Modern email can be built from borrowed parts
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The article proposes a new email-like protocol called HMTP that operates over HTTP, utilizing existing technologies like WebFinger and ActivityPub. The goal is to modernize email infrastructure by replacing legacy SMTP standards while maintaining user address formats.
Why it matters
It explores a decentralized approach to communication that could potentially bypass traditional email providers and legacy design flaws.
Leer en español Share Let's design the successor to email on top of HTTP, fixing the design flaws SMTP has been dragging along for 40 years. Piece by piece. The goal is not to replace the current mail system, heaven forbid!, but to learn, have fun and discover current technologies to swap out every element: sending, receiving, gateway, keys, and so on. The system will never talk to Gmail or any classic email provider: it only talks to itself. The only thing we are going to keep is the shape of the addresses, user@domain . Everything else gets reinvented.
Since it is a mail system over HTTP, a good name for the protocol would be HMTP: Hypertext Mail Transfer Protocol (the S for Simple in SMTP gives up its seat to the H for HTTP).
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