Website: Mail Sweeper
Easy Install - answer a few questions to configure preferences and add the “Dustpan” label to your inbox
Automatic Cleaning - will periodically sweep emails from the dustpan to the trash
Not a subscription, pay once and it’s yours forever.
Carbon Reduction - calculates the carbon reduction for emails deleted
Dashboard - a simple dashboard with some data around individual user savings
During a monthly budget review I found a mysterious $2/month charge to Google. I didn’t notice it for over a year!
I went through my purchases trying to figure out what it could be. After a few days and almost giving up, I checked my wife’s email…
It turns out she had purchased a subscription for more Gmail storage. Google offers 15GB of free storage, if you exceed that limit, you either have to start deleting things or upgrade.
There was a class of emails accumulating in her inbox. They weren’t quite spam, as she didn’t want to block or unsubscribe.
I thought about how I could fix this problem. Along the way also found that my mom and mother-in-law had a similar problem (I caught them both manually deleting emails in bulk on separate occasions).
To fix this, I wanted to create a way to accumulate this email “dust” and periodically automate the disposal. This gave me the idea of introducing a new metaphor for email: The dustpan.
The Dustpan is a new label for the Gmail inbox. Unimportant emails accumulate here, and after a certain age are automatically “swept” into the trash.
Mail Sweeper provides a simple, one time setup of the dustpan, answer a few quick questions to configure your preferences and click the button to install.
I made sure it was so simple my mom could do it without my help!
The carbon cost of a single email is estimated between 0.3g and 50g. The range varies widely depending on the type of email and its contents.
One study in France showed that if everyone deleted 50 old emails, this would be the equivalent of turning of 2.7 Billion lightbulbs for one hour!
Mailsweeper has already swept over 100K emails, and this is growing daily. We calculate the carbon reduction based on the size of the emails deleted. This calculation is displayed right in our homepage!
Not a subscription. Pay once, and it’s yours. For early adopters, the price was $1 and the slots sold out quickly. The price is now $4 for the next 900 or so users, after which the price will be $8.
There are a few competitors, but they are mostly subscriptions that in many cases would cost more than just paying for more storage (seems pointless).
It’s also possible that Google introduces a similar feature in the future for personal accounts. They do provide some light controls for business accounts to auto delete emails.
Let the roast begin, don’t hold any punches!
Key Features
Easy Install - answer a few questions to configure preferences and add the “Dustpan” label to your inbox Automatic Cleaning - will periodically sweep emails from the dustpan to the trash Not a subscription, pay once and it’s yours forever. Carbon Reduction - calculates the carbon reduction for emails deleted Dashboard - a simple dashboard with some data around individual user savingsOrigin Story
During a monthly budget review I found a mysterious $2/month charge to Google. I didn’t notice it for over a year!
I went through my purchases trying to figure out what it could be. After a few days and almost giving up, I checked my wife’s email…
It turns out she had purchased a subscription for more Gmail storage. Google offers 15GB of free storage, if you exceed that limit, you either have to start deleting things or upgrade.
There was a class of emails accumulating in her inbox. They weren’t quite spam, as she didn’t want to block or unsubscribe.
Introducing: The Email Dustpan
I thought about how I could fix this problem. Along the way also found that my mom and mother-in-law had a similar problem (I caught them both manually deleting emails in bulk on separate occasions).
To fix this, I wanted to create a way to accumulate this email “dust” and periodically automate the disposal. This gave me the idea of introducing a new metaphor for email: The dustpan.
The Dustpan is a new label for the Gmail inbox. Unimportant emails accumulate here, and after a certain age are automatically “swept” into the trash.
Mail Sweeper provides a simple, one time setup of the dustpan, answer a few quick questions to configure your preferences and click the button to install.
I made sure it was so simple my mom could do it without my help!
Environmental Impact
The carbon cost of a single email is estimated between 0.3g and 50g. The range varies widely depending on the type of email and its contents.
One study in France showed that if everyone deleted 50 old emails, this would be the equivalent of turning of 2.7 Billion lightbulbs for one hour!
Mailsweeper has already swept over 100K emails, and this is growing daily. We calculate the carbon reduction based on the size of the emails deleted. This calculation is displayed right in our homepage!
Pricing
Not a subscription. Pay once, and it’s yours. For early adopters, the price was $1 and the slots sold out quickly. The price is now $4 for the next 900 or so users, after which the price will be $8.
Competition
There are a few competitors, but they are mostly subscriptions that in many cases would cost more than just paying for more storage (seems pointless).
It’s also possible that Google introduces a similar feature in the future for personal accounts. They do provide some light controls for business accounts to auto delete emails.
Let the roast begin, don’t hold any punches!