Friday, October 21, 2005

Tech Review: Gmail

gmail

With all the buzz surrounding Gmail and me needing a new email since my previously held Yahoo account was hacked, I had to test this webmail from the almighty Google. So I've been using Gmail for over two months now, it's time to draw some conclusions.

There are so many positive points about Gmail that I don't know where to begin. Ok let's start with the most obvious: it's size. With over 2.6 Gb (& counting) of free space, Gmail totally destroys the competition. It's simple, no need for annoying mail client (Outlook) or to delete any messages since the space is not a problem any more. It's really easy to send big files, music or even short movies over the net now! The other major innovation is the interface. Minimalist and simple to use, the interface reflects Google’s search engine. With a capacity of over 300’000 emails, it would have been chaotic to search for an old message. Enters here a powerful internal search engine, fast and convenient that will help you find anything you want.

I also like the anti-spam service; unlike other email (Yahoo, Hotmail) it works extremely good and filtered every single spam message so far. The conversation utility is pretty sweet too, it allows you to follow emails that you have send and receive from a same subject much like an Instant Messaging client would. It’s kinda weird at first but very useful when we get the handle of it. There is plenty of other little tools here and there and I’ll let you discover them by yourself.
Concerning the negative points, I heard people complaining about text ads reflecting the content of their mail and that it was invading their privacy. I don’t know ‘cuz I haven’t seen any of these ads yet, wait and see on this topic. To nitpick a little bit I would add that Gmail needs an anti-virus, a blacklisting function and a translation tool (like on the Google toolbar). But like we said it’s not the final version yet.
Gmail is still in Beta testing. It is impossible to obtain an account without receiving an invitation. The good thing is, I just happen to have myself a hundred invitations left. For those of you that want to receive an invitation, leave a (nice) comment with your email and if I feel like you deserve one, I'll send you an invitation. 
Here are a couple of sure ways to be on my good side:
- Leave a donation
- Support my website through patronizing
- Send me naked pictures of you (only works with pretty girlz)
- Visit my page often
- Leave plenty of comments

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