# I canceled an email address I had for 33 years **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 13, 2026, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643 "2026-07-13T15:42:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/21 "2026-07-13T18:27:53Z")
I’ve had the same primary email _address_ since nearly the beginning of POP/SMTP internet email. I have a domain name and an email address at that domain. I’ve used about 6 email providers over that time, all with that same address, but the most recent for about 15 years now. Which provider will probably last the rest of my life. So it sorta depends on how you want to keep score. Either about 1990, or about 2010. I also have separate throwaway and emergency backup minimal-use email addresses at other ISP / email providers. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/22 "2026-07-13T18:40:39Z")
I have been a Cox cable customer for many years. In 1997, Cox first offered internet in my area, and I signed up and my wife and I each got free Cox email addresses. So we’ve had them for 29 years. She still uses hers as her primary email, while I use my 15-year-old Gmail account as my primary. Cox converted their email to Yahoo a couple of years ago, which is a major improvement over what they were using. ---
**Author:** ![TreacherousCretin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treacherouscretin/32/476_2.png) [@TreacherousCretin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TreacherousCretin)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/23 "2026-07-13T18:59:30Z")
I’ve had my Roadrunner (Time Warner Cable, now Spectrum) for 30 years. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/24 "2026-07-13T19:07:14Z")
I’ve had my Yahoo account since at least 1999. That’s the oldest email I can find. I’m sure signed up in 1998 or so but can’t where it tracks the membership data. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/25 "2026-07-13T19:58:03Z")
My current main email address is the first personal one I got, I don’t remember what year. I had had a work email before that for a little while. I might be described as reluctant to change. ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/26 "2026-07-13T20:49:36Z")
My first address was [glee@difference-engine.uk](mailto:glee@difference-engine.uk). Mind you, I could only send messages to [ada@difference-engine.uk](mailto:ada@difference-engine.uk) … 🧐 ---
**Author:** ![Frodo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/frodo/32/302_2.png) [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/27 "2026-07-13T21:10:58Z")
Charles is that you? (shades of Grampa Simpson listening to the radio, the only thing was Edison reading the Aphabet, “a” he said, then “b”, “c” followed, generally) ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/28 "2026-07-13T22:20:09Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > It started as a NetCom account which later was bought by MindSpring which in turn was bought by Earthlink. That’s dedication! I had my \_\_\_\_@ix.netcom.com account from 1994 but gave it up around 2007. It was already an antique back then. I still have access to some yahoo accounts from 1998, but the oldest account I still use is gmail from 2005. > [@hajario](#): > > I don’t see how to do that in the Settings menus. Here it is in GMail, don’t know if Yahoo is at all similar. [![](https://i.postimg.cc/yNyzZnfV/email-Settings.png) ](https://i.postimg.cc/yNyzZnfV/email-Settings.png) ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/29 "2026-07-13T22:58:37Z")
> [@TroutMan](#): > > Here it is in GMail, don’t know if Yahoo is at all similar. It is not. Though, with Yahoo you can request a download of all of your data they have on their server, and you might be able to get a registration date from it. I’ve actually requested that, because I was curious, but apparently it takes time after you put in the request. I did check my Gmail account, and it shows November of 2005 in that spot, so I guess that’s how old my Gmail account is. It’s definitely newer than either my Yahoo or Mac.com accounts. I know that my Gmail account is old enough that at the time it was difficult to get one, and I had to get an invitation from someone else who already had one. (Looking it up in Google, Gmail was first available in April of 2004, so it had only been around a year and a half when I got an email account. And it _was_ invitation-only until 2007, so my Gmail account is pretty old.) ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2026, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/30 "2026-07-13T23:24:08Z")
My university has provided email since late 1984, but my email address has undergone at least two changes since then. The first one was .bitnet, which changed in the mid 902 to name@math.mcgill.ca and further changed when the department stopped stopped supporting it (the sysop died and was not replaced since it was really no longer necessary for the dept. to provide support) and sometime around 2010, well after I retired it changed to first.last@mcgill.ca. Curiously (and inexplicably) last.first@mcgill.ca also works and it is actually the latter that goes on my outgoing mail. Why do I keep? It’s what all my acquaintances know and it is free. Why not? My wife, who took several courses and earned a certificate in translator (and worked for three decades as a translator) has a student account of the form firstm.last@mail.mcgill.ca where they attached her middle initial to her first name. Again, it is free. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/31 "2026-07-14T00:07:37Z")
I have a Yahoo Mail account that was converted from a RocketMail account when Yahoo acquired rocketmail. I got the account in 1997. I think I was one of the first few web based email accounts. I have my first name + lastmail @ [yahoo.com](http://yahoo.com) as my email address and both my first and last names are very common. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/32 "2026-07-14T03:09:36Z")
I still occasionally use my oldest email address that I’ve had since around 1999, which is also a domain I own, but I couldn’t get it to work with Gmail, so I had to get a Gmail for some specific situations, and soon became my new default. Unfortunately I don’t know how to merge my Google accounts so I can let either go, so I have to keep them both to keep my old username attached to YouTube and elsewhere. I’m reluctant to cut them off cleanly, there has to be a transition period. ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/33 "2026-07-14T03:22:16Z")
My oldest is 32 years old. But my gmail is my main account and it is 22 years old. Back then you could get them with just your last name (or maybe throw on a first name initial) if you were not named Smith. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/34 "2026-07-14T03:55:59Z")
My main account is Gmail and it’s 20+ years. Before that I had a an email from a service that had registered hundreds of domains with last names and you could get your first name @ last [name.com](http://name.com), .org or .net. Then they jacked up the prices so I switched to gmail. I’ve got a Hotmail account that I rarely see anymore and it’s maybe 25 years old. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/35 "2026-07-14T04:11:36Z")
At my first job I had an address _lastname_@decvax, an Arpanet backbone site. When you needed to know the path to ensure delivery, having a backbone email address made things easier. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/36 "2026-07-14T04:26:42Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > My university has provided email since late 1984 Oh, yeah - I forgot about my work address. Terminated as of last year, but that was definitely the longest as of now. Although the preferred setup of _first initial and last name@domain_ eventually changed to _first name.last name@domain_, the original still worked right down until the end. That one dated back to 1990, so just about 35 years. ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/37 "2026-07-14T04:28:08Z")
I’ve been using email since before Domain Names existed, and we had to use bang addressing. That was a real pain in the ass. My current email address dates to when I created my own domain, in late 2000 I think. ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/38 "2026-07-14T19:49:17Z")
My Gmail account is from the invite only Gmail beta, it’s the only one i currently use. Not quite sure when that was though. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/39 "2026-07-14T20:01:11Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > It is not. Though, with Yahoo you can request a download of all of your data they have on their server, and you might be able to get a registration date from it. I’ve actually requested that, because I was curious, but apparently it takes time after you put in the request. It became available today. And my Yahoo email is older than I thought! I have the precise time it was created. > Dec 06, 2000 09:38 PM UTC So it is over 25 years old. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be any way to confirm how old my Mac.com address is, though it can’t be too much older than that since 2000 was when they were first made available. I would guess it was probably in the summer of that same year. ---
**Author:** ![sb1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a87d85/32.png) [@sb1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sb1953)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2026, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643/40 "2026-07-14T20:05:49Z")
I started with [Juno.com](http://Juno.com) in 1999 and still have it. They started charging me for the “turbo” version about 15 years ago and it took a couple days of phone calls but I finally cancelled the turbo part last year. It is a HUGE well of spam -n-crap [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-canceled-an-email-address-i-had-for-33-years/1031643.md?page=3)