{"id":17347,"date":"2010-06-14T16:00:53","date_gmt":"2010-06-14T21:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/?p=17347"},"modified":"2010-06-14T16:00:53","modified_gmt":"2010-06-14T21:00:53","slug":"ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"askleo\"<\/p>\n

By Leo Notenboom<\/p>\n

I’ve been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft’s Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?<\/p>\n

My position: Yes.<\/p>\n

And: Absolutely Not.<\/p>\n

As always, it depends on your needs and your expectations.<\/p>\n

\u2022You may be asking yourself, “What cost? Free email services are free, aren’t they?” By now you should know there’s no such thing as “free” – everything has a cost. It may not come out of your wallet each month, but there’s definitely a cost.<\/p>\n

Here are some of the costs I associate with free email services:<\/p>\n

\u2022Spam – free email services seem to receive a disproportionate amount of spam. There are various theories about why, but the fact is you’ll get more spam with a free mail service than with a regular ISP.<\/p>\n

\u2022Deliverability – free email addresses also seem to send a disproportionate amount of SPAM. Even though you don’t send SPAM, it still impacts you. When spam filters see your email as coming from the same service as lots of SPAM, it’s a strike against you, and can quickly cause your email to be blocked.<\/p>\n

\u2022Customer Service – for all intents and purposes, there is none. This is truly a case of “you get what you pay for”. While there might be web forms and email address that will accept your question, your chances of getting a response are pretty much proportional to what you paid: zero.<\/p>\n

\u2022Limits and Restrictions – With most free services you must read your email through their web interface. If you want to move, forward or download your email, contacts or other information, the process is cumbersome, if it’s even possible at all.<\/p>\n

In short, I would never recommend a free email service for anything that you consider important, or anything that you want to keep long term.<\/p>\n

Here’s how to judge…<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

[This post is excerpted with Leo’s permission from his Ask Leo<\/a> blog.]<\/p>\n

Leo Notenboom has been involved in the tech industry for nearly 30 years. After retiring from an 18 year career as a Microsoft Software Engineer Leo went on to create Ask Leo!<\/a>, a free web site where he answers real questions from ordinary computer users.<\/i><\/p>\n

FaceBook URL: Leo’s Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n

Twitter URL: http:\/\/twitter.com\/askleo<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"askleo\"<\/p>\n

By Leo Notenboom<\/p>\n

I’ve been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft’s Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":66012,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[46,216,10,1408,1409,1410,1411,4875,125,53,1412],"class_list":["post-17347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leo-notenboom","tag-ask-leo","tag-facebook","tag-free","tag-free-email-service","tag-free-email-services","tag-free-mail-service","tag-intents-and-purposes","tag-leo-notenboom","tag-microsoft","tag-web","tag-yahoo-mail"],"yoast_head":"\nAsk Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"PC Matic Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Leo Notenboom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Leo Notenboom\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Leo Notenboom\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ed90798b38aa4ab74e12591da7ab21d5\"},\"headline\":\"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?\",\"datePublished\":\"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":409,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/pcmatic-fallback.png\",\"keywords\":[\"ask leo\",\"facebook\",\"Free\",\"free email service\",\"free email services\",\"free mail service\",\"intents and purposes\",\"leo notenboom\",\"Microsoft\",\"web\",\"yahoo mail\"],\"articleSection\":[\"leo notenboom\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/\",\"name\":\"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/pcmatic-fallback.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00\",\"description\":\"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/pcmatic-fallback.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/pcmatic-fallback.png\",\"width\":1920,\"height\":1080},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/\",\"name\":\"PC Matic Blog\",\"description\":\"Tech Tips and Tricks\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#organization\",\"name\":\"PC Matic - Top Antivirus Company in the USA.\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/techtalk.pcmatic.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/PC-MaticLogo-e1472689639222.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/techtalk.pcmatic.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/PC-MaticLogo-e1472689639222.png\",\"width\":1535,\"height\":483,\"caption\":\"PC Matic - Top Antivirus Company in the USA.\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/logo\\\/image\\\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.facebook.com\\\/pcmatic\",\"https:\\\/\\\/x.com\\\/pcmatic\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.instagram.com\\\/pcmaticusa\\\/\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.linkedin.com\\\/company\\\/pcmatic\",\"https:\\\/\\\/www.youtube.com\\\/c\\\/PCMaticVideo\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/ed90798b38aa4ab74e12591da7ab21d5\",\"name\":\"Leo Notenboom\",\"description\":\"Leo A. Notenboom is the owner of Puget Sound Software, LLC and the Leo in Ask Leo!. Leo has been in the personal computer and software industry since 1979, as a software engineer, a manager of software engineers, and as a consultant. In 1983 Leo joined what was then a medium sized local company called Microsoft and spent the next 18 years in a wide variety of groups working on a wide variety of software. If you're running Microsoft Windows, if you've used a Microsoft development tool or Microsoft Money, or if you've ever purchased a ticket through Expedia, there's a good chance you've been touched by some of his work. And of course, since 2003, Leo has been answering your tech questions on Ask Leo!\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\\\/\\\/ask-leo.com\"],\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/author\\\/leo\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?","description":"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?","og_description":"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?","og_url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/","og_site_name":"PC Matic Blog","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pcmatic","article_published_time":"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1920,"height":1080,"url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Leo Notenboom","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@pcmatic","twitter_site":"@pcmatic","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Leo Notenboom","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/"},"author":{"name":"Leo Notenboom","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/ed90798b38aa4ab74e12591da7ab21d5"},"headline":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?","datePublished":"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/"},"wordCount":409,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png","keywords":["ask leo","facebook","Free","free email service","free email services","free mail service","intents and purposes","leo notenboom","Microsoft","web","yahoo mail"],"articleSection":["leo notenboom"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/","url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/","name":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png","datePublished":"2010-06-14T21:00:53+00:00","description":"By Leo Notenboom I've been receiving a lot of reports of problems with Microsoft's Hotmail free email service lately, and it really begs the question: are free email services like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail worth the cost?","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pcmatic-fallback.png","width":1920,"height":1080},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/ask-leo-are-free-email-services-worth-it\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Ask Leo: Are Free Email Services Worth It?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/","name":"PC Matic Blog","description":"Tech Tips and Tricks","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"PC Matic - Top Antivirus Company in the USA.","url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/techtalk.pcmatic.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PC-MaticLogo-e1472689639222.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/techtalk.pcmatic.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/PC-MaticLogo-e1472689639222.png","width":1535,"height":483,"caption":"PC Matic - Top Antivirus Company in the USA."},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pcmatic","https:\/\/x.com\/pcmatic","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/pcmaticusa\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/pcmatic","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/PCMaticVideo"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/ed90798b38aa4ab74e12591da7ab21d5","name":"Leo Notenboom","description":"Leo A. Notenboom is the owner of Puget Sound Software, LLC and the Leo in Ask Leo!. Leo has been in the personal computer and software industry since 1979, as a software engineer, a manager of software engineers, and as a consultant. In 1983 Leo joined what was then a medium sized local company called Microsoft and spent the next 18 years in a wide variety of groups working on a wide variety of software. If you're running Microsoft Windows, if you've used a Microsoft development tool or Microsoft Money, or if you've ever purchased a ticket through Expedia, there's a good chance you've been touched by some of his work. And of course, since 2003, Leo has been answering your tech questions on Ask Leo!","sameAs":["http:\/\/ask-leo.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/author\/leo\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17347\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}