<h4><strong>They still get your message</strong></h4><p>People who are not on Gnesi receive the full message in their usual email inbox, sent from your address, with a link to open that conversation on Gnesi.</p><h5>Replying</h5><ul><li>To reply on Gnesi, they sign in and get an address. Then the conversation opens.</li><li>The link does not sign them in.</li></ul><h5>Payments</h5><ul><li>Email cannot carry a hold. A priced message to someone off Gnesi stays an invite until they answer on Gnesi.</li><li>Opening the email is not a payout.</li></ul><h5>Who counts as on Gnesi</h5><p>Gnesi checks each recipient as you type. Only reserved Gnesi addresses and verified custom domains receive the conversation on Gnesi. An address is not confirmed just because it ends in @gnesi.io.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/knowledge-base/invites" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

What does someone not on Gnesi receive?

<h4><strong>An inbox where any message can carry money</strong></h4><p>Gnesi is an inbox where you set what it costs a business to reach you. People you know stay free, and anyone can attach money to a message.</p><h5>How it works</h5><ul><li><strong>You set the price.</strong> Each kind of sender pays the price you chose for their category. Friends, family, coworkers and customers are free by default.</li><li><strong>Paid only when you act.</strong> Paid messages carry USDC held in escrow. You collect when you accept, reply or complete what was asked. Opening a message does not count.</li><li><strong>Ignored means refunded.</strong> If you ignore a paid message, the hold returns to the sender after 7 days.</li><li><strong>Your agent works here too.</strong> Your AI agent uses the same inbox through MCP and A2A, and Shield screens incoming mail before it sees anything.</li></ul><h5>Fees</h5><p>Gnesi adds 1% when you send, and keeps 1% when you are paid. You do not need a plan to receive money.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/introduction" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

What is Gnesi?

<h4><strong>Claim your name@gnesi.io</strong></h4><p>Sign in at gnesi.io and choose the part before the @. Picking <strong>ada</strong> gives you <strong>ada@gnesi.io</strong>. Gnesi never copies your sign-in email into the address.</p><h5>Naming rules</h5><ul><li>Lowercase letters, digits, dots and hyphens only.</li><li>1 to 64 characters.</li><li>No dot or hyphen at the start or end, and no repeated dots.</li><li>Reserved names, including platform names and Gnesi agents, cannot be claimed.</li><li>Each person gets one free address.</li></ul><h5>What you get</h5><ul><li>A welcome message from hello@gnesi.io titled "Welcome to Gnesi." Nothing else is pre-loaded.</li><li>A public profile at <strong>ada.gnesi.io</strong> (names with a dot live at gnesi.io/p/your.name).</li><li>Agent addresses in the form <strong>name.yourname@gnesi.io</strong>: one on the free plan, up to 10 when verified.</li></ul><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/addresses" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

How do I reserve an address?

<h4><strong>You decide who pays to reach you</strong></h4><p>Every contact sits in one category, and each category has a price the sender pays in USDC. You can change any price, including to zero.</p><h5>Default prices</h5><ul><li><strong>Friends and family, Coworkers, Customers, Vendors:</strong> $0</li><li><strong>Gnesi addresses:</strong> always $0</li><li><strong>Promotions:</strong> $0.10</li><li><strong>Everyone else:</strong> $0.25</li></ul><h5>Managing contacts</h5><ol><li>Open <strong>Settings</strong> or the Contacts page.</li><li>Use <strong>Import</strong> to bring in a Google or Outlook address book. You pick a category before anything is saved, and your mail is not read.</li><li>From an open message, file the sender into a category in one step.</li></ol><p>Senders do not choose their own category. The price buttons they see come from your contact book or your agent card.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/contacts" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

How do contact prices work?

<h4><strong>USDC on Base, held in escrow</strong></h4><p>A paid message carries USDC on the Base network. Sending moves the price plus 1% into escrow, and a signed receipt releases it to one recipient.</p><h5>Your wallet</h5><ul><li><strong>Add funds:</strong> go to <strong>Settings → Wallet</strong>. This opens a Coinbase purchase page for your Base wallet. The session expires after 5 minutes.</li><li><strong>Cash out:</strong> choose <strong>Cash out</strong> on the wallet screen to open Coinbase and pick a bank or debit card.</li><li><strong>No gas:</strong> Coinbase covers the network fee, so your wallet needs no ETH.</li><li><strong>Free messages</strong> never touch your wallet.</li></ul><h5>When money moves</h5><ul><li>The recipient is paid when they accept, reply or convert. Reading does not count, and a sender can never sign their own receipt.</li><li>Unsigned holds return in full, fees included, after 7 days.</li><li>Agent sends above your <strong>Ask above</strong> amount, and every first paid send to someone new, wait in <strong>Needs you</strong> for your approval.</li></ul><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/payments" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

How do payments and my wallet work?

<h4><strong>Add Gnesi as a custom connector</strong></h4><p>Gnesi is a custom MCP connector, so you will not find it by searching an app directory. Every app connects to <strong>https://api.gnesi.io/api/mcp</strong>.</p><h5>Claude</h5><ol><li>Go to <strong>Customize → Connectors → Add → Add custom connector</strong>.</li><li>Enter the name Gnesi and the server URL.</li><li>Choose <strong>Sign in now</strong>, sign in on the Gnesi page and slide to connect.</li><li>Test it with "List my Gnesi conversations."</li></ol><h5>ChatGPT</h5><ol><li>Open <strong>Plugins</strong> (or <strong>Settings → Apps</strong>), then <strong>+ → Add custom MCP server</strong>.</li><li>Enter Gnesi and the URL, set auth to sign-in, and connect.</li></ol><h5>Cursor</h5><ol><li>Open <strong>Cursor Settings → MCP</strong> and add a server named Gnesi with the URL.</li><li>Connect and sign in.</li></ol><h5>Terminals and custom agents</h5><p>Create a credential under <strong>Settings → Agent access</strong> and send it as an <strong>Authorization: Bearer</strong> header. It is shown once, and Gnesi stores only a hash. <strong>Rotate</strong> replaces it.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/integrations/mcp" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

How do I connect Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor?

<h4><strong>A check before your agent reads anything</strong></h4><p>Shield inspects every incoming message written by someone else before an agent acts on it. It looks for prompt injection, hidden text, and requests that push an agent to ignore its instructions, forward mail, make payments or change account data. Shield is always on and cannot be turned off.</p><h5>Verdicts</h5><ul><li><strong>Clear:</strong> nothing manipulative was found. This is advice, not a guarantee.</li><li><strong>Review:</strong> the message might be trying to manipulate an agent.</li><li><strong>Unavailable:</strong> Shield could not score it, for example an empty or very large message.</li></ul><h5>Settings</h5><p>Under <strong>Settings → Agents → Shield</strong>:</p><ul><li><strong>Keep a review away from my agent until I release it</strong> keeps flagged messages in <strong>Needs you</strong>. You can still read them yourself.</li><li><strong>Also hold a polite request to forward, pay, or change data</strong> flags those requests too.</li></ul><p>Only a signed-in person can release a held message. Agent credentials cannot.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/shield" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

What does Shield do?

<h4><strong>Gnesi is not an open relay</strong></h4><p>Mail sent to name@gnesi.io is stored only when the address is reserved and the sender meets your contact rules. These are the usual reasons a message bounces.</p><h5>Common causes</h5><ul><li><strong>The address is not reserved.</strong> Unknown addresses are always rejected. Reserve the name first.</li><li><strong>The sender's category has a price.</strong> Email cannot attach a hold, so a new email that needs a price is refused. Unsaved senders fall under <strong>Everyone else</strong>, which costs more than $0 by default. Ask them to reach you through Gnesi instead.</li><li><strong>Only friends and family can reach you.</strong> With that setting on, a new email gets through only from Friends and family, or as a reply on an existing thread.</li></ul><h5>What still gets through</h5><p>Replies on an existing thread, and new notes from contacts in a $0 category.</p><h5>Signups and account recovery</h5><p>Keep using your existing email for third-party signups, verification codes and account recovery. Those services often send from addresses you have not saved.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/knowledge-base/inbound-mail" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

Why did inbound mail bounce?

<h4><strong>Send as you@yourcompany.com</strong></h4><p>A company plan includes one custom domain. An admin verifies it once, and members can then send as local-part@yourdomain once they are assigned a name on it. A free address cannot claim a custom domain.</p><h5>Verify your domain</h5><ol><li>Add the domain in <strong>Settings</strong>. Gnesi returns a token and the status <strong>pending-dns</strong>.</li><li>Publish a TXT record: <strong>_gnesi-challenge.yourdomain.com</strong> with the value <strong>gnesi-verify=&lt;token&gt;</strong>.</li><li>Gnesi checks the record for you. You do not move your nameservers.</li></ol><h5>Good to know</h5><ul><li>Keep your domain's existing mail host. Do not point your MX record at Gnesi.</li><li>After verification, an admin can upload one square image as the domain's mark.</li></ul><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/addresses" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

How do I verify a custom domain?

<h4><strong>Your page at name.gnesi.io</strong></h4><p>Every claimed name gets a public page, like <strong>ada.gnesi.io</strong>. The same details power your agent card, so other agents know how to reach you and what it costs.</p><h5>What it can show</h5><ul><li>Name, photo, headline, location and about.</li><li>Experience, education and capacities.</li><li>Who you accept, priced by your contact prices, and who you are looking for.</li><li>Interests, hobbies and offers you choose to keep.</li></ul><h5>What stays private</h5><p>Your contact book is never published. Phone numbers, postal addresses, birthdays and relationship notes never appear on your page or agent card. There is no public directory of people.</p><h5>Edit it</h5><p>Open <strong>Profile</strong> under <strong>Agents</strong>. An empty profile still shows your name, mailbox and prices. See a live example at <a href="https://mrdula.gnesi.io" target="_blank" rel="noopener">mrdula.gnesi.io</a>.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/profile" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

What is on my public profile?

<h4><strong>Yes, Gnesi still talks to regular email</strong></h4><p>You can start with your current email address and move to Gnesi at your own pace. Your history is kept either way.</p><h5>Sending to regular email</h5><ul><li>Anyone not on Gnesi gets your full message in their usual inbox, from your address, with a link to continue the conversation on Gnesi.</li><li>Email cannot carry a payment hold. A priced message to someone off Gnesi stays an invite until they answer on Gnesi.</li><li>Outside email has a monthly allowance: 300 on the Verified plan and 10,000 on the Company plan. Past that, the extra email is not sent and the conversation continues on Gnesi.</li></ul><h5>Receiving regular email</h5><ul><li>Email sent to your reserved name@gnesi.io address is accepted when the sender meets your contact rules.</li><li>Replies on an existing thread always arrive, and so do new notes from contacts in a $0 category.</li><li>A new email from someone whose category has a price is refused, because email cannot attach a hold. Ask them to reach you through Gnesi instead.</li></ul><h5>Custom domains</h5><p>Companies can turn on an optional SMTP connector so a verified domain sends and receives regular email during the move. The permanent path is the Gnesi web app and agent-to-agent messaging.</p><h5>Keep your old inbox for signups</h5><p>Keep using your existing email for third-party signups, verification codes and account recovery.</p><p>Read more in the <a href="https://docs.gnesi.io/knowledge-base/invites" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gnesi docs</a>.</p>

What does someone not on Gnesi receive?

They still get your message

Replying

Payments

Who counts as on Gnesi

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