Help me pick the right email address

September 15, 2012 3:22 PM

What email address should I choose for my personal domain?

My name is Albert Jones (*not really*) and I own the domain abjones.org (*not really, but an example of a similar domain that I own*). What is the best naming scheme for my email address?

[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

or something different?

I realize I can choose any or all of these options, but I'd like to pick just one as my primary email address.

posted by r-senal to Society & Culture (21 answers total)

I use [e-mail]. But *@firstnamelastname.me redirects for me as well.
posted by ish__ at 3:26 PM on September 15, 2012 [4 favorites]

I like [e-mail]. Always fun to be able to have such a short username.
posted by limeonaire at 3:28 PM on September 15, 2012

I own my firstnamelastname.com and have used [e-mail] forever. I like firstname as the email address because I just tell people if they know my name, they know my address.

Having initials and lastname as your domain makes it a little trickier, but I still think using your firstname is least confusing.
posted by The Deej at 3:29 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

I'd suggest [e-mail], but pretty much all of those should redirect to your main email anyhow, so if they misremember and mail ajones@, it will get to you.
posted by jeather at 3:33 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

I would prefer [e-mail] but [e-mail] could also work.
posted by Foci for Analysis at 3:33 PM on September 15, 2012

I would vote for something like
[e-mail], [e-mail], [e-mail]
posted by WizKid at 4:06 PM on September 15, 2012

I'm [e-mail] and I enjoy making up a million different addresses for everyone who asks me for one. It also gives me interesting insight into the origins of spam. My inner sanctum email is [e-mail]
posted by Lame_username at 4:07 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

Whatever familiar people call you should be your mail email address... are you a Woody Allen character who goes by "Albie?" Then you're [e-mail].

You should get an arrangement where you receive all email from all addresses (and most of them will be spam, so filter accounts accordingly) but that way you could build a resume with [e-mail] and give [e-mail] to your mother and so on.

You should also at least glance at any email coming to admin@ and abuse@ and postmaster@ -- people might use these addresses as attempts to reach the management to complain about ... your open relay, oops, or your website or whatnot.
posted by Sunburnt at 4:12 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

[e-mail] is sort of the no-brainer standard and is what I use. Alternatives in my address book for friends and colleagues include:

hello@
hola@
me@
himself@
me@
mail@

If it makes you feel better, everyone else cares much less than you do :)
posted by DarlingBri at 4:12 PM on September 15, 2012

None of the above. The best choice for the part before the @ is a two-syllable phrase consisting of ordinary words. Examples:

gladhand
firstplace
redlight

The goal is to have something that is easily understand when given to people orally, such as over the telephone.
posted by yclipse at 4:40 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

I use [e-mail] for mine.
posted by burnmp3s at 5:17 PM on September 15, 2012

I have all derivatives of my name flow into one inbox but I give out (for example) [e-mail].

I think a lot depends on the length of your last name, the length of your first name and the length of them together. If my name was George Hammerschmidt, I would use George@, or even Hammer@, but if my name was Sam Ray, I would use [e-mail]

The fact that your domain is not your entire name spelled out means that people will have to learn the entire thing, so I would use something simple like either first name only or last name only.

The bottom line is that people will learn or write down whatever you give them.

I have a friend who uses a made up title in front of the @ sign. For example, he uses [e-mail] with business people and [e-mail]
posted by JohnnyGunn at 6:25 PM on September 15, 2012

I used my incredibly common first name as an address somewhere once, never gave it out to anyone, and got an unbelievable amount of spam. So I don't do that anymore. This is why we can't have nice things.
posted by grouse at 6:43 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

I have catch-all status set on my domains. In effect a person can use anything before the @ and then the domain (which is a .com) and it will get through. Following a successful email, I then can respond with the preferred email and have them add that to their address book.

The single advantage is that, as my domain of choice is my real name, it simplifies the process of getting people to remember it. As long as you can get it into their head to type my name and .com , they can use whatever they want before hand. It all depends on our hosting company, but it is a good way to help people remember the address.

Of course, you are bound to have at least one smart-ass friend who will flood your inbox with emails addressed to [e-mail], but that comes with the territory of having smart-ass friends. There are ways to retaliate, but that is an entirely different thread.
posted by lampshade at 6:48 PM on September 15, 2012 [1 favorite]

[e-mail]
posted by StickyCarpet at 7:08 PM on September 15, 2012

Of course, you are bound to have at least one smart-ass friend who will flood your inbox with emails addressed to [e-mail], but that comes with the territory of having smart-ass friends.

Depending on your email system configuration, though, you can use a filtered inbox to separate your quotidian business from new clients, emails from your kids, and still retain [e-mail] for your smart-ass friends' lunchtime chatter.

But to answer your original question strictly, I'd have hello@ as a general public communication ("hello, I want to talk to you about…") and albert@ as your personal address, ie what you print on your personal calling card to give to people you meet in person.
posted by a halcyon day at 8:09 PM on September 15, 2012

I use [e-mail] for friends and family but have the mail server set to catch all. Websites get [e-mail] with [e-mail] on my online CV and [e-mail] as a public email address
posted by Z303 at 11:14 PM on September 15, 2012

When used personally I prefer [e-mail] (can be misunderstood but because it's seldom used for important stuff I'm fine with that; I would set up [e-mail] forwarding to it just in case), and for formal matters it's [e-mail].
posted by KMB at 1:48 AM on September 16, 2012

I use [e-mail], which is also a catch-all, so I can use [domainname]@abjones.org for any accounts I've made. Like [e-mail] and [e-mail] etc. That way I can see where my address has been, and block it if necessary.
posted by mirthe at 8:56 AM on September 16, 2012

1. N'thing everyone's advice to set a catch-all. I'm amazed by how many times people still manage to screw up my email address (which is of the firstname@ format).

2. Go with something that is easy to communicate verbally to people, like firstname@ The problem I've had with just using initials is they are easier to write, but harder to say, or rather, people overthink them. "What is your email address?" "[e-mail]" "How do you spell that?" "a-b-j" "Is that 'a' or 'ay'?"

3. I've got my mailbox mapped over to gmail. The actual address I log in with at gmail is not the one that I use with everyone else when I send email. If my email address is floating around out there in a database that gets compromised (I'm looking at you, Zappos, Linked-In, and Blizzard), I wanted to make it that much more difficult to use that to sidehack my email.

4. If you set the catch-all, it is tempting to use a different email address for every on-line service. I did that for a while, and the problem I had was remembering what I had used if I needed a password reset. Now I just reuse the same few: my actual logging-in address (which I never give out anymore), my everyday address, and a throw-away address for one time things.
posted by kovacs at 9:41 AM on September 16, 2012

I use [e-mail], which is fun if your last name is condusive to such domain name hijinks.
posted by Diddly at 11:22 AM on September 16, 2012