Sure thing, but this is kind of an aside, of course your are right, don't let someone like Google or Facebook handle very sensitive information. Google Analytics is everywhere, however, it doesn't really matter who you use, if you wish to avoid it you will need something that stops it from working.

You can't, and I'll track the hell out of you if you happen to visit my site :-P

*just joking... almost*

Now that you mention it... even GOG has it.

Guess I should keep Firebug on more often when I visit web sites.

If you use Firefox you have plenty of options.
First you can make use of the "Tell websites I do not want to be tracked" option (Tools>Options>Privacy).
Then, there''s Ghostery and Do Not Track Plus (both on Mozilla's addon site).
You can also use Adblock Plus with a number of subscriptions, you can check them out here (I personally use Easy+Privacy and Fanboy's Tracking).
Finally, you can use Element Hiding Helper for Adblock Plus (also on Mozilla's addon site) to catch everything that Adblock can't manage, like the Facbook Like button.

There's an equivalant of Adblock Plus for Chrome, but I don't know if it accepts filter subscriptions.

Don't know what works with IE as I don't use it.


As for the OP, I'll side with those who are for Fastmail. A personal account costs less than $5/ year and it allows commercial use. It has plenty more option, you should check out their site.

EDIT: typos fixed.

I am just going to put this here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDbrX5U75dk

:D

EDIT: The comments are so freaking fun! People hate Microsoft and Google, like they've killed their whole family or something. :D

I installed Ghostery but for some reason it does not want to remember/save the pop-ups I have blocked and I am forced to constantly re-block them. Any way to save them that I have overlooked?

Here is a secure and respectful to privacy e-mail:

http://lavabit.com/

I haven't used it yet but pals at ubuntuforums talk very positive about it.

I use GMX.com, it's free and it works.. and I don't have to provide a telephone number to register as with Google now.

Tools/Setup/Ghostery Options, once you get everything checkmarked there is a "Save" button at the bottom.

I kind of like http://www.hushmail.com, though the free accounts only have 25 mb of space and go inactive if you don't log in for 3 weeks/get deleted after a year of not logging in. It's pretty secure, and it works fine with my 50+ character passphrase, as opposed to a bunch of sites that limit you to 10 letters/no spaces/no special characters. For $35 a year you can get 1 gig, or for $50 a year you can get 10.

It also can auto generate email addresses for you if you just need a spam trap or three. It runs inside it's own java applet which encrypts all the traffic going between you and their mail server to give you increased security.

The regular UI has a retro feel which I like, and they've got a beta UI that's pretty much a direct ripoff of gmail.

The one downside to gmail/hotmail/yahoo mail (ive had all 3 in the past) tho, is its increasingly harder to find a decent username@ instead of going the whole letters/numbers combo.