> The big differences to me are that faxes don't need an "account" to send/receive files, the machines are simpler and cheaper, they have far fewer intermediary technical and user issues, and their network is way more reliable. If you depend on sending and receiving documents, faxes are light-years more reliable and less complicated than, say, e-mail.
You most definitely need an "account" with your telephony provider in order to receive anything.
I meant regarding e-mail (or any other internet file transfer service). Your e-mail account, and that of your recipient, are accounts used to authorize access. If either you or your recipient lose account access, you can not send and receive files. This happens all the time, like when your corporate ID gets locked for no reason, or a user forgets their password, or some other problem occurs.
Faxes require no such accounts. Just plug the machine in to a phone line and send a document.
More accurately, faxes do not support accounts. Faxes assume that a single phone line has a single user, like machines on computer networks in the bad old days. The modern equivalent would be using a single email account for the entire company and posting the password around the office.
You most definitely need an "account" with your telephony provider in order to receive anything.