from: [e-mail]

July 12, 2011 11:56 PM

Is there any resources I could use for getting a custom email address ([e-mail]) cheaply/free? Features don't matter.

I have a wish to create a one-off zine with a contact address within the theme of the zine; so an email address along the lines of ([e-mail]). Being that zines are inexpensive endeavours, and I don't need any storage or features (if it can hold ten messages and reply to them I'm happy!), I don't really wish to buy a website to do this. So do you know of any free/cheap services that offer these custom addresses without the website, or do I need to own a domain name like Google suggests?

(The domain name in question is not currently a website, so there wouldn't be infringement issues.)

posted by solarion to Computers & Internet (10 answers total)

Best answer: Have you tried google apps. It's basically free for your use case.
posted by Mekai at 12:06 AM on July 13, 2011 [1 favorite]

You will probably need to register a domain, but this shouldn't cost you more than $10 a year. A number of the domain registration services will host webmail for you, but this tends to be a little bit of a ripoff.

I'm pretty sure a year's registration with DreamHost still comes with a domain name. With a promotional code (Google is your friend here), you could probably sign up with them for a year plus the domain registration for $20 or so.
posted by brennen at 12:07 AM on July 13, 2011

If you want a custom domain name, you're going to have to buy that domain, but there are certainly services that will provide email for you at that domain without needing additional hosting. Go Daddy does this for an additional fee. I think most domain registrars do (or at least email forwarding).
posted by katillathehun at 12:08 AM on July 13, 2011

Best answer: 10 bucks a year gets you a domain name and Google Apps (including gmail) through Google.
posted by benzenedream at 12:14 AM on July 13, 2011

Use Gandi to register a domain, and Google Apps for mail.

Don't touch Go Daddy.
posted by devnull at 12:15 AM on July 13, 2011 [1 favorite]

I haven't looked into it much, but if Google will do the domain registration directly, that's a pretty solid option.

Seconding the stay-way advice re: Go Daddy.
posted by brennen at 12:17 AM on July 13, 2011

Response by poster: Geez, I blink and there's six answers! Thank you everybody, and Metafilter in general for such a quick and informative response.

Google Apps looks to be the go, if it can't be done individually. (Ten dollars is within the limit of my spending on this, so it works.)
posted by solarion at 12:24 AM on July 13, 2011

Holeinthewallhosting.com will host for $20 per year and has a pretty good feature set. They also do domain registration (holeinthewalldomains.com) for the usual $10 per year.
posted by Awfki at 3:10 AM on July 13, 2011

nthing that Google Apps is probably the cheapest and easiest way to get this done. A .com domain should be less than $10/year too.
posted by turkeyphant at 4:46 AM on July 13, 2011

Yahoo! Small business offers domain registration and one email address at your domain name for 9.95 a year. It forwards/shares an inbox with your Yahoo! Freemail account.
posted by Pork n Beans at 6:20 PM on July 13, 2011