The other day, while setting up a new development environment for work, I stumbled across an interesting discussion about self-hosting email servers. It brought back memories of my own attempts at email independence over the years, and the subsequent frustrations that followed.

Running your own email server used to be a badge of honor in the tech community. Back in the late 90s and early 2000s, it was almost a rite of passage for system administrators and tech enthusiasts. The technical challenges were significant but manageable - configuring Sendmail or Postfix, setting up spam filters, and maintaining proper DNS records.

Yesterday’s announcement about Gmail’s end-to-end encryption had me rolling my eyes harder than when my daughter tries to convince me TikTok is perfectly safe. Google’s latest attempt to appear privacy-conscious feels about as genuine as a $3 note.

Let’s be crystal clear about what’s happening here. This isn’t true end-to-end encryption (E2EE) being offered to regular Gmail users. Instead, it’s a corporate-focused feature specifically designed for Google Workspace customers who actually pay for their services. The reasoning isn’t hard to follow - Google’s bread and butter comes from scanning our emails to feed their advertising machine.