Allow opt-out from Mailspring ID

[OmeGak]

Edit by Maintainers: You can find a more complete response to this question on our Knowledge Base here: https://foundry376.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115003141552-What-is-a-Mailspring-ID-and-why-do-I-need-one-

Feature Request? I'm not interested in the features Mailspring ID brings. Would it be possible to use Mailspring without Mailspring ID? I believe all necessary features for a fully-working open source email client are built-in, so why forcing to use Mailspring ID? This, along with mailsync not being open source (#24), kinda defeats the purpose of the Mailspring client being open source. Well, besides the fact that anybody can make a fork of this project and disable the feature.

Does this feature exist in another mail client or tool you use?

Thunderbird.

---

It seems there is now a fork, started by @notpushkin, that removes Mailspring ID. Updating the issue to give it some visibility to the comment that announces it:

Hey broth/33/rs, tell me what you think. https://github.com/notpushkin/Mailspring-Libre

[billylindeman]

👍

[jakubgs]

I installed Mailspring thinking "Oh boy, this will be great.", but then I saw the registration form...

sudo apt remove mailspring

[thegass]

sudo dnf install mailspring-1.5.3-0.1.x86_64.rpm 5 minutes later and reading this thread sudo dnf erase mailspring

mandatory 3rd party account to read my mails -> dealbreaker.

[securityopa]

I love the interface of this email address as much as I hate the interface of Thunderbird.

Of course I would pay for Mailspring but would never ever share my company's email with your cloud. It does not matter how to what you collect. You should not collect anything in any terms at least you should make it as a feature. For example a feature that the user would select if he or she would like to have a cloud sync between all computers which he or she has.

I almost installed this app on our linux desktops, but when I saw this thread ... Well.... I would not even get neat it as sharing data with your servers should not be mandatory.

[bliet]

Same here. Just want to evaluate this client. But with a registration for a service that is not needed... no way.

[dmitryd]

I was looking for e Linux email client too and installed MailSpring. As long as it prompted me to create an account without a way to opt-out, I got rid of MailSpring at once. No spying, thanks.

I am willing to pay for the opt-out but I would never allow to send my mail activity to a 3rd party server. So, bye, MailSpring.

[fictitiousexistence]

Agreed. The Mailspring ID is a major turnoff.

[noplanman]

Honestly, the main problem I'm seeing here in this issue, is how it's simply not being addressed as the comments are piling up.

So at this point I'm not really open to trying MailSpring any more even if this ludicrous "feature" were removed.

This isn't a problem of the product any more, but of the project itself (i.e. the developers / decision makers). Seems like a nice example of an Open Source project NOT being Free Software.

[rbos]

I went to give this software a try, and was informed that I had to start up a mandatory account on your servers.

No. Dealbreaker.

[javenschuetz]

I think it would be less troubling for people if the privacy policy didn't claim that user personal information wasn't a business asset. It isn't necessarily the ID per-se, as I see it anyway.

"revenue from Mailspring Pro (which competes with subscription products like Mailbird, Rapportive, Mixmax, etc.) will allow me and others at F376 to allocate time to maintaining it indefinitely"

A lot of us are not against paying for software, we just are trying very hard to keep our data to ourselves.

[vincenzoml]

I'm a researcher in Computer Science.

I also was looking for a good imap client for linux, and was about to click "install" on the mailspring .deb then I realised that I needed to permit a third party application to simultaneously hold my e-mail passwords AND make encrypted connections to a third party server and I decided not to install it. Just wanted to share this with the devs, maybe they can understand what this looks like, from the outside.

[benkay86]

Agree with above.

dnf install mailspring-1.5.6-0.1.x86_64.rpm
mailspring
# realize ID creation is mandatory
pkill mailspring
dnf remove mailspring

It's a shame because this looks to be otherwise great software with no dependency on the ID for its core features. Firefox has an optional ID and they are doing OK monetarily...

[wiebel]

Complete show stopper, so sad.

[securityopa]

I would definitely pay for a version which respects my privacy. TBH This could be the best replacement for Apple Mail on my mac and thunderbird for my Linux and windows.

Now, there is no way.

[vincenzoml]

After having read the justification from the devs, that they are maintaining a server (and presumably paying for it) just for the sake of storing metadata associated with mail messages, I smiled a little bit. What I would do (and plenty of people can also get there) is to use IMAP folders to store such metadata and cache it locally. Now tell me this is "technically unfeasible". Make me smile again :)

[prozumr]

The client seems to be stable and robust with a nice fresh UI hence basically a real alternative to Thunderbird. But after all what I am reading in this thread it is simply a No-Go. The business model is a shame. I a willing to pay for good software but I do not want something that is violating fundamental data privacy principles - not even for free. -- Too bad.

[BrainAnnex]

What is this nonsense about FORCING people to create a "Mailspring ID"???

As many, many have complained on this thread, there ought to be an OPT-OUT !

Although I entered some fake junk name/email, and it seems to go past the intrusive sign up.

Anyone who wants to create intrusive programs ought to go work for Microsoft....

More importanty, what's with the heavy-handed attempt to upsell by forcing a max of 4 email accounts, unless one coughs up $8/mo ? :o

I'm not necessarily against freemium for sort-of-useless extra features like "snooze" or whatever, but a minimum # of email accounts?!? Oh, please!

Someone ought to FORK this project, and do it as a REAL community email client program. I'll look into that myself! For now, I'll pass on this so-called "free" email client....

Edit: Someone said that the mailsync module is closed source. Is that a necessary component to the basic email function? This Mailspring program is beginning to appear more sleazy than Microsoft, just incredible!

[securityopa]

I agree with you 100%,

After I saw this, I donated some money to Thunderbird and I decided to keep using it instead. Although it has a horrible oldish look but it works great with all kinds of features which are included in the paid version.

Its a shame!

On Mar 9, 2019, at 12:05 AM, BrainAnnex notifications@github.com wrote:

What is this nonsense about FORCING people to create a "Mailspring ID"???

As many, many have complained on this thread, they ought to be an OPT-OUT !

Although I entered some fake junk name/email, and it seems to go past the intrusive sign up.

Anyone who wants to create intrusive programs ought to go work for Microsoft....

More importanty, what's with the heavy-handed attempt to upsell by forcing a max of 4 email accounts, unless one coughs up $8/mo ? :o

I'm not necessarily against freemium for sort-of-useless extra features like "snooze" or whatever, but a minimum # of email accounts?!? Oh, please!

Someone ought to FORK this project, and do it as a REAL community email client program. I'll look into that myself! For now, I'll pass on this so-called "free" email client....

— You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[BrainAnnex]

I agree with you 100%, After I saw this, I donated some money to Thunderbird and I decided to keep using it instead. Although it has a horrible oldish look but it works great with all kinds of features which are included in the paid version. Its a shame!

I have tried Thunderbird a number of times in recent years... It was my first go-to choice, but:

1) cluttered/ugly [not a big deal for me]

2) not-so-good search functions. On a number of occasions, I was able to find items thru Outlook's search function, but not Thunderbird - doing the same search in the same account! :o That made me lose interest in Thunderbird

3) most recently, Thunderbird is not showing some emails that are in the account - and which show up just fine in Outlook!

I've had it with Thunderbird!

Maybe I'll hold my nose and pay for Mail Bird instead. They seem misleading and over-aggressive in their marketing, and I'm not a fan of their "Window 10" style, but it seemed to work well in a recent test - and they offer a deep discount if you buy soon after installing it...

At least they don't pretend to be a "free open source project"...

[ArchangeGabriel]

@BrainAnnex So because you don’t like that a partly oss project might be doing something with your emails, your prefer to rely on completely proprietary system where you have no idea what they are doing? Seems reasonable.

Other than that, people (on Linux) not liking Thunderbird should give Geary a try, they have been a lot of improvements in the recent 0.13 release.

[securityopa]

Thank you for the suggestion. Personally I love how Geary looks however, still it lacks many features comparing to Thunderbird. The most simple feature which I need is images in the signature which is needed for companies and business.

Still, Geary is perfect for basic email users.

On 12.03.2019, at 10:25, Bruno Pagani notifications@github.com wrote:

able.

Other than that, people (on Linux) not liking

[jlbribeiro]

@BrainAnnex I subscribed this thread (and #24 as well) because I'm hoping either someone will fork this project and maintain an open-source sync engine or for Mailspring to change its direction. So I understand why you'd be upset but... I don't think the "tone" helps.

On Mail Bird: personally it doesn't fly (pun intended) because it's proprietary; I'd say most of us in this thread wanted Mailspring to be the best free and open-source mail client, no closed-source components (like the sync engine) or strings attached (like the Mailspring ID or any kind of "central control").

Geary is great and that's my "pretty and simple" alternative to Thunderbird. My only concern was that for some time it seemed abandoned (the changelog/releases stopped for ~half an year I think) and I was experiencing some frequent crashes while syncing big mailboxes at the time, but these days not only those syncing issues are gone, development seems to be back on track as well. It does lack some features (namely PGP/GPG integration), but for most users I'd say it does the job. You can track the development at their GitLab repo (IMHO it also didn't help they were keeping code in their own source code tracker; I think GNOME benefited from their migration to GitLab, because it helps with visibility).

[groovenectar]

Revisiting email clients, I can't believe I still had Mailspring installed for some reason after being unable to get past this bug from the first run.

Fixed this today with sudo snap remove mailspring

[Bugsbane]

If the ID is really about providing pro features then only force it on users of the pro plan.

Simple.

[HansCronau]

Fixed this today with sudo snap remove mailspring

Thx. That solved it. ;)

Honestly too bad though. I applaud any attempt to make an open source project financially sustainable, but in this day and age I pay not to have my data on your server. Would have loved to have a look past that sign up screen.

[headersalreadysent]

sudo apt-get purge mailspring purge is better.

[filicivi]

Same here. Discovered mailspring and decided to give it a chance. Googling about of getting rid of registration/ID, I decided to solve in radically manner: Removed: mailspring-1.6.1-0.1.x86_64

[jcarlosroldan]

If you came from WIndows like me, and you are looking for something similar to Outlook (column layout, allows Exchange protocol, calendar, native intregration...) you can install Thunderbird, and add the following addons:

• Exchange Calendar: To sync calendars, tasks and contacts using Exchange
• ExQuilla for Microsoft Exchange: Also required to read some Exchange servers
• Lightning: Calendar interface with a nice integration in the Thunderbird interface
• Messaging Menu and Unity Launcher integration: For Ubuntu integration

And you won't need any registration/ID.

[howdev]

Mailspring fork of Open Source Nylas and using proprietary mailsync core. Mailspring Pro is a paid version. All that being said, They making profit just by adding a few features on a large portion of the software they did not design or write. Meanwhile ID is required to use it. If you want to charge people for the software, write your own software instead of taking from the Open Source. If they want to continue to promote Nylas by forking the source then don't charge at all, that is good ethics.

[ArchangeGabriel]

@howdev Please avoid such attack, especially when this is false: @bengotow was one of the main Nylas dev.

[howdev]

@ArchangeGabriel Please check Open Source license. Mailspring is not Open Source when the the core is proprietary and not separable. The Open Source license states source should be made available to modified and redistribute. If whatever proprietary code is separable as an addon and Mailspring can function without it then Mailspring is Open Source.

[ArchangeGabriel]

The core is separable since you are free to implement your own version that match the API. This is not good, almost everyone here (me included) want an open-source core, but it’s not by attacking the developer that things may change.

[aaroncommand]

@bengotow Many people have commented about the technical and privacy issues around requiring a Mailspring account, but it's also a bad decision from a business, marketing and revenue perspective.

A large number of people obviously don't even try the program because of this -- the evidence is here on Github. I know it has been a showstopper for me twice, I keep hearing about Mailspring, twice now I've downloaded it, got up to the screen that wants me to create an ID but doesn't really explain why, and then I've quit and uninstalled.

From a business perspective, you give this client away for free because you want people to upsell to a paid plan later. But requiring the account results in fewer people completing the install, which means fewer people who you can sell the paid plan to.

I have absolutely no problem with creating an account to acquire paid services, but I'm not going to create an account just to try out a piece of desktop software. This is not something people who use desktop software are accustomed to doing. There's nothing on your website which makes a compelling case that it's necessary. I read the article about it - https://foundry376.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/115003141552-What-is-a-Mailspring-ID-and-why-do-I-need-one- Snooze? Send later? If they really need an account, rip them out of the free client. Make them paid features. The correct time for desktop software to require account creation is when someone's ready to bust out their credit card. Otherwise you are just creating more friction and reducing the number of people who use your software.

+1 to this issue from someone who loves to pay for good software, but absolutely won't create an account that stores email metadata in the cloud so that I can download and try an email client.

[groovenectar]

Snooze? Send later? If they really need an account, rip them out of the free client. Make them paid features.

@aaroncommand Sure, add features for paid... But my issue with this is, why target people who pay you money and decrease the security and user experience only for those people? I guess it's a whole other issue as far as putting a price tag on human rights, and using free services as a ticket to harvest souls.

I really doubt that Mailspring has nefarious intentions of course, and perhaps they don't even take the email addresses and automatically add them to a marketing mailing list. Adding the login feature to desktop software, and keeping data introduces a vulnerability, no matter what intention of the login is. For example, some people use the same password (they shouldn't but on the same token it's certainly convenient), and it's yet another place where that password could be compromised by a bad actor. An email client doesn't need these things to operate. It needs to communicate with mailservers to serve its function.

The justification is related to cross-device synchronization. The login is one way to accomplish that. And it's probably the first thing that comes to mind to get it done quickly. There doesn't seem to be a mobile app, so it would only apply to cases where people use more than one desktop computer. Which on first run to check it out, is no one...

I guess the main issue is that it has been implemented as a barrier to using the app at all. Seems to be along the lines of a critical UX issue. If I'm browsing email clients to try them out, I don't want to be filling a bunch of forms and potentially compromising my email address. Even though I use https://zinc.email/ religiously to remedy that, I'm looking at desktop email clients, not webmail where I would expect this kind of barrier as necessary.

[groovenectar]

All-in-all I'm sure we're excessively harsh in this thread with myself included.

Stripping out the noise / abrasiveness we can probably derive some more constructive criticism, and basically a feature request that would help improve the software and create more conversions for Mailspring.

Clearly @bengotow has put a lot of work into it, and the effort deserves compensation with a business model strategy. Unfortunately even implementing what a lot of people are clearly requiring in order to try it represents even more effort to change what's in place. And ultimately it would be up to Mailspring to determine whether that effort is worth it. Hopefully, they are doing very well even without those who aren't going to login before trying it.

[charsi]

If the point of mandating the ID is reducing friction for the user when up-selling I don't think it should come at the cost of reducing the overall user base. Surely having a much larger user base is good for business specially the kind who don't want to use any of your server resources!

Hope the devs find some middle ground that at least allows people to use the product before trusting your servers.

[MystesofEternity]

Surprised that nobody mentioned Evolution as an alternative to this and Thunderbird. That said, the guys in here have a very good point. Forcing a user to register before even getting to try an email client is definitely counter to the fact that the user needs to try something first before paying for it.

Please don't be like those companies who offer free trials/experiences in exchange for user data so things would be 'profitable'. Money is the root of all evil and the bloody root of all problems that the IT industry have these days, the internet world was a much harmonious place before it became "profit focused".

So I firmly suggest for the mailspring team to, why not give it a try? Listen to all the people in here and see if it works out well? You can revert it all back to requiring mailspring ID or go become completely paid software if you fully confirm that it didn't work out well.

[securityopa]

Each time I see comments here I go and donate to thunderbird.

Thunderbird still has a 2000s look but its one of the most reliable and flexible in terms of features. With some plugins you can make its look and feel more modern ...

I would never sell my own data and company’s data to a service like this.

On May 10, 2019, at 5:22 AM, Mystes Yuji notifications@github.com wrote:

Surprised that nobody mentioned Evolution as an alternative to this and Thunderbird. That said, the guys in here have a very good point. Forcing a user to register before even getting to try an email client is definitely counter to the fact that the user needs to try something first before paying for it.

Please don't be like those companies who offer free trials/experiences in exchange for user data so things would be 'profitable'. Money is the root of all evil and the bloody root of all problems that the IT industry have these days, the internet world was a much harmonious place before it became "profit focused".

So I firmly suggest for the mailspring team to, why not give it a try? Listen to all the people in here and see if it works out well? You can revert it all back to requiring mailspring ID or go become completely paid software if you fully confirm that it didn't work out well.

— You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub, or mute the thread.

[s-kris]

Forcing to create an ID even before trying the app? Great UX!

[CarlosRebolledo]

@s-kris qué correo recomiendas? Las características de Mailspring son buenas. Lo he usado pero me preocupan los comentarios sobre uso de datos y política de privacidad. Desde ya gracias.

[Bugsbane]

Uninstalled this and switched to Kube. It's still early days, but it's modern looking, easy to use and I'm really enjoying it! Thanks MailSpring team for requiring an ID! Without that, I never would have looked around and discovered Kube! <3

[alexanderadam]

@Bugsbane is it this one?

[s-kris]

@s-kris qué correo recomiendas? Las características de Mailspring son buenas. Lo he usado pero me preocupan los comentarios sobre uso de datos y política de privacidad. Desde ya gracias.

Yo uso el cliente de correo thunderbird con el tema monterail. ¡Es genial! ref: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2018/08/monterail-thunderbird-theme-add-ons screenshot: https://aozoeky4dglp5sh0-zippykid.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/thunderbird-theme-gtk-darkest.jpg

p.s: utilicé el traductor de google, perdoné la gramática

[CarlosRebolledo]

@s-kris qué correo recomiendas? Las características de Mailspring son buenas. Lo he usado pero me preocupan los comentarios sobre uso de datos y política de privacidad. Desde ya gracias.

Yo uso el cliente de correo thunderbird con el tema monterail. ¡Es genial! ref: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2018/08/monterail-thunderbird-theme-add-ons screenshot: https://aozoeky4dglp5sh0-zippykid.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/thunderbird-theme-gtk-darkest.jpg

p.s: utilicé el traductor de google, perdoné la gramática

Ok, muchas gracias

Saludos desde Chile

[Bugsbane]

@alexanderadam - Yep! :smile: So far, the main issue is the missing search function, however... it's also "missing" the need to create and use a privacy defeating ID... :wink:

[senaduka]

Installed to it try out. I have seen that requires ID and now I am uninstalling it. I'd rather use a proprietary client that does not require some "cloud service" than an open source one that does.

Big +1 to the feature request.

[C-REMO]

Uninstalling it for this reason as well. Please remove this.

[mainframed]

I came here looking for a workaround to avoid an account as well. Looks like i'm uninstalling this "FOSS" app now too. Shame.

[rbrucemtl]

Uninstall... why does everything today require a cloud account login. Blah

[Bugsbane]

why does everything today require a cloud account login

So they can track you, sell your personal life to a bigger business entity later down the road and generally be enticing to advertisers. It's hard to figure out how to manipulate someone when you don't know who they are. Much easier to make a buck if you make yourself attractive to those who would profit from the manipulation of your used's, er, I mean users.