.
  - sneak 2y ago
    As miles pointed out, the risk is not that they lose your data. The risk is that you lose your account. They don’t owe you a data download if they decide to terminate the business relationship which they can do at any time without notice or cause. You agree to this when you sign up. Not having backups of important data in your own possession is just plain stupid. You’re paying them to be online 24/7 and speak IMAP/SMTP, not to archive your data in perpetuity. Email hosting and backups are different services.
    - YPPH 2y ago
      This is such a remote possibility, at least with Fastmail, that I do not consider it reasonable to implement my own backup solution. If they are going to shut down, it isn't going to occur imminently and without any warning. It's an easy statement to make: "just take a backup". But that requires me to dedicate time to implementing a secure and automated solution (and of course, routinely testing restoring it). I'm not doing that, because I pay the service to do that for me. If I'm going to that effort, I may as well self-host.
      - loteck 2y ago
        It's possible your definition of mission critical just doesn't match up to that of those responding to your comment. If the loss of a set of data would threaten the existence of the company, that's mission critical. While having a sophisticated niche tech partner handle day to day operations of that data is one part of managing the risk of data loss, if one put all their eggs in only that one basket, that would possibly indicate one has a lack of experience with tech vendors and hasn't read anything about managing risk. Every business should have at least one routinely tested, independent path for mission critical data recovery.
        YPPH 2y ago
        I think you're right. But I also do not think Purelymail falls in the same camp that Fastmail or Office 365 do, so far as expectations of reliability and business continuity are concerned. The broader question of whether it is appropriate to independently back up your own data in large scale cloud services need not be answered. It is simply sufficient to recognise the risks are far greater when dealing with a one man operation.
  - subsection1h 2y ago
    > A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you Is it only email you don't back up or do you not back up any of your data that's stored on companies' servers?
- 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 2y ago
  Isn't back-up longhand for POP in this context?

by YPPH 2y ago

mariusor 2y ago

I've been using purelymail for multiple domains (with low traffic granted) for about ten years. I've never experienced an outage so far. Support has never failed to respond in the under 5 times I needed it.

sneak 2y ago

You should be backing up your email locally regardless, even if you use Google Workspace or Fastmail.

YPPH 2y ago
I don't agree with you. A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you. Fastmail is particularly good in that respect, since it takes periodic backups for you, allowing deleted items to be accessed. To put things in perspective, I dare say that many large commercial organisations who rely on Office 365 are not backing up emails locally. They do likely have fancy retention holds preventing nefarious actors who compromise access to the account nuking things. I think Fastmail's backup is limited to 7 days. Outside that is a risk; it's one I'll take. Maybe we have different perceptions of risk. But I think one can reasonably take the view it is unnecessary to have an independent copy in this scenario.
- miles 2y ago
  >> You should be backing up your email locally regardless, even if you use Google Workspace or Fastmail. > I don't agree with you. A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you. Terraria on Stadia cancelled after developer's Google account gets locked https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26061935 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26061935 Google users locked out after 15 years' use https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24965432 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24965432 I got locked out of my Google account for a month https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989146 Tell HN: Need help, locked out of Google account with 10 years of personal data https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42350245 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42350245 Android user locked out of Google after moving cities https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13004369 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13004369 Ask HN: I'm a small business and Google locked me out https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22705122 Ask HN: Locked out of Google services with no recourse or explanation https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17428707 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17428707 ASK HN: Google account disabled. Oh what to do? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=350968 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=350968 Ask HN: Google just kicked me out of my account, no option to verify https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24709282 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24709282 Man locked out of Google Drive and loses 9 year old photos after SIM Swap attack https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41915523 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41915523 Ask HN: Locked out of Google Aps email with no recourse - advice? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9768593 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9768593 When you get locked out of your Google account, what do you do? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31070914 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31070914
  - Gud 2y ago
    Parent said reliable, not google.
- sneak 2y ago
  As miles pointed out, the risk is not that they lose your data. The risk is that you lose your account. They don’t owe you a data download if they decide to terminate the business relationship which they can do at any time without notice or cause. You agree to this when you sign up. Not having backups of important data in your own possession is just plain stupid. You’re paying them to be online 24/7 and speak IMAP/SMTP, not to archive your data in perpetuity. Email hosting and backups are different services.
  - YPPH 2y ago
    This is such a remote possibility, at least with Fastmail, that I do not consider it reasonable to implement my own backup solution. If they are going to shut down, it isn't going to occur imminently and without any warning. It's an easy statement to make: "just take a backup". But that requires me to dedicate time to implementing a secure and automated solution (and of course, routinely testing restoring it). I'm not doing that, because I pay the service to do that for me. If I'm going to that effort, I may as well self-host.
    - loteck 2y ago
      It's possible your definition of mission critical just doesn't match up to that of those responding to your comment. If the loss of a set of data would threaten the existence of the company, that's mission critical. While having a sophisticated niche tech partner handle day to day operations of that data is one part of managing the risk of data loss, if one put all their eggs in only that one basket, that would possibly indicate one has a lack of experience with tech vendors and hasn't read anything about managing risk. Every business should have at least one routinely tested, independent path for mission critical data recovery.
      - YPPH 2y ago
        I think you're right. But I also do not think Purelymail falls in the same camp that Fastmail or Office 365 do, so far as expectations of reliability and business continuity are concerned. The broader question of whether it is appropriate to independently back up your own data in large scale cloud services need not be answered. It is simply sufficient to recognise the risks are far greater when dealing with a one man operation.
- subsection1h 2y ago
  > A key reason to host your email with a reliable cloud storage provider is to have backups handled for you Is it only email you don't back up or do you not back up any of your data that's stored on companies' servers?
6LLvveMx2koXfwn 2y ago
Isn't back-up longhand for POP in this context?