The Perils of an .xyz Domain
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I finally got around to setting up the e-mails correctly for my instance (mander.xyz) and noticed that the e-mail deliver-ability is awful, as I get heavily penalized by spam filters for having an .xyz domain. I would not be surprised if search engines penalize this too.

It is not a simple task to change a domain name for an instance without breaking federation, so once you have a federating instance you are are stuck with that domain name.

I would not recommend picking an .xyz domain for your instances unless you intend it to be a private instance forever. If possible, try to go for a .com, or some other more standard TLD!

Interesting read. I just bought my wife a .garden to use for email. It’s on the more expensive side at $30 a year so maybe will avoid the same fate

I’m not sure about how much it is penalized .xyz for being .xyz, but if the domain is new or you don’t have DMARC, DKIM and all of those perfectly set, you will still keep having problems.

Salamander
creator
link
fedilink
5
edit-2
2Y

I was able to set everything correctly (DKIM, DMARC, PTR, SPF, MX records) and I can get a ‘8/10’ from an e-mail tester.

The two points that are deducted are due to SpamAssassin flagging the TLD:

Even then, 8/10 should be good enough, but the emails go into the spam directly - at least for gmail and protonmail.

The article I linked goes into even worse cases, like admins blocking all of ‘.xyz’ domains by default, social media sites flagging them as spam, and chat messages including an .xyz url being silently blocked.

Cold Hotman
link
fedilink
52Y

I’ve had the same thing happen on both .com and .no TLD’s despite setting the DKIM keys, all mail goes to the spam box. And I’ve had the same setup cause no issues.

In my experience it’s spam filters and the large companies behind them, I’ve even had my home IP blocked as untrustworthy - Until I power-cycled my modem and got a new IP from the local pool. To me it’s the reciever that unjustly blocks the mail, not our TLD’s that are “untrustworthy”.

I know it’s not an answer to the situation, but I don’t think there are any. To me, e-mail is another good idea ruined by big tech.

Salamander
creator
link
fedilink
32Y

To me it’s the reciever that unjustly blocks the mail, not our TLD’s that are “untrustworthy”.

Oh, absolutely.

I also tried setting up my e-mail server at home, but my ISP won’t let me forward port 25.

I think it is related to this. I also have a really high trust value an email tester and I use a .com. It doesn’t really matter. The email service we have on our company must have some kind of whitelist of “trustworthy” mail servers. I have sent emails to my company address and they go to SPAM. I’m pretty sure the whitelist is pretty small, or at least it doesn’t include email services provided by non big companies. I use Migadu, btw.

Linkedin blocks .ml website domains too. Rip any site that uses that I guess

Salamander
creator
link
fedilink
22Y

In what way? I just tried sending lemmy.ml in a private message and at least that went through.

Did you confirm if the recipient got it? I shared a Lemmy post link via Linkedin DMs once and the message was shadow un-received (I could see it as sent but the other person never got it, only my before and after messages)

Salamander
creator
link
fedilink
22Y

Yes, I sent it to someone who is sitting next to me. Maybe whatever algorithm they use for filtering is a bit noisy.

Amicese
link
fedilink
12Y

Reddit does too.

lemmyreader
link
fedilink
32Y

There are email providers who will block email from brand new domain names, and perhaps others will consider it spam, and maybe only consider it spam for the very first email contact between your instance and their email server. Your results may be better within a few weeks time.

Salamander
creator
link
fedilink
22Y

I hope that’s the case! I will run more tests in a few weeks.

Post links of your self-hosted instances of Lemmy!

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