Schnail Mail: free real mail for life!

Introducing our latest startup: Schnail Mail.

Schnail Mail Beta
To know the schnail is to love the schnail.

How would you like to send free snail mail for life?

Starting today, you can do just that with Schnail Mail.

Use Schnail Mail to send as many real letters and postcards as you want. Absolutely free. For life.

Free real email for life
Send free real mail for life.

Doesn’t that sound great? Who’s excited about this?

If you are excited and would use Schnail mail, please let us know by pressing the button below to send a tweet.

Now, I do have to mention that there is a little caveat:

We do open your letters.

And read your mail.

An open letter: Dear Sally, would you believe it? It was herpes after all. Signed, John.
Tiny caveat: we do read your mail.

But we only do this so that we can inform recipients of helpful offers and products that they might be interested in.

A leaftlet inserted into the letter: an ad for cold sore cream.
We’re only trying to help.

(We also keep a copy of every letter you send so that we can create profiles of you and your friends so we can send you even more helpful offers as time goes by. Just think of us as the invisible friend you never knew you had.)

Then we just pack everything back up and send your letter on its way.

The re-sealed letter
All packed up; as if we were never there.

I hope you’re still as excited about Schnail Mail as you were a few moments ago. Why not let us know by pressing the appropriate button below to tell us if you will use Schnail Mail:

Wait a minute, you’ve changed your mind?* But I don’t understand why.

This is basically how Gmail works.

You use Gmail, right?

Letter with Gmail logo
Why you hatin’ on the Schnail? We’re basically just Gmail for real mail.

Only with Gmail, Google doesn’t just read your email to create a profile of you, they also pull in all the other data you give them via their plethora of services and devices: e.g., Google drive (all your files), Google+ (your friends and family, status updates,…), Google Now, Google Maps, etc. (where you’ve been, where you are, who you’re with, where you will be tomorrow), and so on and so forth.

And it doesn’t stop there either. They also sell you cheap hardware (Android phones, tablets, and Chromebooks) to make it easier than ever for you to sign in to their services.

In fact, they’re now venturing into providing Internet access. When your Internet sign‐in is your Google sign‐in, they can capture and analyse all of your online activity, regardless of which device or services you use.

Surely, Schnail Mail isn’t nearly as invasive?

So, what do you say?

Show a poor schnail some love?

Further reading

Footnotes

* When I presented this live, recently, at Foundersconf, everyone in the audience put their hands up the first time I asked whether they liked the idea and would use Schnail Mail. Second time around, only three did.