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When I was your age . . .

December 16, 2006 by: UKStevieB

Part of the idea of this blog was to go over some of my rookie mistakes and hope that somewhere along the line the information here might help others avoid the problems I have encountered, so with that in mind I thought I would cover email accounts. When I first went online it was by using my mobile (cell) phone as my modem, and one of the first things I did was to get myself an email account, which was a good idea as when I went to sign up for a broadband account the next day they wanted me to supply an email address with my information. So far so good. When my broadband account was set up my ISP provided me with another email account to go along with it, and as this was a bigger better one I thought I would use it as my main account. Mistake. I hadn't thought it through properly. It was only 15 months later as I contemplated the various offers other broadband providers were making that I realised that if I was to change providers I would lose my email account with my previous provider, the account that I had been using as my main one for over a year! This meant tha I could lose a whole load of important mail, that all the sites I used or subscribed to would need to be notified and that any products/software that I had registered with that address would have to be told and that I could potentially lose contact with some of my friends, some of whom only had my email address by which to keep in touch with me. When I realised this I then decided to try and get myself another bigger and better email account, preferably a gmail account. These weren't the easiest of things to come by as you had to be invited to open an account with them by someone who already was using the service. Luckily I found someone on one of the forums I use that was prepared to send me an invitation. Then began the long process of notifying all the relevant people and changing my address on the forums I use etc. Eventually I got there though, and now I always make sure that I never use the account set up by my ISP for anything except keeping in contact with the providers themselves. The lesson learnt? Never use the account you are given by your ISP as your main account.

Topics: Rookie Mistakes |

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