Tuesday, July 27, 2004

Mail Temps

OK, you want to see some web site's one and only picture of Ann Coulter voting in a Democratic primary. But, the site requires you register. So you give it the relevant information. They want an email address. But, having seen some of what this site offers, you really don't want them to have your email address. So what do you do?

It so happens that there are two (count 'em, two) choices:

  1. mailinator: Tell the site that your email address is, say, sample@mailinator.com. Then, after you submit your information, go to http://mailinator.com/ enter sample in the box, and press go. Any message sent to sample@mailinator.com will show up. You can click any confirmation links they have, and then go look at Ann.
    Two warnings:
    • Anyone who knows email is being sent to sample@mailinator.com can read the email. If you want to keep things secret, use a less obvious name. Mailinator will suggest random email addresses, e.g. puyuvnzgeved@mailinator.com.
    • The mail is only kept for a few hours. This is a Good Thing.

    For more information about Mailinator, read the FAQ.


  2. spamgourmet: I haven't tried this one. It's a little different than Mailinator. You have to register a username and a forwarding email address. Say your username is samiam. Then you set your email for the above example as, e.g., annspicts.4.samiam@spamgourmet.com. The registration bot sends information to this address, and it's forwarded to you. The "4" is means that only 4 emails can come into this account before it's closed. This would seem like a good way to track who's spaming you, then cut if off before the spam gets to heavy.

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