I hate this comparison. I’ve seen it so many times in the last four years or so, but I feel like it always adds more confusion. I don’t think most people know how email servers work. I run a server and have messed with Postfix, and I don’t have a good grasp on it myself. I’m not sure how to improve it but there has to be something better than that.
What is a king to a god?
You’re doing it when protonmail goes out of business suddenly, or changes their privacy rules, or decides they want to raise prices and you don’t want to pay. You can never really predict these things, and having a cheap (domain names can be like $15 a year) option is great.
I really disagree re: email. Proton’s web interface is fine, but if you’re going to use a desktop client, and many people prefer to, I think thunderbird is a better choice than outlook. Further, having a personal domain for email is great if you ever want to switch providers. It’s pretty much the only way to not have to email dozens of people telling them “Sorry, you won’t be able to reach me at this address anymore.” If you do any sort of business over email encrypting it is a good choice, because it is possible to both spoof email and to intercept and read it.
I feel like this option is honestly worse for most people. You have the new security problem of having to transfer the file everywhere, but now the huge inconvenience of potentially losing it or not having it on a new device.
I do not believe either mastodon or lemmy federate your email address at all. Only the server you join has that information. You might have to worry if you have signed up to an uncrupulous instance. That instance admin could sell your email, I guess. They would have access to any email you gave them, so changing it would probably not help. I think the problem is a little overstated, honestly.
This might be a stupid question, but I’m only so-so at wireguard. Do you experience that kind of loss using WG at home, on wifi, between your phone and server?