[donohoe]

I use my lastname [at] gmail (same as my HN username). Over the years, I’ve received all sorts of misdirected messages: medical, financial, support, even real estate documents. When it seems important, I do my best to contact the sender and let them know.

What I’ve learned is that “no-reply” email addresses can cause real harm in situations where it’s critical to reach an actual person.

[multjoy]

One of my gmail doppelgängers has started trading crypto and I am deeply concerned for them.

[animal531]

I think mine is worse off. He keeps being signed up for Facebook notifications on whatever activity he's doing.

[abustamam]

My dad's first name is my last name so my last name @gmail is taken by him :)

But I have a relatively rare first name and even rarer last name due to my dad having a very rare first name, so I easily snagged first.last. Pretty sure to this day I've never even seen anyone with my dad's first name (or my last name).

Meanwhile, my coworkers name is literally Adam Smith and his usernames tend to be adamsmith2 or 3 or 4.

I once worked at a place that has two Brian Smiths who worked at desks across from each other. That was quite bizarre.

[ben_w]

One place I worked, we had one guy with the same personal and family names of the (then) Director General of the BBC… working on a project with another guy who also shared both.

I am not the horror film director I share a name with.

[tracker1]

I've worked in a few groups over the years with several other "Michael"... It's not fun when you get 4 in a group (dev/mgt teams) of like 15.

[fn-mote]

> Over the years, I’ve received all sorts of misdirected messages […]

Looking at my text messages, surely these are a mix of serious business and the starts of scams. How unsavory to think that helping someone could be a bad thing.

[unangst]

Same boat. Obscure last name humans unite!

[tracker1]

Absolutely... I've had the same issue (nickname is gmail name), and constantly amazed how many people don't "get" that you can't just claim any gmail address you like and start using it on websites anyway.

I've gotten student financial aid docs, various product mailing lists, order receipts etc... it's amazing how many places take an email address and just start spamming without any validation at all.

[astrange]

I get a ton of email to my gmail address for other people with similar names.

One of them was a director at Google, but I think she retired. Always assumed that meant I'd get a lame work email if I applied there.

[jspash]

I have [e-mail] because first.last was already taken.

Just curious, do gmail accounts ever expire? Will I ever get the chance to snag the other one? Or does it forever belong to my nemesis and life-long enemy?

[zaptheimpaler]

Even if your google account is deleted, the email address is NOT recycled because it can be used to impersonate people - maybe the previous owner still has physical/digital accounts linked to that old email. As far as I know most services do this - an email address once registered is never released again.

[eth0up]

Unused they have a half-life. Google Voice numbers much more aggressively so.

It's somewhere in the document.

[roywiggins]

After two years of inactivity:

https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/12418290?hl=en

[krainboltgreene]

This answer is not actually correct. I have an account I deleted 18 years ago, still can’t make it again.

[amarant]

Could in theory be because someone else grabbed the account 16 years ago tho, unless I'm missing something?

[tech234a]

No Google does not allow creating a new account with a previously-used Gmail address. Each Gmail address can be used at most once.

[krainboltgreene]

I emailed the address to make sure: It bounce due to not existing.

[simulator5g]

You can never make another account with that address because Google does not delete things.