Had to confirm this wasn’t an April 1 announcement lol:
Built on Stalwart is very interesting.
11 Likes
Fascinating…I am much more excited about thundermail funny enough.
I’m sure the pro versions has more features beyond the three the article mentioned, but the utility behind another AI writing assistant or a scheduling feature is not the best. Sure, a FOSS alternative to scheduling is nice but that assumes there aren’t free services like calendy or when2meet.
2 Likes
Ok not gonna lie, the UI looks really nice and clean especially the dark mode…
I have not used Thunderbird seriously in a long time and I am tempted to try again. I tried several versions ago and I was still not convinced. I will probably test run on my laptop daily driver.
1 Like
This is really exciting, Stalwart is such a great project. The fact that they are partnering with them gives me hope they’re going to give privacy & security a high priority 
I’m of the same mind, I guess they’re trying to compete with other email products that have made these features as a big selling point. Hopefully it’s done in a privacy respecting manner. I’m not sold on this confidential computing thing 
In case anyone missed it, Thundermail beta signup here: https://thundermail.com/
4 Likes
I am a big fan of Thunderbird and how they turned the tables around after Mozilla abandoned the project (Could Firefox do the same?).
I will definitely be an early adopter as soon as the service drops, to help with the testing and support Thunderbird financially. Looking forward to the updates on this project!
2 Likes
It’s a bit of an accelerationist mindset, but I do kind of think Mozilla abandoning Firefox (in a similar manner to Thunderbird) would be the best possible scenario for the web browser ecosystem at large.
It won’t happen though because Mozilla somewhat relies on tricking Firefox users into donating to Mozilla instead of funding Firefox development directly.
2 Likes
It isn’t so much tricking but rather using their Firefox brand & distribution to fund the mothership. It isn’t an uncommon “trick”, if we can call it that.
For instance, going on about “[PG] mission is to defend digital rights” (especially in the header of the donation page) only to claim in the footer that “[PG] strictly do not use donations to support political campaigns/candidates or attempt to influence legislation” (link / mirror) might be seen by some as tricksy. Especially to those who work in the digital rights space (like AccessNow, EFF, UofT’s CitizenLab, Harvard’s BKC, activists, investigative journalists, etc) and hold not just corporations, but also governments & law enforcement to account at enormous financial & socio-political cost. PG could argue that it defends via public awareness, but that isn’t mentioned anywhere explicitly (ie, “spread the word about mass surveillance” is mentioned in addition not in clarification of the sentence “defend digital rights”). Is that a trick? Is it innocuous or sinister? Wouldn’t it be bad faith to call it that?
1 Like
Seems like they will be using servers in Germany most likely!
1 Like
None of the organizations you mentioned would support a political campaign/candidate or influence a piece of legislation either, because that would be illegal.
Nothing about our statement on that page implies we can’t hold governments or corporations to account, so I am not sure where you’d get that idea.
Regarding policy:
Organizations may, however, involve themselves in issues of public policy without the activity being considered as lobbying. For example, organizations may conduct educational meetings, prepare and distribute educational materials, or otherwise consider public policy issues in an educational manner without jeopardizing their tax-exempt status. [IRS.gov]
Obviously if we wished to discuss proposed legislation in an educational manner[1] nothing about our statement or the law prevents us from doing so. If our education about a law leads people to believe that law shouldn’t be passed, that is not an attempt to influence legislation either.
There is a reason the EFF frequently directs people to Fight for the Future when actual action needs to be taken on proposed legislation. I wouldn’t say that makes the EFF (or PG) ineffective.
So yes, we will not be doing anything similar to FFTF, but we could be doing things similar in scope to EFF, AccessNow, etc.
Regarding campaigns:
Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office. [IRS.gov]
as we occasionally do ↩︎
3 Likes