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Comment by anderspitman | Hacker News Reader

Not just a GB. It was also constantly increasing in size, with a live counter to show how much storage you had available. Super gimmicky, but fun.

I guess there are probably a lot of people here who are too young to have ever used those early versions. You also had to scrounge forums for an invite code.

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I made my account(s) off invite codes and have "just my last name" at gmail dot com as an address... it's one of my most prized possessions, to this day!

I managed to snag my (very common) italian last name. I get a flood of messages every day. I both love and hate my account.

I don't even speak italian!

do you receive any interesting emails?

I get the same thing. My last name isn't that common though so I've messaged the culprits specifically (especially if they use their phone number when signing up for whatever it is) to ask them to please stop using it.

Someone will have the idea and sign up for 5-6 things all in one burst, which usually inspires my outreach.

Hanging out in IRC channels in early 2000s was how I wasted my teenage years. But I did get a gmail invite out of it leading to my primary email address to this day: arithmetic@gmail.com

Thats awesome man.

I also have <last name>@gmail.com. It’s not a super common last name, but common enough that I get emails almost daily from people accidentally omitting a first initial.

I convinced my mom to buy me a beta invite for $5 on ebay and then spread my invites out to my family and friends.

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