Difference between revisions 603273389 and 607782405 on enwiki

{{refimprove|date=December 2011}}
'''Mailinator''' is a free [[disposable email address]] service created in 2003 by [[Paul Tyma]]. The idea is to let a user invent a new [[email address]] on the fly, whenever needed, for instance while filling a form on a [[website]].

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Emails may be viewed in unmodified "text view" mode. Mailboxes may also be accessed directly via the [[Uniform resource locator|URL]] as in http://MailboxName.mailinator.com.

==Potential problems==
A few 
[[website]]s might block the sending of [[e-email]] to the Mailinator domain, or services similar to it, but Mailinator provides alternate domains whichto work around this ban in most cases. In addition, a domain owner can set up the [[MX record]]s to point to the Mailinator server, in effect adding an unlimited number of domains thatfor which Mailinator will receive messages for. This is expressly allowed by Mailinator.<ref name=OPM />

A significant difference of Mailinator compared to regular [[message transfer agent|email service]]s is that received messages are kept for only a few hours. As new messages arrive, the older messages are deleted to make room for them, resulting in messages being available for a variable amount of time.

In addition, messages may be dropped silently for a number of reasons, making it unwise to use Mailinator for [[email]]s that cannot be re-sent to another address.

Each mailbox also has a ten-message limit, which means that choosing a unique address is important. Presumably, this is to prevent a flood of mail to a single address from forcing the Mailinator system to delete messages from other mailboxes earlier than usual.

Finally, aAccording to the Mailinator FAQ, "Plain text is best, [[htmlrequently Asked Questions (FAQ), plain text messages are best, as [[HTML]] is filtered. Images, attachments, and fancy stuffstyles are simply stripped away.  But, on every page showing an email, there isHowever, when a message is displayed, a '"text-  view' link where you can see" can be selected, displaying the message source code.  The source code can be copied to a local text file with the .email PRECISELYl extension and opened viewing with as mailinator received it. Headers, dirty words, mime-encoded images, you name it." client program that is capable of doing so, displaying formatted HTML mail just as it was sent.<ref>The Mailinator site was redesigned in mid-2013, and the [http://www.mailinator.com/faq.html FAQ] no longer mentions this aspect of usage.</ref>

==See also==

*[[Disposable e-mail address]]
*[[Spamgourmet]]
*[[TrashMail]]
*[[Paul Tyma]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://www.mailinator.com Mailinator] - Mailinator homepage
*[http://paultyma.blogspot.com/2006/12/architecture-of-mailinator.html Paul Tyma's blog] - Description of the Mailinator architecture by its founder, Paul Tyma
*[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9405E6DD173EF935A25753C1A9659C8B63 New York Times Technology] - Review of Mailinator

[[Category:Webmail]]
[[Category:Anti-spam]]