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Google is the fastest way in, and it's also what builds your circle and your weekly draft automatically.
With email and password, you build your circle by hand to start. You can still connect Google afterward, just to pull suggestions, then disconnect it again and keep this account, no strings attached.
WHY WE ASK FOR GOOGLE
afewpics isn't really for the people you already text every day. You don't need help remembering them. It's for the people you're close with but don't talk to as often: the college roommate, the cousin a few time zones away, the friend from your old job. Those are exactly the people you're most likely to forget when you're building a list from scratch, off the top of your head.
So when you sign in with Google, we look at two things: who you email with, even occasionally, and (this is the part that matters more) who emails you. A birthday message, a wedding invite, an anniversary note. Those usually come from people who think of you even if you don't write back very often, which makes them a pretty good bet for “someone who belongs in your circle” even before you consciously think of them yourself.
We don't read your email.
We never open or store the body of a single message. What we actually look at is who a message is to, from, and cc'd, and its subject line, checked against a short list of patterns like birthday, anniversary, and wedding. That's the entire signal. If you signed up with email and password and connected Google just for this, you can disconnect it again right from your circle page whenever you're done. No need to dig through your Google account settings, though you can always check there too.
None of this adds anyone automatically. Every name Google helps surface shows up as a suggestion on your circle page. You still decide who's actually in, one at a time.
Not sure if someone wants in? Ask first.
Instead of guessing, you can send them a link with a short note explaining what afewpics is, and let them opt themselves in. Here's what that actually says:
I'm not on Instagram or Facebook much these days, so I miss a lot of what's going on with people I care about. I started sending a few photos from my week over email instead, once a week, nothing to install, and getting them back is honestly the best part. No pressure at all if it's not your thing, but if you'd like in: afewpics.com/join/sharat-4f2a
Nothing changes for them until they actually tap the link and add their email, and nothing changes for you either, they just move from “pending” to “in your circle.”