About.Me

kaptitsky · 10 Sep 2011, 07:07 AM

Have you created an About.Me URL?

Now it comes with email @About.me

Powered by AOL, with all that means.

Looks like Project Phoenix is dead, with invites gone and no updates, but the idea of "A custom profile & personal analytics dashboard" is where AOL is putting their resources.

Berenburger · 10 Sep 2011, 08:29 AM

Does remind me of Telnic. There you have your own .tel domain with all sorts of (personal) information.

xmailer · 10 Sep 2011, 10:18 AM

They keep trying, eh? Thanks for the info. So, I've signed up, but I haven't yet found anything at the site or in the interface about an @about.me email, nor anything resembling an email interface.

kaptitsky · 10 Sep 2011, 10:32 AM

It was under the offers tab in the dashboard, along with Moo cards for the cost of shipping.

I got an email telling me to look there.

n5bb · 10 Sep 2011, 11:00 AM

Yep ... if you sign up for about.me/username, emails sent to username @ about.me are rejected. From comments at other websites (nothing at about.me) it appears that you must wait until they send you an invite.

Bill

xmailer · 10 Sep 2011, 11:05 AM

Ah, okay. I sure don't see anything under the ad kaptitsy mentioned. I'd thought of trying to send an email to my username @about me, but hadn't gotten around to it yet, so thanks for saving me the trouble. I guess I'll just wait and see if I get an invite.

xmailer · 11 Sep 2011, 01:13 AM

I just got the email from just.me and my "powered by AOL" @about.me email address, which only took maybe a little more than 12 hours after my registration.

I'm not sure how much I need yet another AOL email address, but like a few others I've gotten at AOL, with their apparently ill-fated Phoenix Project and their Beta project at mcom.com, it's another fairly "choice" email address, should I ever get around to making use of it. I sure do wish AOL would add autoforwarding, though, as that might make me a lot more likely to actually make use of some of these addresses. (But will the addresses opened with Phoenix and Mcom.com remain active as "regular" AOL addresses, I wonder?)

xmailer · 11 Sep 2011, 02:38 AM

Although this is more about AOL in general than about About.me, I thought I might have found what may be the next best thing to autoforwarding of messages sent to my AOL email address(es), in the form of a supposed option in AOL to have SMS notifications sent to a mobile phone, but although I was able to receive the confirmation code from AOL to my Google Voice number (which, in turn, autoforwards to my Gmail account) to verify my "mobile" number, unfortunately in my tests thus far the notifications of new messages, which I had created filters for, aren't sent to the number -- or at least aren't received.

Added: Just wondering, has anyone else here ever succeeded in getting the SMS notifications to work with any AOL email account and any mobile number?

David · 11 Sep 2011, 05:35 AM

For the record: @hotmail.com accounts have an option to send a text message to your mobile phone, on the arrival of a new email message.

Nikolaos · 11 Sep 2011, 05:39 AM

Was startled and a bit sad to hear Phoenix is dead, I have quite liked the service so far. Their pop3 is soooo fast compared to Hotmail or Live!

So I went to check the AOL Mail Blog and the official word seems to just be that they're in a makeover or testing phase and have only temporarily removed the invite functions.

Those two blog entries I linked to above were posted in June and July, so it's been a while, but then again I don't expect AOL to move at anything above the speed of a snail, so I'm not going to worry that Phoenix is quite dead yet

About.me sounds nice though. I must go grab one and add it to my giant pile of hoarded accounts - thanks for the tip!

Nikolaos · 11 Sep 2011, 06:02 AM

Just signed up for about.me - but haven't found anything about a free email addy

Is it just a forwarder, like if you enable emailing for profile visitors? I must have misunderstood, I was hoping for a full pop3 account

[ETA: Oop, never mind, mouth engaged before brain, etc. Just found the support page giving the email access settings. They sure don't publicize it!

]

[ETA2: Pop3 login failed to work. Not sure what I might be doing wrong, and the FAQ section is too skimpy to help, but I think I'm just going to put this one on the backburner for now. Not exactly enthralled by the experience so far

]

[ETA3: Just re-read the thread. Thwapping self on head again. I guess no invite = no email! Oh well

Now I have another useless account I don't need - serves me right for not reading properly first! LOL

]

kaptitsky · 11 Sep 2011, 10:16 AM

I was wrong about Phoenix, just as I was wrong about About.Me offering e-mail.

Dear me.

Well, wrong and right in both cases. Just let About.Me hang out and maybe you will get an e-mail offer too. Clearly they are making them.

And Phoenix says they are just waiting for infrastructure/backend changes, and then things will change. But they will enable Phoenix for your AOL address if you send to mailproduct@aol.com .

Or at least that's what Seth Halvaksz, Phoenix project manager says.

To complete the circle, here is Seth's about.me page: http://about.me/sethhalvaksz

Apologies again.

n5bb · 11 Sep 2011, 10:31 AM

I just received about.me email invites from the two accounts I had registered. This took only about 15 hours, although your mileage may vary. Since I haven't had an AOL account in well over a decade, I checked out the features and saw nothing interesting. No forwarding. Minimal rules features. Default setup overflowing with content unrelated to email. Booorrriiinnnggg.

Nikolaos · 11 Sep 2011, 10:52 AM

LOL! Oh well. It's a nice little domain to add to the collection, anyway. I'll wait and see if I find an invite in my inbox tomorrow - fingers crossed!

[ETA: Oh yes. Just to add to the joy and confusion on this thread - I just dropped by Phoenix's web interface today for the first time in ages, and my login failed with one of those Twitter-like error messages. You know, the ones that sound cool but tell you nothing about what's actually wrong ;P Pop3 is still working fine though. They really must be doing some renovation work there!]

kaptitsky · 11 Sep 2011, 11:36 AM

Speaking for myself, I like AOL based mail addresses and have a bunch of them, between the lamented Tunome and Phoenix and such.

Sure, the webmail is very basic and automatic forwarding is missing. But I find it quite functional, able to do what is needed.

But the backend is standards based, fast IMAP/SMTP (and POP) that just pounds away nicely.

Set it up in a client, either a local client like Thunderbird or a webclient like Gmail and AOL mail works great. (Their own consolidation client, Project Phoenix, still has too many limits).

It's good solid mail, nothing fancy, easy to use and reliable.

10 Sep 2011, 07:07 AM	#1
kaptitsky The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 2,186	About.Me Have you created an About.Me URL? Now it comes with email @About.me Powered by AOL, with all that means. Looks like Project Phoenix is dead, with invites gone and no updates, but the idea of "A custom profile & personal analytics dashboard" is where AOL is putting their resources.

10 Sep 2011, 11:00 AM	#5
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 8,930	Invitation-only email Yep ... if you sign up for about.me/username, emails sent to username @ about.me are rejected. From comments at other websites (nothing at about.me) it appears that you must wait until they send you an invite. Bill

11 Sep 2011, 02:38 AM	#8
xmailer Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: USA Posts: 5,485	Although this is more about AOL in general than about About.me, I thought I might have found what may be the next best thing to autoforwarding of messages sent to my AOL email address(es), in the form of a supposed option in AOL to have SMS notifications sent to a mobile phone, but although I was able to receive the confirmation code from AOL to my Google Voice number (which, in turn, autoforwards to my Gmail account) to verify my "mobile" number, unfortunately in my tests thus far the notifications of new messages, which I had created filters for, aren't sent to the number -- or at least aren't received. Added: Just wondering, has anyone else here ever succeeded in getting the SMS notifications to work with any AOL email account and any mobile number? Last edited by xmailer : 11 Sep 2011 at 04:08 AM.

11 Sep 2011, 06:02 AM	#11
Nikolaos Essential Contributor Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 345	Just signed up for about.me - but haven't found anything about a free email addy Is it just a forwarder, like if you enable emailing for profile visitors? I must have misunderstood, I was hoping for a full pop3 account [ETA: Oop, never mind, mouth engaged before brain, etc. Just found the support page giving the email access settings. They sure don't publicize it! ] [ETA2: Pop3 login failed to work. Not sure what I might be doing wrong, and the FAQ section is too skimpy to help, but I think I'm just going to put this one on the backburner for now. Not exactly enthralled by the experience so far ] [ETA3: Just re-read the thread. Thwapping self on head again. I guess no invite = no email! Oh well Now I have another useless account I don't need - serves me right for not reading properly first! LOL ] Last edited by Nikolaos : 11 Sep 2011 at 06:26 AM. Reason: i made a boo-boo. again :)

10 Sep 2011, 08:29 AM	#2
Berenburger The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: The Netherlands Posts: 2,908	Does remind me of Telnic. There you have your own .tel domain with all sorts of (personal) information.

10 Sep 2011, 10:18 AM	#3
xmailer Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: USA Posts: 5,485	They keep trying, eh? Thanks for the info. So, I've signed up, but I haven't yet found anything at the site or in the interface about an @about.me email, nor anything resembling an email interface.

10 Sep 2011, 10:32 AM	#4
kaptitsky The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 2,186	It was under the offers tab in the dashboard, along with Moo cards for the cost of shipping. I got an email telling me to look there.

10 Sep 2011, 11:05 AM	#6
xmailer Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: USA Posts: 5,485	Ah, okay. I sure don't see anything under the ad kaptitsy mentioned. I'd thought of trying to send an email to my username @about me, but hadn't gotten around to it yet, so thanks for saving me the trouble. I guess I'll just wait and see if I get an invite.

11 Sep 2011, 01:13 AM	#7
xmailer Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: USA Posts: 5,485	I just got the email from just.me and my "powered by AOL" @about.me email address, which only took maybe a little more than 12 hours after my registration. I'm not sure how much I need yet another AOL email address, but like a few others I've gotten at AOL, with their apparently ill-fated Phoenix Project and their Beta project at mcom.com, it's another fairly "choice" email address, should I ever get around to making use of it. I sure do wish AOL would add autoforwarding, though, as that might make me a lot more likely to actually make use of some of these addresses. (But will the addresses opened with Phoenix and Mcom.com remain active as "regular" AOL addresses, I wonder?)

11 Sep 2011, 05:35 AM	#9
David Ultimate Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Canada. Posts: 10,355	For the record: @hotmail.com accounts have an option to send a text message to your mobile phone, on the arrival of a new email message.

11 Sep 2011, 05:39 AM	#10
Nikolaos Essential Contributor Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 345	Was startled and a bit sad to hear Phoenix is dead, I have quite liked the service so far. Their pop3 is soooo fast compared to Hotmail or Live! So I went to check the AOL Mail Blog and the official word seems to just be that they're in a makeover or testing phase and have only temporarily removed the invite functions. Those two blog entries I linked to above were posted in June and July, so it's been a while, but then again I don't expect AOL to move at anything above the speed of a snail, so I'm not going to worry that Phoenix is quite dead yet About.me sounds nice though. I must go grab one and add it to my giant pile of hoarded accounts - thanks for the tip!

11 Sep 2011, 10:16 AM	#12
kaptitsky The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 2,186	I was wrong about Phoenix, just as I was wrong about About.Me offering e-mail. Dear me. Well, wrong and right in both cases. Just let About.Me hang out and maybe you will get an e-mail offer too. Clearly they are making them. And Phoenix says they are just waiting for infrastructure/backend changes, and then things will change. But they will enable Phoenix for your AOL address if you send to mailproduct@aol.com . Or at least that's what Seth Halvaksz, Phoenix project manager says. To complete the circle, here is Seth's about.me page: http://about.me/sethhalvaksz Apologies again.

11 Sep 2011, 10:31 AM	#13
n5bb Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: May 2004 Location: Irving, Texas Posts: 8,930	I just received about.me email invites from the two accounts I had registered. This took only about 15 hours, although your mileage may vary. Since I haven't had an AOL account in well over a decade, I checked out the features and saw nothing interesting. No forwarding. Minimal rules features. Default setup overflowing with content unrelated to email. Booorrriiinnnggg.

11 Sep 2011, 10:52 AM	#14
Nikolaos Essential Contributor Join Date: Dec 1999 Posts: 345	LOL! Oh well. It's a nice little domain to add to the collection, anyway. I'll wait and see if I find an invite in my inbox tomorrow - fingers crossed! [ETA: Oh yes. Just to add to the joy and confusion on this thread - I just dropped by Phoenix's web interface today for the first time in ages, and my login failed with one of those Twitter-like error messages. You know, the ones that sound cool but tell you nothing about what's actually wrong ;P Pop3 is still working fine though. They really must be doing some renovation work there!]

11 Sep 2011, 11:36 AM	#15
kaptitsky The "e" in e-mail Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 2,186	Speaking for myself, I like AOL based mail addresses and have a bunch of them, between the lamented Tunome and Phoenix and such. Sure, the webmail is very basic and automatic forwarding is missing. But I find it quite functional, able to do what is needed. But the backend is standards based, fast IMAP/SMTP (and POP) that just pounds away nicely. Set it up in a client, either a local client like Thunderbird or a webclient like Gmail and AOL mail works great. (Their own consolidation client, Project Phoenix, still has too many limits). It's good solid mail, nothing fancy, easy to use and reliable.