Do you use 1 or several? What’s your philosophical approach to email?
I have 5 major email accounts:
[ol]
[li]personal (friends & family)[/li][li]personal business (amazon orders, bank statement notifications, etc)[/li][li]work (my consulting company, but not client specific)[/li][li]client (for the current client because each site likes to add you to their email system)[/li][li]dummy (throwaway email for any software download or news article that require a valid email address; periodically change the accountname from dummy1 to dummy2 to shake off the followup spam)[/li][/ol]
Plus I have a dozen or so “archive” email files I kept from previous employment. The accounts are no longer active but I keep the PST data file for reference.
[ol]
[li]archive1 (old job #1)[/li][li]archive2 (old job #2)[/li][li]archiveN (old job #N, etc, etc)[/li][/ol]
I use Outlook 2007. Each account has its own dedicated *.PST file. I never delete old emails. They act as a “free” diary of my life. It’s interesting to rummage through some email archives to see the thoughts going through my head at a particular time.
I also tend to answer work related emails with paragraphs of research so each work-related archive acts as a “knowledge management” database.
I don’t use instant message and discourage voicemails on my cellphone so emails are my main linkage to the outside world. However, I’m not the type to always answer personal email within a day. My typical turnaround is 2 or 3 days.
I haven’t updated the email technology to forward them to my cellphone. At the moment, I just carry a cheap Motorola RAZR. The email forwarding seems to work better for big screen devices like iPhone or Blackberry.
I’ve had my oldest email account (the personal one) since 1997 with all the emails since that time. Amazingly, it’s been fairly spam free.
I deliberatly avoided hotmail and gmail because I’ve had my email long before those services became available. Also at the time, they did not have POP mailbox access which meant I couldn’t keep an archive of all my emails on my local computer. I’m definitely a packrat when it comes to emails.
work and personal - I like things simple. Ok, fine I have one little step-child hotmail account for all unwanted downloads that may get copious amounts of spam…so 2.5 accounts to be accurate.
1.) Oldest, maiden name–mainly used for spam these days but I still check it because sometimes friends or family accidentally email me there.
2.) Main–for use on resumes, and for friends and family, and online accounts, etc. where I don’t need to be anonymous
3.) Anonymous–This is my peski_piksi account, used for fan-ficcing, message-board use, etc., where I don’t want someone to know who I am unless they put some real effort into it.
4.) Ebay–only reason I don’t use #2 account for this is because when I first signed up it was to buy a gift for someone I knew was watching the auction…didn’t want her to know I was buying it for her. Rarely used and only occasionally checked.
I totally forgot that I also have a dedicated email account for ebay & PayPal. I did this as a security precaution. I didn’t want someone trying my PayPal email account to hack into my Chase & Citi bank accounts.
–My “personal” account. This is my general all-purpose address, on Gmail.
–My “professional” email. This is a gmail account I set up when I was in private practice, and my clinic didn’t have its own domain, so I could have a more professional-looking email. (It’s my name “MD” at gmail.)
–One for my radio show.
–One for the radio show under its old name. I changed it about six months ago, so I should probably take this one off of my Gmail Manager.
–One through the university that I work for now.
I count about six that I’ve had in the past few years that are inactive–other school accounts, old personal accounts, accounts I’ve set up for specific purposes, etc.
Used for the SDMB, rarely does it see any action
3-4 Used for ordering thing and registering things. If I get mail there, it is usually spam, so I don’t think too much about it.
1/ firstinitiallastname - for job searches and ‘personally professional’ email.
2/ old joke name - now primary for spam searches and when one-time purchases ask for emails (mag subscriptions, contests, whatnot)
3/ new joke name in german (which funny when translated but also with the double entendre), still reads nonsensical but appropriate in english - for friends only. But the stalker has this one too; I just block her.
I’m hoping once I get a job again I will have an official business email. I always only use these for real job stuff.
I have several e-mail addresses (the oldest dating back to ~1997 I believe), but they all collect in the same (gmail for domains) account. Hence the 10,000 spam e-mails per day.
Main personal (firstnamelastname@ISP) for most personal correspondence, online orders, etc.
Main anonymous (twickster47@yahoo) for here, dating, etc.
Personal/professional (initialslastname@gmail) for freelance work, job applications, etc.
Old personal (firstnamelastname@previousISP) was #1 with my old ISP; it got overrun with spam, but I occasionally check through it to see if there’s anything actually for me there.
When I’m working, I generally have a work address also
Gmail, to use to sign up for stuff that requires an email address when I don’t want to give my “real” email address, and which I almost never check,
Alumni account from college, forwards to #1 (this account is set up by the University only to forward and has no associated storage capacity). Almost all mail though this is of the “you’ve been out of school for 10 years, time to give us money!” kind.
Personal address for my wife and me. Handed out judiciously, never gets any spam.
Personal address used for giving out online when buying stuff, registering for forums, etc. This is the one that gets spammed. Never gets email from real people.
Personal address for bills
The one for bills is the only one that I do not constantly monitor. I check that one every day or two.