"So far, my conclusion is that this is a service that is technically more than capable of replacing GMail, even for power users. Furthermore, FastMail’s primary (and in fact only) business model is to charge you money for making sure that you can keep on emailing like a boss. Together, this makes for an offer that I could not refuse".
Totally agreed. I'm a Fastmail's happy user, glad to pay for such a great service.
Google Apps isn’t Google’s primary business – they could neglect it and have unhappy customers, but their bottom line would hardly notice the difference.
Given that ~90% of Google's revenue is its search business (AdWords and AdSense) that's true for pretty much everything they do apart from that core business.
Totally agreed. I'm a Fastmail's happy user, glad to pay for such a great service.