I used to feel like this about email, so I made my own email service. Try it out: https://port87.com/

I feel like most people hate email because email services stopped innovating like 15 years ago.

I started a new account, on a new instance, and the very first notification I got was for a spam message from that ‘fediverse chick’ person. It really made that “it’s like email” connection feel complete.