collective.email

An email address for your collective. yourcollective@collective.email — share the inbox within your group, assign a conversation to any member, and have the internal conversation right next to the email, invisible to the sender.

Multi-tenant service: one container hosts every collective. All mail flows through Resend — inbound via webhook, outbound via API. No IMAP, no SMTP, no per-tenant DNS.

How it works

sender ──► <slug>@collective.email ──► Resend inbound ──► POST /webhooks/resend
                                                              │  fetch full email + raw MIME
                                                              ▼
                                                    route by slug → collective
                                                    thread · store · auto-assign
                                                              │
              members' personal inboxes ◄── notifications (Reply-To: slug+r.<signed>@…)
                    │ reply
                    ▼
        webhook again → verified member → send to original sender as <slug>@… (Resend)
                        └─ someone already answered? block + bounce back to the member

• Passwordless: members sign in with their personal email + 6-digit code; 3-month sessions.
• Self-serve joining: each collective shares a 24h invite link; people pick their own email and notification level (as-they-arrive / daily / weekly).
• Derived status: last message inbound → needs reply; any reply → answered. Oldest waiting first.
• Assignment provenance: "Xavier assigned this to Leen", "Automatically assigned based on previous emails from this sender", "Assigned — replied via email notification".
• Attachments: inbound stored & downloadable, outbound from the web composer or forwarded from email replies.
• Waiting list: the homepage takes signups (waitlist table + email ping to ADMIN_EMAIL); the platform admin converts them into live collectives at /admin in one click — no billing yet.

Local development

npm install
npm run dev        # http://localhost:3000

Without RESEND_API_KEY, every email (codes, notifications, outbound replies) is printed to stdout, and the webhook accepts test payloads with inline text — the whole flow works offline:

curl -X POST localhost:3000/webhooks/resend -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -d '{
  "type": "email.received",
  "data": { "email_id": "t1", "from": "Marie <marie@example.org>",
            "to": ["yourcollective@collective.email"],
            "subject": "Hello!", "message_id": "<m1@example.org>", "text": "Hi there" }
}'

Production setup

1. Resend (mail plumbing)

1. Create an API key → RESEND_API_KEY.
2. Domains → Add domain: collective.email. Resend gives you DKIM/SPF DNS records (see Vercel step).
3. Receiving: enable inbound for collective.email — Resend gives you the MX record to add.
4. Webhooks → Add endpoint: https://collective.email/webhooks/resend, event email.received. Copy the signing secret → RESEND_WEBHOOK_SECRET.
5. Set RESEND_FROM=collective.email <notifications@collective.email>.

2. Deploy on Vercel (recommended)

The app runs as a single Vercel function (api/index.js wraps the Hono app; vercel.json rewrites everything to it). State lives in managed services:

Concern	Service	Env vars
Database	Turso (libSQL — same SQLite dialect)	TURSO_DATABASE_URL, TURSO_AUTH_TOKEN
Attachments	Vercel Blob (private downloads proxied via /attachment/:id)	BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN
Digests	Vercel Cron → GET /cron/digest hourly (see vercel.json)	CRON_SECRET
Signing	sessions & one-click links	SECRET (required — no disk to persist a generated one)

Steps: vercel link → set all env vars from .env.example → vercel deploy --prod → point the collective.email domain at the project. In Vercel's DNS panel add Resend's MX record on @ (all <slug>@collective.email mail → webhook) and Resend's DKIM/SPF TXT records. x-vercel-ip-country makes the homepage's EUR/USD detection work automatically.

3. Alternative: any Docker host

Without TURSO_DATABASE_URL/BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN, the app falls back to a local SQLite file and attachment files under /data — the Dockerfile still works for Coolify/VPS deployments (port 3000, volume at /data, healthcheck GET /health). Same codebase, zero config divergence.

4. First run

Sign in with ADMIN_EMAIL → /admin → create your first collective (e.g. commonshub) with its admin's email. They get an onboarding email; from there everything is self-serve. Existing addresses (like hello@commonshub.brussels) can simply auto-forward to commonshub@collective.email until the Pro own-domain plan exists.

Pricing (waitlist only, no billing yet)

Duo $/€10 (2 members) · Collective $/€25 (5 members) · Pro $/€100 (own domain) — monthly, or ×10 yearly (2 months free). The homepage shows EUR or USD based on visitor location (x-vercel-ip-country/cf-ipcountry headers, Accept-Language fallback). Stripe integration comes once the waiting list validates demand.

Development notes

• npm run typecheck / npm run build / npm start (serves dist/).
• Stack: Hono (SSR JSX, no client framework), better-sqlite3, mailparser (parses raw MIME fetched from Resend), Resend HTTP API.
• Product history and design decisions: SPECS.md.