by xyzzy » Wed Mar 12, 2014 12:41 am
I did quite a bit of looking around a few months ago, and the only one I could find was Zoho.com. So far I've really liked it; it doesn't put ads on the bottom of my outgoing or incoming messages, it works in my IMAP- or pop3-based email clients, and the web interface doesn't drag along like a drugged elephant on my old laptop like Gmail/Yahoo/etc. do.
I can't recall whether they asked for a phone number, but I'm fairly certain they didn't. (When a site does demand one, I use a Google Voice number from an ancient account I only use for that purpose, though I'm hoping to find a more anonymous free phone number service at some point.)