Fastmail Labels Beta(beta.fastmail.com)
beta.fastmail.com
Fastmail Labels Beta
https://beta.fastmail.com/help/receive/labels-beta.html
120 comments
Is there any reason for why IMAP keywords cannot be used for labels by e.g. having some prefix for the keyword which indicates that it should be interpreted as a label? Client support is of course needed but to me it seems like the IMAP protocol already supports labels. Maybe IMAP lacks the ability to enumerate all labels?
Gmail already has a bad hack for this: It reports labels as folders and that duplicate copies of emails are in them.
So the issue is that any other solution would work improperly for Gmail. Client support is a huge part of the problem: If it's outside the standard, clients aren't going to handle it the same way.
JMAP, of course, fixes this.
So the issue is that any other solution would work improperly for Gmail. Client support is a huge part of the problem: If it's outside the standard, clients aren't going to handle it the same way.
JMAP, of course, fixes this.
IMAP keywords are in the standard.
Yes, but how to use them to emulate labels support is not.
It wasn't super obvious to me, but you have to use beta.fastmail.com for this to work.
Confused me for a moment as you can complete the first step of enabling this (changing to New Rules) using the stable client.
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Oh, no, it's even more confusing than that. You enable the labels beta function on the beta website, but then it applies even on the main website.
Confused me for a moment as you can complete the first step of enabling this (changing to New Rules) using the stable client.
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Oh, no, it's even more confusing than that. You enable the labels beta function on the beta website, but then it applies even on the main website.
you are right, does this mean that labels will work on the main site?
Yep, seems to have the same functionality.
I've submitted beta feedback indicating my concerns.
I've submitted beta feedback indicating my concerns.
Might as well put it here since Fastmail doesn’t come up often. Does anyone find Fastmail’s spam detection to be pretty mediocre? I usually get a few obviously spam emails a week in my inbox. The volume is low so I don’t mind it but that’s really the one thing I miss from Gmail.
I find it far superior to Gmail because although Fastmail occasionally does not flag spam, Fastmail almost never sends legitimate mail to spam. Gmail would routinely give false positives which in my view is much worse than occasional false negatives.
Been on FastMail since 2016 and I barely receive any spam to begin with. It took me years to hit the 200 spam emails to activate the personalized filter, which brought my false positive rate to zero.
The problem I frequently encounter is with emails incorrectly classified as spam. Once a month I go to spam folder and find few emails that were not spam. Even though I click "not spam" on each, I don't feel algorithm is getting any better with time.
Once the personalized filter is activated (requires marking 200 as spam and 200 as not-spam), this problem should go away entirely. It did for me anyways.
Not at all. Rarely ever get a spam email in Fastmail. Gmail is the worst in my experience. It’s far too aggressive and would regularly capture legit emails when I used it. I lost a few important emails this way. The best email filter I ever had was to use greylisting on a self hosted email machine - this method had almost 100% perfect filtering for me. Unfortunately custom email servers don’t really work in the modern email ecosystem. Fastmail is the best managed system I think at the moment and have been happy with it for years now.
Spam detection requires a few ingredients:
1. Lots of email that you can categorize.
2. Lots of users to label the email as spam or not spam.
3. Tons of code to identify classifiable features such as clickable links, the ASN from which the message originated, and so many other things.
4. Some kind of classifier that pulls all the above into a decision about each message. And make sure it’s really fast and doesn’t require gargantuan resources either, because you’re trying to provide cheap mailboxes.
Google has enormous advantages in solving for spam filtering. It has over a billion active users, enormous computing resources, and top AI talent. Not to mention legions of talented general programmers to build all the feature extraction stuff. Competing with Google on spam filtering is an unwinnable game IMHO.
1. Lots of email that you can categorize.
2. Lots of users to label the email as spam or not spam.
3. Tons of code to identify classifiable features such as clickable links, the ASN from which the message originated, and so many other things.
4. Some kind of classifier that pulls all the above into a decision about each message. And make sure it’s really fast and doesn’t require gargantuan resources either, because you’re trying to provide cheap mailboxes.
Google has enormous advantages in solving for spam filtering. It has over a billion active users, enormous computing resources, and top AI talent. Not to mention legions of talented general programmers to build all the feature extraction stuff. Competing with Google on spam filtering is an unwinnable game IMHO.
FastMail just uses SpamAssassin btw; I'm not sure if they have any modifications, but based on the results it seems just the standard SA.
This is astonishing to me, considering that Jeremy Howard is a leading AI guru.
All I know is what I can see from the X-Spam headers they add with that matched rules, which are SA's. FastMail has been around for ages, and I guess it's "good enough" (or at least, not "bad enough" to replace). It's not so easy to replace a tested (though imperfect) solution like SA with some new AI stuff, even of it would be better; it's all about ROI.
Also, not sure if Howard is still involved to FastMail? They sold to Opera in 2010, although they've been independent again since 2013, but it looks like the 2010 sale was the end of Howard's involvement?
Also, not sure if Howard is still involved to FastMail? They sold to Opera in 2010, although they've been independent again since 2013, but it looks like the 2010 sale was the end of Howard's involvement?
I trained the “personal” filter myself using their instructions years ago when I first started using them and it’s been pretty solid since.
I would imagine that they have far less email volume to train any kind of spam-classifying AI on, as well as a smaller amount of (human) resources to spend on advanced spam classification. Google has a huge leg up in this particular aspect.
Another big aspect is FastMail can't use non-spam emails for training data. And users can opt out of having even their spam emails used for classification. FastMail doesn't co-opt people's data for their own use so they rely entirely on voluntary sharing.
I regularly receive spam in gmail (russian and gmail originated spam) in main inbox.
And promotions box is usually just spam.
Also lately started getting spam google calendar events and they just wont go away even after reporting them as spam multiple times. I don't why is that even a feature, why can someone completely random add recurring-daily events to your calendar.
And promotions box is usually just spam.
Also lately started getting spam google calendar events and they just wont go away even after reporting them as spam multiple times. I don't why is that even a feature, why can someone completely random add recurring-daily events to your calendar.
You can disable this somewhere, it scraps your emails (also spam) and adds up any ical events to your calendar which generates the event notifications...
Can be fullly disabled somehow in gmail settings.
Can be fullly disabled somehow in gmail settings.
Thanks will search that.
edit: for anyone else looking, it was in calendar settings page
edit: for anyone else looking, it was in calendar settings page
ive been using fastmail for several years and this hasnt been an issue for me.
My “Personal Spam Filter” is trained and spam has not been an issue for me.
Indeed. I went through the efforts of creating their recommended “learn safe” and “learn spam” folders, but this didn’t help. There doesn’t seem to be a way to reset their spam dataset.
yes, e.g. thunderbird's builtin junk filter seemed much better to me. Gmail's too.
I believe I saw somewhere that fastmail's spamfilter may have a 'feature' that whitelists mails from certain senders so that spam gets through if it was forwarded via my university account.
There even was an option to tell Fastmail about these forwarding accounts, but it didn't seem to work, maybe due to multi-hop forwards.
I believe I saw somewhere that fastmail's spamfilter may have a 'feature' that whitelists mails from certain senders so that spam gets through if it was forwarded via my university account.
There even was an option to tell Fastmail about these forwarding accounts, but it didn't seem to work, maybe due to multi-hop forwards.
My spam folder seems to catch a fair bit across my hundreds of aliases so far
Is that not the idea more than relying on the spam filter. Just delete aliases?
Is that not the idea more than relying on the spam filter. Just delete aliases?
I never get any spam on Fastmail, I set up a training folder and it has been solid for the past 5 years or so.
One reason I switched to Fastmail is it's just folders, not labels. I HATED labels in Gmail. It never works right with external clients, even if you use plugins in Thunderbird or try to use labels like they are folders.
I gave up and basically used the web interface until I switched to FastMail.
Will folders ever become mandatory? If so, maybe I should finally give in and host emails myself. It can't be more painful than being forced to use labels.
I gave up and basically used the web interface until I switched to FastMail.
Will folders ever become mandatory? If so, maybe I should finally give in and host emails myself. It can't be more painful than being forced to use labels.
Labels will probably remain optional, since folders are better supported by IMAP clients and they've been in the standard forever.
The only service that does not support folders properly is Gmail and the actual problem with Gmail is that they're abusing IMAP folders for emulating their labels. Fastmail has always been very standards compliant and I don't see them abusing the standard without a way to turn the behavior off.
So I don't really understand the drama. Also note that a lot of users, including myself, are craving for labels ;-)
The only service that does not support folders properly is Gmail and the actual problem with Gmail is that they're abusing IMAP folders for emulating their labels. Fastmail has always been very standards compliant and I don't see them abusing the standard without a way to turn the behavior off.
So I don't really understand the drama. Also note that a lot of users, including myself, are craving for labels ;-)
I can't find the blog post, but I read one once that said, basically: you don't need labels or folders. You need your inbox, the archive, and trash. Once you've tended to an email, either archive it (and just use your search function later), or delete it.
I've tried unsuccessfully to maintain folder/label systems over the years, and I always end up having to search my emails anyway. So why bother with trying to make a consistent folder/label structure? I'm much more likely to remember some key words from an invoice than remember which labels I would've applied.
I've tried unsuccessfully to maintain folder/label systems over the years, and I always end up having to search my emails anyway. So why bother with trying to make a consistent folder/label structure? I'm much more likely to remember some key words from an invoice than remember which labels I would've applied.
Folders aren't for filing emails after you've read them. Used well, they're for filing incoming messages automatically. I have a heavily email-driven workflow, and I am active on dozens of mailing lists. My email servers filter incoming messages and deliver them directly into folders based on which list they're coming into. Another filter has a list of commerce-associated domains that get filed into folders based on which accounts they're associated with. As a result, the only mail that hits my inbox proper is mail from friends and family (plus the occasional not-filtered-yet work/list mail). Everything else lands in folders, and I prioritize opening those folders and dealing with those messages.
As you mentioned, once a message is 'consumed,' it just gets archived. But the folder system (combined with sieve filters) is what makes dealing with a ton of incoming email extremely pleasant.
As you mentioned, once a message is 'consumed,' it just gets archived. But the folder system (combined with sieve filters) is what makes dealing with a ton of incoming email extremely pleasant.
Folder structure (whether email or filesystem) give context. In the same folder may be related emails from other people or with different subjects. Search works for finding a specific email, and folders help finding related emails once you have the first one.
In addition, folders have better discoverability, whereas I find search to be finicky (looking for exact words when I only remember a synonym)
I have a similar problem with google drive. Oftentimes I will find a file that I was looking for, but I know there are related files in the same folder (maybe a spreadsheet used to generate the other document). But I can't get to the folder from the file (as far as I know). If I don't remember some keywords from the other file, I may be SOL.
In addition, folders have better discoverability, whereas I find search to be finicky (looking for exact words when I only remember a synonym)
I have a similar problem with google drive. Oftentimes I will find a file that I was looking for, but I know there are related files in the same folder (maybe a spreadsheet used to generate the other document). But I can't get to the folder from the file (as far as I know). If I don't remember some keywords from the other file, I may be SOL.
I can't see why they would ever be mandatory, but Fastmail is a big player when it comes to email standards, so if they're bringing in label support I expect that it's becoming a part of standard emailing and proper support will appear in external clients soon.
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It's not quite clear to me: Can these rules be applied to already existing mails at creation time?
This is convenient in Gmail and when I last looked at fastmail in 2014 this wasn't possible.
This was the support answer: "I am sorry, but our filters only work at email delivery time. You can't really use them on emails already delivered to your account.
However, to work on already delivered emails, I would suggest you use our 'Search' feature. You can search for emails matching specific criteria, and then select them and move them en masse to a different folder, or even delete them."
This works but makes migration/reorganizing a bit annoying
This is convenient in Gmail and when I last looked at fastmail in 2014 this wasn't possible.
This was the support answer: "I am sorry, but our filters only work at email delivery time. You can't really use them on emails already delivered to your account.
However, to work on already delivered emails, I would suggest you use our 'Search' feature. You can search for emails matching specific criteria, and then select them and move them en masse to a different folder, or even delete them."
This works but makes migration/reorganizing a bit annoying
Since about a month ago, yes: https://fastmail.blog/2020/03/23/email-organization-filters/
Excellent, thank you for the link.
I enabled the new rules that support labels and opted into the beta. If you create a new rule that automatically applies a label, you can choose to apply it to "All matching conversations now" or "New matching messages on arrival."
> It's not quite clear to me: Can these rules be applied to already existing mails at creation time?
A subset of the new rules system can be applied to existing mails when the rule is created, at least when the rules are used with folders. I've not tried the new label system, but I think the folder/label processing comes after the rule matching so I'd expect it to be the same.
Once a rule is created, there does not appear to be any way to change whether it is in that subset or not.
Consider a rule that filters on who the mail is from. On the old rule creation screen, you could select whether to use the from email address or the from name in your condition. For email address you could check for containing, beginning with, or ending with a string, matching or not matching a glob pattern, or matching or not matching a regular expression. For a from name, you could check for exact match, contains, or glob pattern.
On the new rule creation screen, there are no longer separate from email address and from name options, and there is no choice in how it matches. You just enter a string--I'm not sure how exactly it uses it.
If you want the older, more flexible conditions you can get them by clicking "switch to no-preview rules". That gives, as far as I've seen, the same condition options that the old rules did. The cost, as the name "no-preview rules" suggests, is that you do not get a preview of what messages the rule matches.
When you hit "continue" on the rule creation screen for a "standard rule" (that's their name for non-no-preview rules), it brings you to a screen that shows all your existing mail that matches the rule, with a label showing what folder it is currently in. From there you can ask to further edit the selection criteria. Once you are happy with the messages it is selection, you can tell it to go ahead and create the rule.
That brings up the screen to specify the rule actions. On that screen there are check boxes to apply it to existing messages (the ones you saw in the preview) and to apply it to new messages.
When you create a no-preview rule, there is as you would expect no preview. There are also no check boxes for existing/incoming. It applie to incoming, and only incoming.
If you create a no-preview rule, and later edit that rule, there is no way that I've found to change it to a standard rule. If you create a standard rule, and later edit that rule, there is no way that I've found to change it to a no-preview rule.
Fastmail also lets you create rules by editing the sieve code text. The sieve code contains various rules generated by Fastmail internally and all the rules created from the rules you make in the Fastmail GUI. Between each section of such rules they have a text area where you can enter your own rules.
I don't know if there is any way to get it to do the preview and apply to existing thing with rules entered via those text areas. If there were I'd be tempted to stop using the rule making GUI and just do all my rules myself in sieve.
A subset of the new rules system can be applied to existing mails when the rule is created, at least when the rules are used with folders. I've not tried the new label system, but I think the folder/label processing comes after the rule matching so I'd expect it to be the same.
Once a rule is created, there does not appear to be any way to change whether it is in that subset or not.
Consider a rule that filters on who the mail is from. On the old rule creation screen, you could select whether to use the from email address or the from name in your condition. For email address you could check for containing, beginning with, or ending with a string, matching or not matching a glob pattern, or matching or not matching a regular expression. For a from name, you could check for exact match, contains, or glob pattern.
On the new rule creation screen, there are no longer separate from email address and from name options, and there is no choice in how it matches. You just enter a string--I'm not sure how exactly it uses it.
If you want the older, more flexible conditions you can get them by clicking "switch to no-preview rules". That gives, as far as I've seen, the same condition options that the old rules did. The cost, as the name "no-preview rules" suggests, is that you do not get a preview of what messages the rule matches.
When you hit "continue" on the rule creation screen for a "standard rule" (that's their name for non-no-preview rules), it brings you to a screen that shows all your existing mail that matches the rule, with a label showing what folder it is currently in. From there you can ask to further edit the selection criteria. Once you are happy with the messages it is selection, you can tell it to go ahead and create the rule.
That brings up the screen to specify the rule actions. On that screen there are check boxes to apply it to existing messages (the ones you saw in the preview) and to apply it to new messages.
When you create a no-preview rule, there is as you would expect no preview. There are also no check boxes for existing/incoming. It applie to incoming, and only incoming.
If you create a no-preview rule, and later edit that rule, there is no way that I've found to change it to a standard rule. If you create a standard rule, and later edit that rule, there is no way that I've found to change it to a no-preview rule.
Fastmail also lets you create rules by editing the sieve code text. The sieve code contains various rules generated by Fastmail internally and all the rules created from the rules you make in the Fastmail GUI. Between each section of such rules they have a text area where you can enter your own rules.
I don't know if there is any way to get it to do the preview and apply to existing thing with rules entered via those text areas. If there were I'd be tempted to stop using the rule making GUI and just do all my rules myself in sieve.
As a longtime Fastmail user, it's taken a long time to get to this point -- a labels beta. At this point, I'd like to see some truly unique native analytics on my storage rather than somewhat late attempts at market feature parity. I'd like to see a unique suite of management tools, like, say, an intelligent bulk unsubscriber. But sure, I'll test labels out.
I also would have loved this earlier but serious question: who else, besides Google/gmail and Microsoft/Outlook, is even trying this stuff? I've periodically looked pretty hard and been unable to find anyone.
Fastmail is the clear market leader for people who don't want to use gmail or outlook, and I'm pretty excited to try their labels. I would love to see them implement answers to some of the questions the basecamp (hey) folks raised here [1], but I'm pretty confident they'll implement some of them. I also suspect that many of the things basecamp/hey want to do break interop with other email clients for editing. That is, you can read them, but not use the hey features from other clients; Fastmail may not be willing to make that trade. Super excited to see what hey do though!
Either way, building a super-reliable email service that can handle 10s of gigs of emails and hundreds of thousands of messages is not easy and Fastmail does a good job.
[1] https://hey.com/problems-with-email/
Fastmail is the clear market leader for people who don't want to use gmail or outlook, and I'm pretty excited to try their labels. I would love to see them implement answers to some of the questions the basecamp (hey) folks raised here [1], but I'm pretty confident they'll implement some of them. I also suspect that many of the things basecamp/hey want to do break interop with other email clients for editing. That is, you can read them, but not use the hey features from other clients; Fastmail may not be willing to make that trade. Super excited to see what hey do though!
Either way, building a super-reliable email service that can handle 10s of gigs of emails and hundreds of thousands of messages is not easy and Fastmail does a good job.
[1] https://hey.com/problems-with-email/
This is quite a leap forward in organising emails. I believe emails need to be organised into concise groups in order for you to become your most productive.
One thing I would suggest is to allow the organisation of labels according to when the last email was received. Today, Yesterday, This week, Last week, This month, Last month etc.
I actually run a similar product called DarwinMail [1], which was built shortly after GoogleInbox announced it would shut down in 2018.
We have supported bundles (labels in Fastmail) for about 12 months now. Through consistent iterative updates (thanks to feedback from our users) we have made huge progress.
Apart from the core (built-in) bundles: travel, finance, purchases, forums, promotions, social, updates you can also create a bundle from any label you wish.
[1] https://www.darwinmail.app
One thing I would suggest is to allow the organisation of labels according to when the last email was received. Today, Yesterday, This week, Last week, This month, Last month etc.
I actually run a similar product called DarwinMail [1], which was built shortly after GoogleInbox announced it would shut down in 2018.
We have supported bundles (labels in Fastmail) for about 12 months now. Through consistent iterative updates (thanks to feedback from our users) we have made huge progress.
Apart from the core (built-in) bundles: travel, finance, purchases, forums, promotions, social, updates you can also create a bundle from any label you wish.
[1] https://www.darwinmail.app
Interesting. Is there an IMAP attribute similar to Gmail's X-GM-LABELS?
Label support comes via JMAP. As for how this is exposed in imap.fastmail.com I'm not aware somebody checked yet. Here https://www.emaildiscussions.com/showthread.php?t=76159 is a feature discussion around this feature. It's bound to appear there at some point.
(I work for Fastmail, but am not really involved with the teams that have done most of the work on labels.)
In the backend, there is no difference between labels mode and folders mode; all of the changes are in the UI. There are no IMAP attributes or keywords (they're poorly supported by third-party clients); any email message can appear in more than one mailbox, where "mailbox" means "folder" or "label".
On disk, mailboxes are stored as UNIX directories: all copies of the message (i.e., in all folders/labels) are hard links to the same inode. Over IMAP, each can have its own metadata (\Seen and \Flagged, for example), and they'll probably appear as separate copies (depending on how your client decides to do things).
As you say, JMAP has this built in: each Email object has a MailboxIds property. When the web client (or your own bespoke JMAP client!) fetches emails for one folder/label, and then you click to a different folder/label, the client doesn't have to download that message again, because it already has it in its local cache.
In the backend, there is no difference between labels mode and folders mode; all of the changes are in the UI. There are no IMAP attributes or keywords (they're poorly supported by third-party clients); any email message can appear in more than one mailbox, where "mailbox" means "folder" or "label".
On disk, mailboxes are stored as UNIX directories: all copies of the message (i.e., in all folders/labels) are hard links to the same inode. Over IMAP, each can have its own metadata (\Seen and \Flagged, for example), and they'll probably appear as separate copies (depending on how your client decides to do things).
As you say, JMAP has this built in: each Email object has a MailboxIds property. When the web client (or your own bespoke JMAP client!) fetches emails for one folder/label, and then you click to a different folder/label, the client doesn't have to download that message again, because it already has it in its local cache.
Would be good to do what Gmail does over IMAP because many email clients already know how to handle it.
A feature that only works in the web UI isn't useful for me and while I'm excited about JMAP, it doesn't have support in any of the email clients I can use.
A feature that only works in the web UI isn't useful for me and while I'm excited about JMAP, it doesn't have support in any of the email clients I can use.
I don't know, but Fastmail is using JMAP: https://www.fastmail.com/help/guides/interfaceupdate-2018.ht...
This supports labels: https://jmap.io/spec-mail.html
This supports labels: https://jmap.io/spec-mail.html
While I sympathize with a company providing a good service and being paid accordingly, $5 a month still seems too high for email.
Email is way more important than Netflix, so you should probably be willing to pay more for email than Netflix. FastMail can get pretty pricy in a multi-user scenario, but as a single account it's a pretty reasonable price.
$5 / month is still pretty close to $0 / month for many people. I transitioned from Gmail -> Fastmail a year ago, and I'm very happy with all aspects (reliability, features etc). Would be fine with paying > $5 month if that's what it took.
It's quite disappointing how skewed our perspective on software pricing is. I grew up in an era when compilers cost $1000; now people complain about $3 for an iPhone game.
Given that a burger cost $5, I'm more than fine with sacrificing a burger each month for private email.
Given that a burger cost $5, I'm more than fine with sacrificing a burger each month for private email.
Is there a standards for labels in IMAP protocol? Or this another Gmail like proprietary protocol? Does this sync all emails multiple times if they have multiple labels in a regular email client?
IMAP keywords are basically labels. IIRC they even have Thunderbird integration. You can "tag" messages in TB with a variety of hard-coded tags (like "Work" or "Todo") and they will be saved as IMAP keywords on the server.
The problem is that it's hard to create custom ones in Thunderbird. It involves editing about:config, and when custom ones are saved to the server, other instances of TB won't recognize them unless you edit the about:config of those instances too. Basically, it's possible but too much pain in the TB UI to be useful.
The problem is that it's hard to create custom ones in Thunderbird. It involves editing about:config, and when custom ones are saved to the server, other instances of TB won't recognize them unless you edit the about:config of those instances too. Basically, it's possible but too much pain in the TB UI to be useful.
I've been a Fastmail user for my personal email for several years now, however I still miss labels. Therefore I love seeing this.
It is unclear to me how this works with IMAP clients. Are these labels still exposed as folders over IMAP?
If so, I assume messages get duplicated, just as with Gmail, therefore the client will need special hacks to deal with it, just as with Gmail.
It is unclear to me how this works with IMAP clients. Are these labels still exposed as folders over IMAP?
If so, I assume messages get duplicated, just as with Gmail, therefore the client will need special hacks to deal with it, just as with Gmail.
So it looks like labels are like “multi-folders”, and unlike gmail, there is no mix of labels and folders. It’s either or.
Folders can be implemented by having a set of labels of which only one can be assigned to any given message. Then use folder names/paths as these labels and, voila, you got folders.
So perhaps it's something that is coming...
So perhaps it's something that is coming...
Except everything will get duplicated in Archive ;-)
All labels might actually be better.
Gmail does not have a mix of labels and folders. It's all labels in Gmail.
You're right. The "move message" icon is, however, of a folder[1], so I guess over time I came to the misunderstanding that I was working with folders!
[1] https://it.stonybrook.edu/sites/default/files/kb/8618/images...
[1] https://it.stonybrook.edu/sites/default/files/kb/8618/images...
GMail has a feature to emulate hierachies from labels, basically folders. Maybe that's what he meant.
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If you have a spouse and/or kids, and you want them to use FastMail for the same reason you do, consider putting pressure on FastMail to offer a (reasonable) family plan. I’ve been a happy customer for a decade but they’ve raised their prices (which would affect new accounts) and do not offer a family plan so this year be my last year with them.
Edit: typo
Edit: typo
This is a big reason why I list cheaper alternatives to Fastmail whenever the topic of emails comes here. If your needs are more than one mailbox (not aliases), then Fastmail soon becomes prohibitively expensive. A few years ago, when asked about cheaper pricing plans, Fastmail replied that it has no plans (no pun intended) to go cheaper or offer cheaper plans.
There are other alternatives that are cheaper and focus on privacy, reliability, etc. They may not be as famous as the Fastmail brand. Posteo (no custom domain support), Mailbox.org, Runbox, Migadu, Mailfence and Mxroute are just some of the providers out there that give Fastmail a run for the money. Vote with your wallet.
There are other alternatives that are cheaper and focus on privacy, reliability, etc. They may not be as famous as the Fastmail brand. Posteo (no custom domain support), Mailbox.org, Runbox, Migadu, Mailfence and Mxroute are just some of the providers out there that give Fastmail a run for the money. Vote with your wallet.
I suspect Fastmail can't afford to offer cheaper plans. I bet their common customer is a small business and offering cheap family plans would put a huge dent in their revenues. Also, I suspect it would attract people that need tech support. I'd bet a really nice dinner their cfo has modeled the numbers.
So as to prevent abuse from small businesses, why not request proofs that you are indeed a family, or something of the sort? (there some privacy-related edges in doing that though, and a time expense in verifying those docs...) Or, the other way around, add it explicitly in t&c that small businesses abusing family plans are violating t&c's?
Also, a family plan doesn't have to be 4x cheaper, even a 2x discount might do the trick if we're talking a family of 3-5.
I highly doubt this would put a "huge dent" in their revenues if all the nerds who are currently using their standard plans solo will invite their family members in and would start paying a little bit more than they currently do (e.g. 1.5x); what it would do though is it would earn them some positive karma and visibility on hn, reddit and other corners of the net.
Also, a family plan doesn't have to be 4x cheaper, even a 2x discount might do the trick if we're talking a family of 3-5.
I highly doubt this would put a "huge dent" in their revenues if all the nerds who are currently using their standard plans solo will invite their family members in and would start paying a little bit more than they currently do (e.g. 1.5x); what it would do though is it would earn them some positive karma and visibility on hn, reddit and other corners of the net.
Before the current prices, they had family plans and the rationale for removing them was that they are struggling to be profitable.
So your hutch goes counter to their direct declaration at the time (I'm a long time customer, don't have references ready, but I can look if you want).
"Positive karma and visibility on HN/Reddit" is laughable. Don't get me wrong, but I see a lot of self-entitlement on these threads, with people supposedly blocking ads for privacy reasons and due to not having a way to give money, yet when something like YouTube Premium happens, they still don't subscribe, because fuck them, too expensive. Brings the "eating your cake and having it too" ideal to a whole new level.
As a matter of fact the cheap or free users generate over 80% of the support tickets, always. And if it's free or too cheap, it means you're the product.
What gets actual positive karma is staying in business and not milking user data in order to serve ads. If you want your data to be milked, Gmail is still free.
So your hutch goes counter to their direct declaration at the time (I'm a long time customer, don't have references ready, but I can look if you want).
"Positive karma and visibility on HN/Reddit" is laughable. Don't get me wrong, but I see a lot of self-entitlement on these threads, with people supposedly blocking ads for privacy reasons and due to not having a way to give money, yet when something like YouTube Premium happens, they still don't subscribe, because fuck them, too expensive. Brings the "eating your cake and having it too" ideal to a whole new level.
As a matter of fact the cheap or free users generate over 80% of the support tickets, always. And if it's free or too cheap, it means you're the product.
What gets actual positive karma is staying in business and not milking user data in order to serve ads. If you want your data to be milked, Gmail is still free.
Thanks, these are all good points (and I did a bit of research/googling on the family plans that they had, too).
In a very simple example though: I'm currently considering getting a FM account, but I would only get it for the whole family, e.g. of 4. As of right now, I probably won't because 4 x $50/y is a tad too much.
So, in the one extreme, FM has to support +0 extra customers and gets $0. I'm not happy, they lose a customer, noone wins.
If I subscribe alone, FM has to support +1 customer and gets $50. Since it's their current plan, they are happy with it. FM wins.
Another unrealistic extreme, the whole family is free, FM has to support +4 customers and still gets $50. Obviously they aren't happy with it.
However, if the family gets a discount K, so that a family of four pay (K * $200), where K < 1, we get examples like e.g. they get +4 customers and +$150. If that's above their profit margins, they're happy and we're happy, everybody wins. I'm pretty sure even if K was something like 0.8 this would already attract many, the question is finding a number that suits everyone. Or it could be - get discount X% for family of size Y, so the discount is dynamic, e.g. 0.9 for 2, 0.85 for 3, etc.
I wouldn't categorize these users as "cheap" (why?) since it's not a whole lot cheaper than buying the normal plan X times. As long as there's a non-zero discount, it would be viewed differently by the users (as opposed to the current "fuck off, we don't care" approach).
In a very simple example though: I'm currently considering getting a FM account, but I would only get it for the whole family, e.g. of 4. As of right now, I probably won't because 4 x $50/y is a tad too much.
So, in the one extreme, FM has to support +0 extra customers and gets $0. I'm not happy, they lose a customer, noone wins.
If I subscribe alone, FM has to support +1 customer and gets $50. Since it's their current plan, they are happy with it. FM wins.
Another unrealistic extreme, the whole family is free, FM has to support +4 customers and still gets $50. Obviously they aren't happy with it.
However, if the family gets a discount K, so that a family of four pay (K * $200), where K < 1, we get examples like e.g. they get +4 customers and +$150. If that's above their profit margins, they're happy and we're happy, everybody wins. I'm pretty sure even if K was something like 0.8 this would already attract many, the question is finding a number that suits everyone. Or it could be - get discount X% for family of size Y, so the discount is dynamic, e.g. 0.9 for 2, 0.85 for 3, etc.
I wouldn't categorize these users as "cheap" (why?) since it's not a whole lot cheaper than buying the normal plan X times. As long as there's a non-zero discount, it would be viewed differently by the users (as opposed to the current "fuck off, we don't care" approach).
Your analysis again skips the cheap family plans (1) cannibalizing the full-price SMB plans; and (2) the families that are already on the normal plans that immediately demand a discount. And implicitly assert Fastmail's cfo hasn't modeled these scenarios and is just leaving money on the table because they don't like money.
Basecamp is launching their email service soon — Hey.com — as well.
Just speculating here, but it is likely not going to be much cheaper than Fastmail, knowing basecamp's pricing history. I hope they do launch a family plan though
I takes years to develop an interface, apps. etc. FM has been doing this for two decades plus
I’m in the same boat. I would happily migrate my wife, kid, parents, and possibly even my siblings over if it was more affordable to do so. They don’t see the value in not being in the Google ecosystem, so they aren’t willing to pay themselves, which is understandable. I would be happy to pay for them, but at $50/year per user that adds up too fast unfortunately.
What pricing plan would work for your family?
I’m not sure to be honest. At least, I’m it sure what would work for me, but that wouldn’t sabotage their business sales. It might be nice to have a family plan that’s “up to 10” users. It could be used by small companies but anything over 10 would have to migrate to a business plan. I wouldn’t mind it starting at $10/m for 3 accounts and then maybe $2/m for each additional up to 10? That would cap at $24/m for 10 personal email accounts, about 50% off their current pricing.
Thanks! That sounds like what I was also thinking.
I have five children, three of which have an email address. Right now we are on a grandfathered free GSuite account. I would love to get away from Google, but $250 (and $350 in a few years) per year feels pretty steep. Most of the family plans with other software tend to be in the vicinity of ~3 full price users for up to 6. This would feel very reasonable to me.
Just wanted to add my voice that I’d love to see a discounted family plan! Even if there were constraints on subsidiary accounts - it isn’t like my kids are sending 50 emails a day.
Edit: I should note I am already a paying customer with my business email.
Just wanted to add my voice that I’d love to see a discounted family plan! Even if there were constraints on subsidiary accounts - it isn’t like my kids are sending 50 emails a day.
Edit: I should note I am already a paying customer with my business email.
If anyone from fast mail reads this, I would like to agree to this too.
I would love a family plan that would let me put my parents on my domain, however I cannot justify current fast mail pricing for the several emails each week
I would love a family plan that would let me put my parents on my domain, however I cannot justify current fast mail pricing for the several emails each week
This is the only reason I'm not on fastmail.
While I'll easily pay $5 for myself and a few more I'm basically forcing all emails on my domains to go through fastmail. And if I want to lend the domain name for relatives to use for email it seems like a rip-off to expect them to pay 5*$5 a month for a family with three kids.
It really annoys me that you can not use the Basic account (which regardless is very restricted) with a domain. By all means, require that the account that manages the domain at the Standard level but as it is now there is no sensible way to allow add some low-volume mail accounts for relatives or family members that aren't tech-savvy.
While I'll easily pay $5 for myself and a few more I'm basically forcing all emails on my domains to go through fastmail. And if I want to lend the domain name for relatives to use for email it seems like a rip-off to expect them to pay 5*$5 a month for a family with three kids.
It really annoys me that you can not use the Basic account (which regardless is very restricted) with a domain. By all means, require that the account that manages the domain at the Standard level but as it is now there is no sensible way to allow add some low-volume mail accounts for relatives or family members that aren't tech-savvy.
I have migrated 4 people from my family to Fastmail. It was a xmas present. We did the setup together on Christmas Eve and exchanges some mails. Emails sent after that day equal 0. I guess will be ending the contract too. No worth 200 USD / year for 0 mails sent.
That said would support a family plan too. For me it’s important that they are not sitting on a free gmail account.
That said would support a family plan too. For me it’s important that they are not sitting on a free gmail account.
Is anyone from FastMail reading this by any chance?..
Another +1 here, currently considering FM for myself, spouse and/or kids, and while for a single person it's bearable, for 4 it becomes overly expensive so we'd have to look for alternatives.
Another +1 here, currently considering FM for myself, spouse and/or kids, and while for a single person it's bearable, for 4 it becomes overly expensive so we'd have to look for alternatives.
Not yet - most of the fastmail team is here in Melbourne, and it’s 5am. I’m sure they’ll see all this in a few hours and respond then.
I pay $150/yr for three people. Give me $250 for 10 people. The extra seven people won't be using as many compute/storage resources guaranteed.
Same for us. Family of four, I have a basic account.
I'd happily switch to a standard plan if it enabled access to a family feature.
I'd happily switch to a standard plan if it enabled access to a family feature.
I've been with fastmail for about a year now. My wife wants to leave Gmail and have been thinking about Fastmail as well, but the price per user puts us down... waiting for Hey and see what their price plan will be
Same here. Family of four + some members of the extended family. I am doing IT for all and would be happy to move everybody to fastmail under the same custom domain.
Same here. I have 2 Fastmail accounts (1 personal, 1 business, paid 2 years in advance for both because I'm certain I will stick around), and use Amazon Prime Family, Spotify Premium Family... would really like to use a Fastmail Family. I use the Professional Plan on my personal account, but my wife would use much much less GB, but I would need to add her with her own 100 GB Professional plan.
I have four kids each with Gmail accounts. And a wife with a Gmail account. Is there any reason for me to migrate to FastMail for myself if I don’t migrate them? The only thing I could think of was that all of our logins are through my Gmail account so I can move those into Fastmail just to have them out of Gmail.
ditto. this is a winning strategy for FM, and with three kids it would be a no-brainer to me. As it is, though, you have only one customer.
100% agree. I look into it once a year at least (usually multiple times), make some transition plans... but I just can't drop hundreds, almost a grand a year, to fully transition myself and the family :<
I fully understand that there are costs, but I feel having a family plan would increase your revenue and profit.
I fully understand that there are costs, but I feel having a family plan would increase your revenue and profit.
That's a lot of mailboxes. Is it like $50 * 8?
They used to have a family account, but they removed it. I'm not sure why.
From a business point of view I think that creating a family plan would likely decrease their revenue (in the short term), as lot of small businesses/professional users would abuse this
Does it work with Spark?
Does Spark implement the JMAP protocol (successor to IMAP)?
Doesn't look like it.
But searching for "spark + jmap" return interesting results, haha
But searching for "spark + jmap" return interesting results, haha
So Mailmate should be compatible with those, can anyone confirm?
I was wondering the same. And other mail clients as well.
Just tried it, it seems to only work one-way and tags behave like regular folders. So Mailmate shows your web-created tags as folders, but if you apply an existing tag in Mailmate nothing happens in the web version.
Edit: found that discussion on JMAP support in Mailmate: https://lists.freron.com/mailmate/2019-January/010799.html
Edit: found that discussion on JMAP support in Mailmate: https://lists.freron.com/mailmate/2019-January/010799.html
>Add colors to your Labels ...
>Switching back to Folders mode: ... Your labels will be converted into Folders.
Upon converting back to Folder mode, what happens to our painstakingly entered per-label color assignments?
As a Fastmail user, this worries me, as on its face suggesting a destructive bulk state change to all metadata of the account.
>Switching back to Folders mode: ... Your labels will be converted into Folders.
Upon converting back to Folder mode, what happens to our painstakingly entered per-label color assignments?
As a Fastmail user, this worries me, as on its face suggesting a destructive bulk state change to all metadata of the account.
In the backend, there’s no difference between labels and mailboxes. This switch is purely a boolean that instructs the the webmail client which set of behaviours to use.
Your colours will remain intact if you switch between the two. Mailboxes can have colours too.
Your colours will remain intact if you switch between the two. Mailboxes can have colours too.
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what about zoho? i use it for business but is it viable and friendly for non-tech literate families? I simply connect zoho to thunderbird.
Curious to hear how people use these!
As a fastmail user I was waiting for them, but now knowing its either labels OR folders, I will stick with folders. Labels tend to be much more disorganized for me. I consider them an extra on top, not essential
I have been looking for alternatives to gmail for quite some time but without luck so far aslabels are absolutely essential to me.
I kind of use them like folders, but one main difference is that I can keep important emails in my "Inbox", while they can still show the label. With folders, they basically become archived right away, so there were emails that I was hesitant to assign a folder to, because it'd mean that they'd disappear from my view.
Basically the "Inbox" is my TODO list in a sense. And with labels I can keep better track of what is necessary for the emails/todos to become archived.
Basically the "Inbox" is my TODO list in a sense. And with labels I can keep better track of what is necessary for the emails/todos to become archived.
That makes sense. Thanks for sharing!
How many users does fastmail have?
Too expensive.
That they don't chase free users is an advantage to those of us who pay. For about $50 per year, I get rock solid, feature-rich email as well as fast support from real people who are informed and empowered.
It's not for everyone, but it's worth it if you value your mail and time.
It's not for everyone, but it's worth it if you value your mail and time.
Ya, been a user since 2009. I’ve been really happy in those nearly 11 years. The price has gone up, I originally paid $35/yr, it is now $45 (less if you pay several years in advance) but still generally worth it.
My only complaint is that the more they extend JMAP the more I want a dedicated email client that supports it, and none do as far as I am aware.
My only complaint is that the more they extend JMAP the more I want a dedicated email client that supports it, and none do as far as I am aware.
I appreciate that with JMAP, FastMail has essentially become the first entity to do labels correctly, with a freaking standard behind it, but client support isn't going to be there for many years so I will avoid it. The big upside for me is it'll take away one reason people say they can't leave Gmail.