Not in the sense of the user experience, but in how it actually works.
People get their email from different places (gmail, yahoo, hotmail, outlook.com, their work, whatever) and they all use the same format and protocol and send email from one site to another over the great big internet and no matter where you get your email from it will work with everyone else.
Now, Usenet is honestly a much better analogy, but nobody knows what that is anymore.
It is in how it functionally operates.
Not in the sense of the user experience, but in how it actually works.
People get their email from different places (gmail, yahoo, hotmail, outlook.com, their work, whatever) and they all use the same format and protocol and send email from one site to another over the great big internet and no matter where you get your email from it will work with everyone else.
Now, Usenet is honestly a much better analogy, but nobody knows what that is anymore.
The user experience is what you’re typically explaining to someone though, most people don’t care about the backend.