Poll: How did you choose your e-mail address? Thread poster: ProZ.com Staff
|
|---|
| | Interlangue (X)
Angola
Local time: 22:06
English to French
+ ...
... email accounts with different names, mainly variations on business name
| | | | Theo Bernards (X) 
France
Local time: 22:06
English to Dutch
+ ...
| When I started freelancing... | Aug 28, 2010 |
the only freelance portal I knew of was a generic freelance portal called Guru. In order to hint at professionalism and cost-effectiveness I thought it was a good idea to begin my career with a openly cost-free email address from hotmail with the nickname gurutheo (which I still use on almost all generic freelance portals I am registered with) mentioned in it. Initially, I even used that nickname in my website address when I learned of a translators portal that offers free websites, but I have c... See more the only freelance portal I knew of was a generic freelance portal called Guru. In order to hint at professionalism and cost-effectiveness I thought it was a good idea to begin my career with a openly cost-free email address from hotmail with the nickname gurutheo (which I still use on almost all generic freelance portals I am registered with) mentioned in it. Initially, I even used that nickname in my website address when I learned of a translators portal that offers free websites, but I have changed that to theobernards.polish portal.com to become less ghost-like. However, my email address was so well-known at that point that I didn't want to jinx my operation by picking a new hotmail address. Now I don't fancy having to manage more than one email address, which will inevitably be the case when I change it.
[Edited at 2010-08-28 11:24 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | neilmac
Spain
Local time: 22:06
Spanish to English
+ ...
| I have several | Aug 28, 2010 |
I have only ever used free webmail, which occasionally causes problems because some firewalls reject my emails as spam (I have one client whose system always does this but only out of office hours).
The first one I ever had was a hotmail account, and I used my real full name. I soon learned the error of my ways under a deluge of spam, and since then have opened at least half a dozen, mostly for different purposes.
My main business email is my first initial n + my surname; the email I... See more I have only ever used free webmail, which occasionally causes problems because some firewalls reject my emails as spam (I have one client whose system always does this but only out of office hours).
The first one I ever had was a hotmail account, and I used my real full name. I soon learned the error of my ways under a deluge of spam, and since then have opened at least half a dozen, mostly for different purposes.
My main business email is my first initial n + my surname; the email I use for proz/kudos communications is the same, but with the vowels removed;
I recently opened a gmail account, mainly because I am occasionally unable to download files from my yahoo mail and gmail seems not to have this problem; my gmail handle is my full name without vowels
I like anagrams, so I also have a couple which are anagrams of my name.
I also have one which I mainly use for paypal and similar payments, SW licences and so on, which is called "eu_forum", which I chose because it sounds sort of official and because it was available at the time.
PS I never use Outlook, which I find cumbersome and irritating, mainly because it does things fait accompli without being told.... ▲ Collapse
| | |
|
|
|
my main address is my last name. My gmail address is a name from a book I read as a child, and my yahoo address, which I don't use that much is also my last name and first initial. I really use that one for paypal and for some online bills and payments.
| | | | Paul Dixon
Brazil
Local time: 17:06
Portuguese to English
+ ...
| Name + country of residence code | Aug 28, 2010 |
I have nearly always used my name as an e-mail address, with several providers over the years including Obsidiana (closed their Brazilian operation), Cidade Internet (went bust), Globo.com (axed free service) etc. I currently have two e-mail addresses with different free providers. One of them is just a direct use of my name but, in the case of Yahoo, my name was already in use - so I had to make it different by adding "br" for Brazil at the end of the name.
| | | | Michael Harris
Germany
Local time: 22:06
Member (2006)
German to English
+ what I do. But I would NEVER use freemail stuff as there is no service
I pay my €100 / year which includes loads of stuff and if I change my provider, etc. it is not affected.
| | | | Interlangue (X)
Angola
Local time: 22:06
English to French
+ ...
| Different experience | Aug 28, 2010 |
Michael Harris wrote:
But I would NEVER use freemail stuff as there is no service
I pay my €100 / year which includes loads of stuff and if I change my provider, etc. it is not affected.
I pay 100€/month (that includes my 2 or 3 phone calls/month) and that only paying address offers the worst service: slow, unreliable, no spam guard, no automatic reply service, small capacity, very restricted webmail possibility, etc.
In my experience, FREE Webmail accounts are much better - for instance, their virus check does not take 6-8 hours (yes you read that correctly, six to eight hours) to check an attachment and they do not charge for checking, authorised size of attachments is at least 5 times bigger than the webmail version of my paying address and they have much less downtime!
And when I contact the provider to complain, the only answer I ever get is "you should upgrade" (to an even more expensive thing
| | |
|
|
|
Amal Al-Arfaj
Saudi Arabia
Local time: 23:06
Member (2005)
English to Arabic
+ ...
| Almost the same here | Aug 28, 2010 |
Interlangue wrote: I pay 100€/month (that includes my 2 or 3 phone calls/month) and that only paying address offers the worst service: slow, unreliable, no spam guard, no automatic reply service, small capacity, very restricted webmail possibility, etc. In my experience, FREE Webmail accounts are much better - for instance, their virus check does not take 6-8 hours (yes you read that correctly, six to eight hours) to check an attachment and they do not charge for checking, authorised size of attachments is at least 5 times bigger than the webmail version of my paying address and they have much less downtime! And when I contact the provider to complain, the only answer I ever get is "you should upgrade" (to an even more expensive thing
It was too bad for me that I actually had my business email hosted by hotmail. It's far much better.
| | | | Thayenga
Germany
Local time: 22:06
Member (2009)
English to German
+ ...
| An abbreviation and its longer version | Aug 28, 2010 |
My main E-mail address consists of 2 words written as one which, in the Cheyenne language, mean something positive.
The other 2 E-Mail accounts I have with different hosts - rather those I'm still using, since I have about 6 or 7 of them - are an abbreviation of the main account's name.
I began using them for their positivity, so that it took my friends pointing it out to me for me to actually pay attention to the fact that the first two letters of the abbreviation are... See more My main E-mail address consists of 2 words written as one which, in the Cheyenne language, mean something positive.
The other 2 E-Mail accounts I have with different hosts - rather those I'm still using, since I have about 6 or 7 of them - are an abbreviation of the main account's name.
I began using them for their positivity, so that it took my friends pointing it out to me for me to actually pay attention to the fact that the first two letters of the abbreviation are indeed my real first and last names' initials. ▲ Collapse
| | | | | My name @ business name | Aug 28, 2010 |
I'm a freelancer, registered as self employed, but I have a business name to use on my website and invoices.
So the domain name for my email is that of my website. And the prefix is my own name.
It is really very cheap to register a domain name, a little bit more if you want to have hosting for a website and access to webmail and other email tools.
When you control your email address like this, you generally have quite sophisticated tools. To be sure I don'... See more I'm a freelancer, registered as self employed, but I have a business name to use on my website and invoices.
So the domain name for my email is that of my website. And the prefix is my own name.
It is really very cheap to register a domain name, a little bit more if you want to have hosting for a website and access to webmail and other email tools.
When you control your email address like this, you generally have quite sophisticated tools. To be sure I don't lose emails, I forward from my email address to another account, which I run as an IMAP account. I then have emails on two servers, plus my laptop if I've accessed them via my email programme. After having a computer die, I resolved never to lose important emails again. You can find more info. here:
http://www.proz.com/translation-articles/articles/2384/ ▲ Collapse
| | | | | Didn't even remember posting this poll! | Aug 28, 2010 |
It must have been quite some time ago. And I certainly don't remember saying "fiction name" instead of "invented/fictional name" - but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it - I'm sure you all get the point.
I should come clear too: the reason I asked was that when I take job applications for my language school for new teachers, I am often amazed by the inappropriacy of the addresses some applicants have, which have clearly been chosen, along the lines of "[email protected]"... See more It must have been quite some time ago. And I certainly don't remember saying "fiction name" instead of "invented/fictional name" - but I'm not going to lose any sleep over it - I'm sure you all get the point.
I should come clear too: the reason I asked was that when I take job applications for my language school for new teachers, I am often amazed by the inappropriacy of the addresses some applicants have, which have clearly been chosen, along the lines of "[email protected]", or "headintheclouds@etc", or "brazenteacher@etc" - I am paraphrasing, but you get my drift. When training teachers, this is one of the matters I draw their attention to, and suggest that they use something such as [email protected], ie initialsurname(twoinmycase)efl etc, to give a more professional impression.
Having said that, my many addresses do not follow my own advice, although I use a series which are all initialsplusavila... so when I first joined Proz, I used one of my e-mail monikers, being the initials of my business name, plus Avila, my place of work, and then persuaded the powers that be to add my own name, rather than changing completely when I wanted to make my identity more clear. ▲ Collapse
| | |
|
|
|
| Wrong hosting | Aug 28, 2010 |
Interlangue wrote: Michael Harris wrote:
But I would NEVER use freemail stuff as there is no service
I pay my €100 / year which includes loads of stuff and if I change my provider, etc. it is not affected. I pay 100€/month (that includes my 2 or 3 phone calls/month) and that only paying address offers the worst service: slow, unreliable, no spam guard, no automatic reply service, small capacity, very restricted webmail possibility, etc. In my experience, FREE Webmail accounts are much better - for instance, their virus check does not take 6-8 hours (yes you read that correctly, six to eight hours) to check an attachment and they do not charge for checking, authorised size of attachments is at least 5 times bigger than the webmail version of my paying address and they have much less downtime! And when I contact the provider to complain, the only answer I ever get is "you should upgrade" (to an even more expensive thing
You all pay too much, guys. I pay 140 $ (not €) for 2 years and the capacity is nearly unlimited + efficient support at any time (mail support, hotline, live chat). There are more options that you can dream of. The only one I use is the auto-responder, though.
I can give references in private if anyone is interested.
So to answer the question, I use my own domain (which costs 5 euros a year), preceded by only "info". This is for my professional address. The domain is my businessname, so I chose business name from the poll.
I have many other private addresses, but I don't think they are relevant to discuss here.
| | | | Rebecca Garber
Local time: 16:06
Member (2005)
German to English
+ ...
| Back in the day at US universities | Aug 31, 2010 |
Everyone's email name was their three initials plus a number indicating where their names fell alphabetically.
I have 4 initials. At first, the IT dept wanted to only use 3, but I convinced them to use all 4.
| | | | To report site rules violations or get help, contact a site moderator: You can also contact site staff by submitting a support request » Poll: How did you choose your e-mail address? | Anycount & Translation Office 3000 | Translation Office 3000
Translation Office 3000 is an advanced accounting tool for freelance translators and small agencies. TO3000 easily and seamlessly integrates with the business life of professional freelance translators.
More info » |
| | CafeTran Espresso | You've never met a CAT tool this clever!
Translate faster & easier, using a sophisticated CAT tool built by a translator / developer.
Accept jobs from clients who use Trados, MemoQ, Wordfast & major CAT tools.
Download and start using CafeTran Espresso -- for free
Buy now! » |
|
| | | | X Sign in to your ProZ.com account... | | | | | |
Login to reply/comment 
