[RTC List] Gmail, or ....?

[William Van Hefner]

Tim,

First of all, even if your ISP was not blocking SMTP (outbound e-mail)
from outside their network (if they even are) it is highly likely that
the ISP for the wi-fi provider you are using already is.

There are two common solutions for this, outside of changing your
e-mail address and/or ISP. Your best bet is to contact whoever runs the
wireless system at the campground and see if they will set you up with
an account that is used strictly for sending outbound mail while you
are there. If the wi-fi provider knows what they are doing, they
probably get these requests all of the time, and will already know what
it is that you need.

The other common fix is to contact your ISP and see if they have an
alternate port that you can use to access their mail server. I have no
clue who Nuvox is, but if they cater to business customers at all, they
should be able to have you access their mail server on port 587 using
SMTP AUTH, or some other common workaround. If they don't offer this
type of service, you should probably find a different ISP anyway. Both
of these methods will require you to temporarily change certain settings
in Outlook, or whatever mail client you are using.

As for Gmail, Yahoo! mail, AOL, etc., as a mail administrator myself, I
would never recommend any of these common, free consumer services for
important business e-mails. It is far too common for these services to
silently delete important e-mails that they accidentally tag as spam,
and you will never have any kind of control (or knowledge) over what
e-mails they delete and/or block. You can not count on these services
to back up your e-mails, and don't count on getting any "real"
technical support unless you are paying for it or have a court order
that forces them to cooperate. In other words, you get what you pay for.

I'm not "selling" anyone e-mail service here. I mostly administrate
private networks. It's my opinion that if your e-mail is business
critical, then you really can't afford to rely on most of these freebie
services though. If your business is just a hobby and you can afford to
lose occasional e-mails with no possible trace, or it is just used for
personal purposes, most of these services will work well enough for you
though.



William Van Hefner
Vantek Communications, Inc.
postmaster at thedigest.com



On Thu, 21 Dec 2006 23:28:24 -0500 (EST)
muellert at one.net wrote:

> Hi folks.
> 
> Well, my promise not to stray too far from 'on-topic' seems to have
> been premature.  I want to cancel my current ISP, Nuvox, because
> since we left our house (w/ DSL), our POP3 mail client can only
> recieve, not send, mail. I have to go to the Nuvox website to send
> mail.  I don't want to get new ISP service until we settle into a
> somewhat long term location.  The KOA campground, home for the next
> month or more, has wi-fi, so I have net access.  I just need new
> email service.
> 
> I've already ruled out Yahoo, Hotmail, and the other traditional web
> based free email services.  Does anyone use Gmail?  Would you
> recommend it?  Are there any other free or low cost email solutions
> that I should consider?
> 
> Thanks to all who sent messages of support recently.  Rhonda and I
> feel very welcome on this list and in HC.
> 
> Tim & Rhonda Mueller
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> List mailing list
> List at redwoodtech.org
> http://redwoodtech.org/mailman/listinfo/list_redwoodtech.org
> 


-- 


William Van Hefner
Editor - TheDigest.Com

Vantek Communications, Inc.
555 H Street, Suite C
Eureka, CA 95501
707.476.0833 ph
800.331.4638 fx
e-mail: van at thedigest.com