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> It takes an hour to set up a Postfix server. It can run in a virtual instance on a Linux laptop sitting on your desk if you want it to. The email is 100% your property. No one’s going to “take a look” or otherwise scan it for information for government or advertisers.

True, but there's a problem for the homeowner in rolling their own private mailserver. Their public IP is almost certainly dynamic (DHCP) from their ISP. This means the IP is going to be in every RBL (Real-time Block List) and no legit mailserver is going to accept connections from that home-stationed server.

They may be able to arrange to "smarthost" it to their ISP's mailserver if they're lucky, but that's something that has to be explicitly configured with the ISP (because you're basically asking your ISP to be a relay for whatever you send) and most commercial ISPs do not want people having their own home-stationed servers, mail or otherwise.

> Technology can be daunting, but it’s not out of reach for anyone.

Technology, that's true. Connections to other servers, not necessarily.