disposable-email-domains VS check-if-email-exists

The block list seems to come from https://github.com/disposable-email-domains/disposable-email-domains/ — I think you should cite your sources even if it’s distributed as public domain

This post is a response to https://github.com/disposable-email-domains/disposable-email-domains/pull/298 since they have (probably wisely :) locked down comments. They propose adding Firefox Relay domains to their blocklist.

And this is why users protect themselves with services like Firefox Relay, something Dustin Ingram, a Python Software Foundation Director, doesn't appear to understand [1] or care. My email was leaked in this breach, along with many others, an email I used to really value but one I've relegated to the dumpster fire of "spam slot" because I learned my lesson too late.

Dustin has now locked that GitHub to only previous contributors so users are once again left voiceless and powerless in the continuing war against their privacy.

We've been thinking of the business owners and the children [2] for decades now. It's time to start thinking of the users, people like you and me who are exploited constantly for everything they have to be unceremoniously discarded in a waste heap once they've been used up.

[1] https://github.com/disposable-email-domains/disposable-email...

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29978952

The point is not about ideological debates, making money from GPL software is purely a practical business decision. Many people are doing it, see e.g. https://reacher.email/ (written in Rust btw).

I started with open-source.

I initially created https://github.com/reacherhq/check-if-email-exists, after some years it got to ~50 stars and nice overall feedback, that's when I thought of a SaaS wrapper on top of it.

So a possible path is "idea -> open-source -> monetize". I find the first arrow to be easier to execute than a direct idea to monetization leap.

We forked (this repository)[https://github.com/reacherhq/check-if-email-exists] and made a few modifications.

I run an open-source [1] email verification API, called Reacher. I managed to hit 10k ARR this year (1st year).

It's written in Rust, self-hostable, and does not use a DB of emails (like some competitors do).

Landing page: https://reacher.email.

[1]: https://github.com/reacherhq/check-if-email-exists

Check If Email Exists\ (205 comments)

GitHub issues like this one warm my heart:

https://github.com/reacherhq/check-if-email-exists/issues/91

Identifying something that needs doing, especially when you have no idea how to do it, is a bold skill.

Too often have I seen engineers be reluctant to open an issue because they don’t know how to implement it, technically. I still do it, myself. If you need it then you’ll find a way.

The converse is also true: losing focus by filing tasks and procrastinating on features because you know how to build them, not because you actually need them to move your business / project forward.