Mail Memories – A desktop app to rescue photos from Gmail
Show HN: Mail Memories – A desktop app to rescue photos from Gmail
What is the idea?
A local desktop app that walks the whole mailbox, pulls the photos out of attachments, de-duplicates them, and lays them out as ordinary dated album folders. Nothing is uploaded.
Who would use it, and what do they get?
A non-technical person with a decade-old mailbox; the deliverable is an album folder they can actually open.
What is missing today?
Takeout delivers an archive format, not an album; Google Photos only knows what you deliberately uploaded, and cannot see the scan you emailed yourself in 2011. The missing piece is the last-mile unpacking, not the export.
What makes this one different?
Make local-only the product, not a footnote: read-only, no network, and the deliverable is a folder you can drag straight into a phone gallery plus a contact sheet of the ten faces that appear most. Cold start (Chinese): 小红书/豆瓣 「邮箱 老照片 找回」「换手机 照片丢了」; (English): the 'how do I get ten years of attachments out of Gmail' thread that recurs in r/DataHoarder and r/gmail.
What could kill it?
It is a one-time job — opened once, never again — and Google closes it forever by adding a single 'photos folder' checkbox to Takeout. It also has to ask for mailbox access, which is the permission ordinary people are most reluctant to grant.
Who pays, and for what?
Anyone changing phones, retiring an old mailbox, or sorting out a late relative's accounts. One-time purchase.
What is the main risk?
A single-use utility with no repeat, on a job the platform can absorb in one release.
How much work is it?
about two weeks of work
Where does the evidence come from?
https://mailmemories.com https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48762000