Need a good kids e-mail service

MissTake · October 29, 2003, 4:42pm

LilMiss has entered the realm of e-mailing pals…

She had signed up of a service (Lilhangout.com), but she couldn’t get e-mails from me or other family members. I attempted to contact the company that runs the e-mail, but couldn’t find anywhere to do so!

Please help her (and me, cuz I am getting tired of her using MY Hotmail, then asking what v1@gra is and why do guys want larger penises!)!

I do not want her to use a HUGE e-mail service (ie Hotmail or Yahoo), nor do I want one that tends to be SPAM happy.

What are some great kid-friendly e-mail services?

lauramarlane · October 29, 2003, 4:52pm

I got my son a hotmail account and set it to exclusive. That way only email from people in his address book can get through to his inbox, and he can check his email from my house, his dad’s house, or the library. Would that be a possiblity for LilMiss?

MissTake · October 29, 2003, 7:37pm

I really do not want her on such a huge e-mail service. I do want web-based so she can check it other places also, but I’m leery of spam and such-- no matter HOW good the walls you put up may be, there’s a good change with such monolithic services some stuff will ooze through.

lauramarlane · October 29, 2003, 9:18pm

I understand your concerns completely! My son is only 11 and I had the same concerns. I set up a dummy account that I made exclusive and monitored for a few months and nothing did sneak through, but that’s not a guarantee.

There are some kid email accounts out there, but I haven’t found anything that’s free unfortunately. I’ll ask the children’s librarian at the library I work at if she’s familiar with any software and let you know if I can help.

Toddly · October 30, 2003, 1:51am

Why couldn’t she use an e mail account from your ISP. You just need to set up another Identity if you are using IE. Most ISP’s allow several e-mail accounts and if she only gives it out to her friends then the spam should be managable.

herwono · October 30, 2003, 2:27am

You can try E-Garfield Email.

MissTake · October 30, 2003, 2:22pm

lauramarlane: Thanks! Any info you can obtain you be much appreciated!

Toddly: Tried that. When I logged into my ISP e-mail, however, I found that the entire ISP is going away effective 12/31/03. Because of the (now) short term nature, she said she didn’t want to use it. Also, it had a fairly long name which she had a hard time remembering

herwono: Thanks to you also! I’ll have her take a gander at it!

Toddly · October 30, 2003, 3:54pm

I use a free web based account from Myway.com. I do not get any spam in that account. It resembles Yahoo but not quite as large. You might give it a look.

Elenfair · October 30, 2003, 4:02pm

Another goodone to try is

http://www.mailpuppy.com

They have very good spam filters, and I never got any crap in my account there. I used it for my mom’s students, too, at one point and it worked really well.

So long as kidlet doesn’t spread the email around, no spam should reach the kidlet.

alterego · October 30, 2003, 4:14pm

www.spl.at is a good youth portal with e-mail

lauramarlane · November 3, 2003, 6:43pm

I checked with our children’s librarian and she’s recommended mailpuppy to a few of the parents, but most kids use hotmail or yahoo anyway because they’re cooler (well, that’s the word in the computer lab, at any rate.)