Namesco email 'scripting error' has last bastion of Demon Internet holdouts scratching their heads There was another twist in the long-running Demon subdomain saga yesterday as Namesco accidentally mixed up some customers due to a "scripting error." A Register reader received an email from the outfit with the familiar exhortation to update their old Demon domain to something a little longer lasting. Former Demon subdomain …
This American had a Demon account from January of '93 through the early 2000s ... I was traveling between Blighty & California quite a bit back then, so it made more sense than you might think. It was a good ISP, with excellent staff on the few occasions I needed to talk to them. I probably set up a couple dozen accounts (perhaps thirty) for friends over there.
RIP Demon, you done good.
Demon was exceptional back in the day. I once phoned them on Boxing Day to get tech support with a beta version of Windows 2000 (not expecting anyone to be there, or to be able to help).
Not only was there someone there, they helped me sort the issue even though it was something new to both of us.
It's a real pity the email addresses are going to be switched off, to this day I still get the odd email about software I wrote 20 years ago (and it'll always be floating around somewhere, I'm sure). For whatever reason my friends and family still email me there too, even though I've told them of my new address...
That reminds me - I'm still using my Demon address for El Reg. I'll have to update that!
The email address I use for my ElReg account (and only ElReg, I might add, outside of a few ancient friends trying to find me) is a seemingly unkillable AOL account that started life at Q-Link in '86 ... It's supposedly been deleted a dozen(ish) times since 1989. I stopped trying to nuke it in 2004.
Through a friend who worked at Mercury I became a beta tester of their dial-up internet and scored myself the simple email address of my abbreviated first name @mcmail.com
They later went on to become cable and wireless and so @cwcom.net also became a thing.
I think eventually they ended up as part of boltblue.com which after many years killed off these old email address.
Upon the recommendation of another friend some 20-odd years ago I registered my own domain name, a move that I've never regretted. I don't run my own mail server but it's easy enough to move backend servers if I really must.
It was only the other day I discovered that BT is charging folks a whopping £7.50 per month to keep their @btinternet.com address if they leave. That's outrageous!
Slightly more on subject I did actually get a email recently from a friend that was announcing the imminent demise of his long held demon email address. Sad really.
I was with them for years and was still hanging onto my demon email as I've had it for so long (about a year after demon started)
Still going through the history now to migrate everything onto my own domain.
Bit of a mistake by Namesco but my transition so far has been smooth from demon to my own domain though as I'm still using it hosted on Exchange 365 so they done all the config changes and no charge for the new domain in the first year.
Still debating running my own mail server or just keeping the exchange one as to be fair, it works, can use Thunderbird with it (leaving the email on exchange so can have phone connected to same mailbox)
The only real pain is having to add new aliases for account@domain on the admin page as MS treat each account name as a different user and need to set that up before using it.
> Still debating running my own mail server or just keeping the exchange one as to be fair, it works,
I'd avoid anything M$ and mail - unless you want to spend your spare time digging through your classified as junk folder.
If it all works for you - fine - but if there is a problem there is absolutely 0 worthwhile support from M$ and this includes the paid for o365 service.
Possibly need to remove 'and mail' from the above as well FTFM :-)
I don't want to sound like some kind of cheerleading gimp for namesco but it wasn't their responsibility to tell us about the temporary nature of it, that was something Vodafone should have done and made clear instead of lying about it (even if they claim it was only a teeny tiny omission) and trying to rewrite history.
When a service is outsourced, the service continues and is never presumed to be as temporary as the contract for providing said service.
Pissed off about the way Vodafone tried to just dump us in the bin but thankfully able to move on so the boiling acid bath does have a layer of 'meh' over the top.
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[ disclaimer, sort of : I have my own domains and mail server but the fixed demon email not being an ISP freebie was good for various things including domain registration etc which I am not prepared to chance on a free webmail account regardless of apparent reliability ] [ disclaimer 2 : I have a deep permanent vitriolic hatred for Vodafone ever since they fcked up their takeover of broadband/landlines here which means everything is always their fault regardless. ]
I'm assuming the only reason they're killing the domain rather than at least offering a forwarding option is so they can save the GBP10 /yr or thereabouts.
Once it gets released, how long will it take before some scummy spam slinger sucks up the domain and uses it for spam or phishing?
My guess is in the order of seconds
Having helped a friend go through the palaver to set up the switch to the temporary email service I'd not be surprised if a lot of former demon customers gave up.
As for the name, in the early days of internet my business used Demon email. One potential client (with strong connections to a church) declined our proposal on the grounds that he didn't want any association with the word. (We revised the proposal using a different email service to comply and he's still a customer 25 years later).
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