Everything about working with Sam, from the first forward to the morning brief.
Every account gets one assistant address: [email protected]. The easy rule: use the same name as your own email with @reef.net after it, so [email protected] pairs with [email protected]. Mail sent there is the only mail he ever sees. Your own inbox stays where it is.
Good first filter: -category:promotions -category:social -category:updates. That sends mail from real people and skips the noise. Add senders or subjects later; Gmail applies the filter to new mail only.
Outlook (web): Settings → Mail → Rules → Add new rule → condition (for example From: people in my contacts) → action Forward to → his address. Apple iCloud Mail: Settings → Rules → forward matching mail to his address. Anything else: any rule or filter that can forward mail works; there is nothing to install.
When you answer someone, add [email protected] in CC. Two things happen: the reply you owed is marked done, and any commitment in your message (“I will send the contract Monday”) becomes a promise in your ledger with its date. Mail from your address is never treated as a request to him.
Every day at the hour you choose, in your timezone: today’s calendar (if connected), replies waiting on you with how long each has waited, what you promised, what you are waiting on, the overnight mail that matters, and a count of the noise he skipped. The first brief goes out the morning after your first forwarded email. You can ask for one any time on the Brief page.
Four kinds: Reply owed (someone is waiting on you), You promised (from your own CC’d mail), Waiting on others, and To do. A loop closes when he sends an approved reply, when you reply with him CC’d, or when you press Done. Snooze hides a loop until a date; Dismiss drops it. The Free plan shows the last 30 days; Pro keeps everything.
When a message needs a reply, he drafts one and emails it to you right away with buttons: Send as Sam (from his address, inside their thread, signed as your assistant), Reply from my own address (opens your mail app with the reply prefilled and him CC’d, so the loop still closes), Edit first, or Discard. Every button opens a small confirmation page; nothing happens until you press it there. You can also open any message in the app and ask for a draft with a line of guidance (“yes to Thursday, ask for the deck first”). He writes as himself, never as you, and never invents facts, prices, or commitments; if he does not know, he says he will check with you. Free: 3 drafts a day (30 a month). Pro: 40 a day (300 a month), on the stronger model. Turn automatic drafts off in Settings if you prefer to ask each time.
After a reply goes out, he starts a Waiting on them loop. If they answer, it closes on its own. If they go quiet past your follow-up window (Settings, default 3 days), it appears in your brief with a Draft a follow-up link. The brief also carries Done and Snooze links for every open loop, so the whole morning can be handled from your phone without opening the app.
Settings has three boxes. My companies lists the businesses, products, and addresses that are yours (support@ and info@ included), so a request sent to any of them is treated as a request to you. Standing instructions is what you would tell a new assistant on day one: what you sell, how to talk to customers, what never to promise. Sites he should study takes up to six pages (your homepage, pricing, about); he reads them and writes himself a briefing card of what the business is, what it charges, and what it is trying to accomplish. Every draft and brief uses both, and he quotes only prices that appear in what he read.
Send him a plain email with nobody else on it and he treats it as a note from you. “Follow up with Acme on Tuesday” becomes a loop with a due date; “Remember: the PayRio contact is Libby” is kept as memory. He replies with one line so you know it landed. No app needed.
If you use Unforget with the same login, the two are one list without any setup: every loop he opens appears there as a task with a link to the email, every task you add there shows up in his brief, and ticking something off in either place closes it in both. Sam Pro includes Unforget Pro.
He runs on CogmemAi. Promises, decisions, notes you email him, and the replies he sent are remembered so later drafts have context. Memory is per account and never shared.
Settings → Connect Google Calendar. He reads today’s events for the brief, read-only; he never creates, changes, or deletes anything. Disconnect any time; the token is removed immediately.
Forwarded mail, drafts, loops, and briefs are stored for your account only. Admins never see message contents, only counts. To delete your assistant and its data, email [email protected] from your account address. Full policy: privacy, terms.
No. Your assistant only sees what you forward or CC to his reef.net address. Your inbox, password, and provider stay untouched. There is no OAuth grant to your mailbox.
No. He writes drafts. Nothing leaves until you press Send, and every send is logged. When he does send, it goes from his own address, in the original thread, signed as your assistant.
Anything unfinished: a reply you owe, a promise you made, a thing you are waiting on someone else for. Sam keeps the ledger and works it down with you each morning.
CC him when you reply to people. He reads your own messages for commitments (dates, deliverables, follow-ups) and logs each one with its deadline.
Email content is treated as data, never as instructions, so a message cannot tell your assistant what to do. Mail that looks like fraud is flagged and never answered.
Yes. His name, your name, timezone, brief time, and extra addresses that count as yours are all in Settings. His reef.net address is yours as long as your account exists.
The address, triage, the morning brief, a 30-day ledger, and three approved drafts a day. Sam Pro is $14.99 a month or $119 a year for full history, up to 40 drafts a day (300 a month) on the stronger model, and Google Calendar in the brief.