Comment by olivierduval | Hacker News Reader

Comment by olivierduval | Hacker News Reader

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Actually, I think that the "right move" should be quite different: DONT STOP a service with a short deadline but DEGRADATE it with a long deadline.

If you STOP a service (or turn it to a PAID service) on short notice - and a service that is essential to people - then people will have to rush to find a solution... and will feel been extorted.

If you DEGRADATE the service more and more, people will slowly leave or upgrade to PAID, but they will have the choice.

Moreover, email is really a sensitive matter: it's a main point of contact for... well... email... but altogether for online service (IRS, website account, etc.) and in a way our digital life. So you can't just leave such a short notice. However, you have to let your FREE customer know that they have a choice to make quickly... so DEGRADATION is a good tradeoff I think

They have been trying that for awhile, legacy accounts have not been getting some of the new feature, space was more limited on the legacy accounts than the paid accounts, and a few other things.

Most of us however we perfectly fine with the limited on the accounts... in reality if they just gave me the exact same level of service as they do the free gmail but with a custom domain I would be fine / happy. That is after all what the original service I signed up for was in the beginning.

I have no interest in Google Workspace, I want Gmail, Drive, and Identity. That is it. Maybe Photos... All of which they offer free to everyone still today just not with a custom domain

Same here. I honestly don't need the custom domain email stuff (I can move that to another provider). Just give me an option to turn my account into a regular @gmail.com account with working email/calendar/meet like everybody else paying $0, and I'll be happy. I'm just not a fan of being left with a crippled account even compared to their free service if I want to keep my existing stuff outside of email.

I'm thinking of doing something similar, basically:

1. cancelling my Legacy Free Edition

2. moving my domain to another provider (e.g. Proton Mail, Fastmail, etc.)

3. creating a personal Gmail account using one of the email address that will be formerly part of my Legacy Free Edition

I have some hesitance that the Google account creation flow won't allow me to do this.

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