There are also Web sites on the Internet that will give you an e-mail address and a mail box where you send and collect your messages. This is called Web based e-mail and it is free, apart from the cost of the local telephone call  you make when you use the Internet. 

Web sites that offer e-mail services hope to attract more people to their site as generally the first thing people do when they go online is to check to see their e-mail messages.

Two popular sites for free e-mail are Hotmail, which is owned by Microsoft and Excite, a Web site that also lets you search the Internet.