Gmail - Elaborate Hoax?

[Garrett]

Google announced a new free email service at the end of their West Coast day yesterday, ensuring a media blitz on the holiest of hoaxter holidays - April Fools Day. Is this upcoming service the real deal?

John Battelle said (http://battellemedia.com/archives/000527.php), "...this has got to be an April Fool's Joke. A very believable one, one that in the long run may come true, but a joke."

I'm inclined to think so too, especially considering the tone of the press release (http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/gmail.html), which sounds like an Onion (http://www.theonion.com) reporter wrote it in a parody of Google press releases.

Classic Google prank or the next big leap in free email?

Remember, Google is hiring (http://www.google.com/jobs/lunar_job.html)... is this because of their expected increase of work due to handling gMail?

[John Glube]

Garrett,

Me thinks the main stream media has clearly been had on this one.

The press release is a classic (http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/gmail.html).

But notice the service is not actually open for business. Rather you can sign up to a "jokers" mailing list.

Tie this in with the related job's release (http://www.google.com/jobs/lunar_job.html) and my vote goes to - "April Fools - got yah."

John

[rambodog]

Google has had e-mail tests in the works and, with search becoming a very competitive market again, e-mail is certainly one thing that really pulls users back to a portal. If its a hoax there is likely a real version just around the corner.

[keywordguy]

I hope this is only hoax. The Internet is clogged enough with SPAM from free services like HotMail, Yahoo Mail...the list goes on.

Why give spammers, hoaxsters, and frauds one more free email service to abuse. Just as a website for business is almost as required as a business card....so is a legitimate email address.

I would block Google email addresses just as I'm doing with the other free services that spew out spam.

[jbrown123]

If reaction is bad, then Google cans idea and call it an April Fools joke.

If reaction is good, then Google goes ahead and develops the service.

[MrOwen]

I would say this isn't a hoax, primarily because Google can't afford to piss a bunch of people off by renigging on the deal. The competitive marketplace in the search engine world is hot right now and this is a positive sign that G is determined to keep their share. As big of a company as Google is and with all the free press they already get I wouldn't think them to pull this type of stunt. Also, why build out this page with lots of detailed information.

http://www.google.com/gmail/help/about.html

This is only my opinion and believe me, I've eaten my words many a time in the past.

[Garrett]

I'm becoming more convinced that Gmail's the real deal, especially considering Danny Sullivan's article (http://searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3334241) in today's SearchEngineWatch.

He's got some quotes from Wayne Rosing, vice president of engineering at Google.

I may be eating MY words before the day's out, MrOwen.

[sajdlz]

I saw this report this morning also and wondered the same thing, especially after seeing reports with 1gig of storage space. that seems kind of crazy to offer for free. If it happens.. great, another email account to set up for the spammers to spam. If not.. great gag Google:-)

[xmx]

I think it is possible this is real.

I just read the PR and seems they are really going to do it.

Anyway, 1 Giga for emails is really a lot and they know only a few users will profit completely of the amount of space.

They will probably add their ads to the web interface and also regular web search results to the results of the searches one makes in the mail.

They want to grab the free email users (reported as number one online activity) and provide them their other regular services.

[Craig C]

Not only isn't this an April Fool's joke, it's absolutely brilliant. I guarantee that Google will launch this, because it is a no brainer for them.

The key to how this is going to work is the way they describe the process. They stated that an e-mail and it's replies will be grouped into a natural conversation. Sound familiar? It should, this is going to basically be an extension of their usenet archive - groups.google.com.

In case all you nay sayers aren't aware, Google bought dejanews a few years ago and renamed it google groups. Google groups is an archive of EVERY SINGLE post that was EVER made to usenet over the past 20 years. They can afford to provide this monstrous database of conversations for free because of targeted advertising, the same targeted advertising that will fund gmail.

Basically, I'm guessing that they will create secure newgroups that exist only on their servers for storing your messages. The key about this will be their support for attachments. Don't get your hopes up that your getting 1GB for storing software because it won't happen. I'm betting they will have either no support for attachments or automatic deletion of file attachments after a certain amount of time. That's how they will succeed where others fail. They can't make money storing your files, but the more e-mail you store with them, the more potential for income.

With lifetime e-mail storage, not only will Google be able to earn money with targeted ads on all of your e-mail, but it will lock you in as a lifelong google user.

Brilliant.

Craig

[synergytheory]

I dunno, 1GB of space makes me think hoax.
Say 10 million users sign up, that's like 10,000 terabytes. I am sure it won't take long for SPAM to fill that up.
1 Terabyte HD costs about 1200, so to hold 10 million users, google will have to spend 12 million on HDs :) I think to much.

On the other hand, google will need to spend roughly $1.20 on each user. I bet they would get that back in the first day with advertizing.

[OneMoreBite]

Check out the first quote in the press release: "Heck, Yeah," Say Google Founders

Does that sound like a real press release to you? LOL. I'm voting April Fools joke.

Kathryn

[atimmins]

They have it on thier website and it certainly looks real enough. Should you want to read thier FAQs go here http://www.google.com/gmail/help/about.html, it looks to be an impressive offering.

I especially like the advance spam filtering feature. This is combined with a direct link to thier spam abuse department. As stated in the FAQs, by using this link to report spam mail G will be able to continually improve the spam filtering algo.

It seems the only controversy is thier plan to scan and index the emails for relavent AdSense add placements. I personally do not find this to be a problem, I mean realistically I don't discuss top secret rocket science in my emails. Additionally all the scanning is done by machine not humans, it simply allows them to display ads that may in fact be benificial to me.

Lets face it folks, the US government scans and archives every email they can intercept. All this in an attempt to foil terrorist plots. Hackers, Crackers and other idiots with to much idle time I'm sure also intercept many email communications with the express intent of stealing your identity. If one were truely worried about such activity one would digitaly sign and encrypt all such communications.

I look forward to Google's newest offering. I have no doubt that their abilty to allow us to search old emails will perform head and shoulders above M$ Outlooks ability to do so. Outlook is so slow even when I'm just searching for a particular email address that I sent to, much less the contents of individual emails!

I say go Google, let me Gmail!

[Daniel Brandt]

I don't think it's a hoax, in that the Gmail program is planned as described. The cute press release is just more evidence that Google is out-of-touch due to the slobbering mass-media adulation they get every day of every week.

It's the media's fault. Why hasn't there been more coverage of the privacy implications in the fine print?

From http://www.google.com/gmail/help/privacy.html

"Email contents and usage. The contents of your Gmail account also are stored and maintained on Google servers in order to provide the service. Indeed, residual copies of email may remain on our systems, even after you have deleted them from your mailbox or after the termination of your account."

From http://www.google.com/gmail/help/terms_of_use.html

"You do, however, agree that Google may monitor, edit or disclose your personal information, including the content of your emails, if required to do so in order to comply with any valid legal process or governmental request (such as a search warrant, subpoena, statute, or court order), or as otherwise provided in these Terms of Use and the Gmail Privacy Policy. Personal information collected by Google may be stored and processed in the United States or any other country in which Google Inc. or its agents maintain facilities. By using Gmail, you consent to any such transfer of information outside of your country."

_______________

And furthermore, Google's normal 34-year cookie is being recorded as you cruise the Gmail pages. When you insert your email address to be notified of Gmail updates, this mere act of inserting your email address allows Google to tag your cookie, with the unique ID number in it, to your identity as an individual. Since Google apparently has no policies regarding data retention, theoretically all of your past search terms that you've used in Google can now be identified positively with you as an individual -- regardless of your changing IP address. (This assumes that you don't go to the trouble of deleting your Google cookie on a regular basis.)

And that's just for indicating an interest in Gmail. What happens when Google starts saving every email until year 2038 and you're powerless to delete any of it? What a field day for the legal profession! What a wet dream for Total Information Awareness!

[Craig C]

I dunno, 1GB of space makes me think hoax.
Say 10 million users sign up, that's like 10,000 terabytes. I am sure it won't take long for SPAM to fill that up.
1 Terabyte HD costs about 1200, so to hold 10 million users, google will have to spend 12 million on HDs :) I think to much.

On the other hand, google will need to spend roughly $1.20 on each user. I bet they would get that back in the first day with advertizing.

Now your getting it. Don't think of it in terms of giving away storage space, think of it more along the lines of simply adding more content to their search engine to get more eyeballs for their advertising.

As long as they only archive e-mail and not attachments, then few people will ever come close to 1GB. And as for the space being taken up by spam, it most likely won't be anywhere near as bad as you think it will be if the system functions the way I think it will. The mail will be stored in a relational database. A piece of spam won't take up any more space if it resides in one mailbox or a million, because they will only need to store one copy of the e-mail. The only trick is how to keep such a system secure.

It's simply brilliant. And it's a perfect fit for Google.

Craig

[jstarkweather]

Daniel...dude...paranoid much?

Seriously...34 year cookie? Ever heard of "statute of limitations??". Unless you are a murderer I don't think you have much to worry about.

I think this is most certainly NOT a hoax. And I agree with the brilliant comment.

Jim

[fctoma]

I'm excited for this to come out. I can only see how this would help Google, don't see any "real obvious" cons for Google.

Looking forward to it.

[Deep13]

if its not april fool's joke then its going to leave giants like yahoo amd hotmail far far behind

but if its joke then its going to make lot of people upset including me..

Deep

[John Glube]

Well, it may not be a hoax and I may end up in the can on this one.

According to a story written by Susie Harwood of Netimperative she writes in part:

"There has been some speculation that the news is an April Fools hoax due to the light-hearted and humorous tone of the press release, but the company's spokesperson has assured Netimperative that it is a genuine news story."

http://www.netimperative.com/cmn/viewdoc.jsp?cat=all&docid=BEP1_News_0000063935

But then who knows. It sure makes for great publicity, helps to generate lots of traffic to the forums and gives everybody something to yack about, (including myself.) Enjoy.

John Glube
Toronto, Canada

[RsL]

Hoax?

Maybe, or they are just testing the waters to see how it would be received.

It would definitely be a well received source of revenue, and webmail is a excellent search engine companion (yahoo, MSN).

Will be interesting to see :D

[kikkertm]

Not sure if it's real.. Though it was until I read:

"And Gmail accounts can already be used to read and send email in most languages (even Klingon)."

(http://www.google.com/gmail/help/about.html#langs)

Hmmm... Dunno..

[Christian_SEO]

It's amazing to me what a media frenzy Google can stir up... and I'm amused by it...

There have been hints about Gmail for while now, so I'm sure it's the real deal if the source is really Google.

It is an April 1st joke, but the question is who is the joke on...?

Man, doesn't anyone else see what's going on? It's pretty simple to me:

Microsoft to search engine one.
Google to web mail one.

End of round one, and the winner is ________!

I've had a Hotmail since before Microsoft bought it. I still like it ok and use it when I don't want to give out my main email, but many of the banners are enough to give you into a seizure...!

Now, if Google provided an email service, what do you suppose that would be like...? Hmmmm....

I'll tell you what I think, and that is you will open an email from Bob about the Packers game, and there will also be Google ads that are sports-related, waiting patiently on the side for some attention.

And they won't friggen' be blinking at me either!!!

Where do I sign up...?

[crashingflwrgrl]

It sure makes for great publicity, helps to generate lots of traffic to the forums and gives everybody something to yack about, (including myself.)

I agree with John. It seems to be a brilliant marketing scheme to get everybody talking. Looks like it's totally working too. I for one think it's real and not a hoax.

Just my 2 cents.
Crash

[jordanlgt]

http://www.google.com/gmail/help/about.html#interest

[Wacky]

If it's a hoax, Good one but ya're gonna make people hopping mad.

If it's a real deal, Good grief. Gonna need to work on my spam buster again for another type of junk e-mails.

Hmm It's like the saying, "Damned if you do, Damned if you don't"

Somebody confirm it! *laughs*

[esiegel]

I'm betting Hoax.

1 gig of e-mail is huge. If this was real...why would they trump the others by going that big? Why not 500meg? or 100meg? or 10meg for that matter? Competition only allows 4meg.

And it can be used in any language...what e-mail can't? I can type in any languange I want (my wife says I should try English some time).

I just don't see it...I don't think that Google is going to invest this much on servers/drives/etc. to store massive amounts of never to be touched data (face it...when was the last time you actually looked at that e-mail that you received 8 months ago...and just can't bring yourself to delete?)

[RISTMO]

At first, I accepted it as amazing and great, then I started wondering....re-reading the PR certianly made it seem like an April Fools joke. And then there was the strangeness of the time zone being specified for this PR and none of the others [ http://www.google.com/press/pressreleases.html -- see the "UTC"? ]. And then lots of people reported seeing this PR come out yesterday (March 31) but dated today (April 1st). Another piece of evidence for this being a joke.

But this is a joke. It's the best joke. Because it's real. The joke is that people don't know if it is or not, then when they find out that it's real, they'll only be more impressed by it. This is Google's perfect opportunity to widen the gap between itself and Yahoo (take away Yahoo Mail, and Yahoo becomes a lot less valueable). Not only that, but Google only needs each user to click a couple/few times per year to cover costs, and anything else is extra. They might actually make a fortune on this! Think of all the people who'd switch from paying $50 a year at Yahoo for extra storage and nicer features when those same features are available for free at Google? And Google hasn't been down for more than a few minutes for as long as I can imagine. Yahoo Mail seems to have problems all the time.

I searched Google and found that on Jan 19th, 2004, CNN and some other places wrote about this maybe happening in the future. Either Google's been planning this and feeding info to the media or some people at the other companies were in on the joke, but really, why make a joke about doing it when they really don't? Everything is in their favor by actually doing this. And them actually following through makes the joke 100x better than it would have otherwise been.

Rick

[affordableweb]

The joke is all the free PR this announcement has made for the folks at Google. You can't buy publicity like that.

Gmail is for real and its no hoax. We are all aware of the search engine war between Google, Yahoo and MSN. With Yahoo and MSN finally realizing the power of search what could Google do to stay on top? What real strength does Yahoo have over Google? How about 52 million current subscribers? Thats millions of online consumers with buying habits, personalized surfing trends and literally tons of new content added daily via email.

Google can afford to give away 1 gig of harddrive because they want the content. Just a few days back they "clarified" the confusion regarding Adsense in emails. Ask yourself why no Adsense in email? They want to serve Adwords based on your topic of conversation. They want dedicated users logging in every day to check their Gmails and clicking on Adwords Ads. If you fill out your profile and tell them your name, age etc. They can offer even more relevant ads and increase CTR.

If you ask me Google just cranked it up a notch in the war for search engine dominance. I look forward to the competitions answer. Do you think Yahoo will offer even 100 Meg to 52 million subscribers? How about refunds for all that upgrade to 100 meg for $29.99?

[alienzhavelanded]

Some of the mainstream media are reporting this as accurate. PC World has it as a lead article today @ :

http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,115493,tk,dn040104X,00.asp

Happy coding,
The Martians

[Christian_SEO]

I just read the press release and there is nothing about "carrier pigeons" so I am 100% sure it is real.

As far as the 1GB limit? Genius! I just got a flyer selling a 200GB Maxtor drive for $219. Yes, about $1 a gig RETAIL!

Now, I would think they are using something a little better than that for storage, but who knows? I do know they can afford to buy whatever it takes.

The advertising is going to pay for it, easily.

Once users start flocking to Gmail (is that Gee-mail, or 'gmail?), watch as the others scramble to try and catch up.

http://www.gmail.com I just signed up to be notified of updates... :-)

[Nacho]

Perhaps a new approach to this topic would be to highlight the benefits to everyone related in the industry. Kind of like the best of what is being said out there and here.


ADVANTAGES

Benefits for the user:

- Mail storage (1Gb) for a long time. Probably with an option to expand when full for an upgrade $$.
- Faster search of emails vs. than what is available now through MSFT, Eudora, etc.
- Search vs. Sort
- Keeping email all in context (grouped) and displayed as a conversation
- eMail provides will be more competitive and provide users with higher benefits, lower prices, etc.
- If Google comes up with a POP3 version through subscription and similar services, no ads, it will probably be a great product for users and revenues for Google. Queston is how much?


Benefits for Google:

- Owning Internet users, which is a valuable and measurable accounting asset
- New revenue streams through more places to distribute ads
- More branding power
- Control of information (to the point that they could know how much you’re spending online through order confirmations)
- Knowing the user through data collection and identification of demography and geography.
- More market share
- Creative ways to increase the value and interest for the IPO
- Lots and lots of PR from the media + the actual users through forums
- Incredible amounts of feedback. We are telling them how they should do it right.
- And I’m sure there are more. .


Benefits to the Internet Industry

- Increase competitiveness
- Re-invent the “email” wheel through creativity for Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, etc.
- SEMarketers will have new opportunities to manage this for their clients and do it right.
- Google will bring the storage market to lower their costs
- New opportunities to track by the analytics firms (GoToast, Urchin, Webtrends, etc.)


Benefits to Companies:

- New ways to target users and increase awareness of their brands, product or service.
- Small businesses could use this if Google will allow a nacho@mycompanydomain.com be alias to nacho@gmail.com


DISADVANTAGES

Disadvantages for the user:

- Invasion of privacy. If you are a customer that is very worried about this, then this service is not for you. There are millions that are ok with this, “Yahoo dominates the niche, with 52.6 million unique users per month in the United States, according to a February survey by online research firm comScore Media Metrix. Hotmail is next, with 45.4 million users. AOL has 40.2 million paying users.”
- Can Google turn off my entire account or my emails as they can remove pages from the index?


Disadvantages for Google:

- Finding ways around “privacy issues” so that they can effectively use this. Perhaps there is not a huge privacy risk that Google is going to 'read my mail' – when all they are doing is running their adsense analysis on the processed page they serve me that has my email included on it.
- New ways for spammers to use their resources to get the users
- Late entry, make it work and debug.
- Trademarks & Patents are not aligned (according to posts in WMW). They will probably deal with this with no mayor problems.
- (not a disadvantage, but a challenge) How to carefully implement an algorithm that will rank the right document to the top of the list.


Disadvantages to the Internet Industry

- The storage market will suffer from this if they bring margins to their knees.
- SEMarketers will have to deal with clients about “why so poor conversion?” and “am I getting the right ROI?”
- Increasing competitiveness sometimes means sacrificing profit margins, not a good thing for the many shareholders that have Y!, MSN or AOL.


Disadvantages to Companies:

- Poor conversion rates from these types of ads because users are not in buying/research mode. However, if this is controllable by Google on the Adwords/Adsense account by opting out, then OK.
- Sending out an email newsletter to the users of @gmail.com and having competitor ads being served right next to it.

Feel welcome to Add/Remove any of these bullets.

Saludos,


Nacho

[Dave Hawley]

All looks real to me and fits is well with Googles vision. I would say, if it is real, it will become the most popular free email in the world, inside of a few years. Most of which Google touches turns to gold.

It's quite funny really. While MS are out trying to get a half decent SE, Google are going to take all their hotmail customers.

Go Google!

[Andilinks]

If they launch it concurrent with the IPO and all the excess cash that will bring they will not only be able to capture the lion's share of the email market they will probably have the technology and computing power to be able to identify and pinch off the heads of spammers as though they were vermin.

I'm sure that must be a central part of their plan, a superior spam filter trumps all the competition and if anyone can pull it off it's Google.

The better mousetrap wins again, go Google!

Andi

[sovidiu]

This is all a joke, since nobody can afford to give away 1Gb/user, assuming that Google still is the number one search engine in the USA. It's just a test to check out brand-loyalty from J. Doe to the Mountain View company. At least, that's the way I think of it. Adding free web-based e-mail to their services would mean making Google look like a "Yahoo web-site style" clone, now that their new interface is not so googlish at all.

[Dave Hawley]

a superior spam filter

Arh yes! They will have 2 reasons and driving forces to have a great spam filter.

1) Keep customers happy.

2) Stop peoples mail accounts getting anywhere near the VERY HIGH limit.

I suspect also they will be showing AdWords based on the content of an open email. This could have the *potential* to double there AdWords revenue!

I suppose the day will also come when they move into Web hosting.

Go go Google!

[Dave Hawley]

since nobody can afford to give away 1Gb/user

Not too sure about that. Besides, I doubt 90% would come close to 20% of that.

[Dave Hawley]

It's for real!

Just in from AdWords newsletter


Second, we're extending the reach of contextually-targeted advertising to ads in approved email programs, including Gmail and HTML newsletters. Keep reading for more details.

[Andilinks]

since nobody can afford to give away 1Gb/user

I have to agree with Dave here because no matter what the cost (and Google's IPO will leave them with a wad of cash) they are not giving it away. They are trading it for access to the data contained within the emails. If they are indexing emails as they are sent they will soon be on top of every development before it happens.

Google with their algo expertise, would quickly be able to assign a weight based on address clusters. Trends drawn from aggregate emails are all they really need to, uhhh... rule the world?

I'm sure their TOS for the project is being drawn up very carefully to allow this along with indexing.

Andi

[kingdonk]

I was working on a project near the end of 2003, this was going to be the monster of all e-mail services, but for the cost of development, we needed a partner to get a larger reaction, so we were in talks with Google's UK business manager, we had talks but all fell thru, three months lator they had aquired a few small e-mail service companies and have since been indevelopment.
They can from our market research, that google having its own e-mail service will become a direct competitor of Yahoo and msn/hotmail.
This service is for real, and being called Qmail is because the idea for the service, started with the idea buying out atmail.com then using parts of their software but remodeling the whole thing, and heavely working on the back end, with the industry leaders in each area.
Checking the availability for X mail (x being any letter) there are not many left so Q mail is the obvious awnser.

I almost forgot one thing which every one complains about which they dont think logical about.
Google will be 100% no spam policy, others like yahoo/hotmail/aol allow spam to be sent.
If you recevie an e-mail in your inbox saying xxxxx@hotmail.com it helps with free marketing, you sign up for a hotmail account, within one day you will have three spam mesages from xxx@hotmail.com its all logical, and free marketing mesureas.

[rawdist]

I agree with Dave Hawley, after seeing it in the Adwords newsletter it is definitely real. There is no way they are going to mess around with the paying customers on the 2nd of April.

[colr]

Personally I think Google are laughing at us all, and in a way I hope they are:

There are too many free email accounts available, most of them being hijacked by spam and virus vendors all the time to do their nasty work. One more free email system is one more spam pedestral.

The idea of having any organisation with the power to direct targeted email advertising (i.e. SPAM) is horrific. If this was the case, the bottom line is that Google have become what they have always intended to keep out - the spammers. Am I just being over zealous here, or does anybody else agree?

[Dave Hawley]

Personally I think Google are laughing at us all, and in a way I hope they are:

Why do you say that?


There are too many free email accounts available, most of them being hijacked by spam and virus vendors all the time to do their nasty work. One more free email system is one more spam pedestral.

There might be many but, as with Search Engines, only a few are at the top and control about 85% of market share. I think you will find Google will do a great job of stopping spam. See my reasons above.


The idea of having any organisation with the power to direct targeted email advertising (i.e. SPAM) is horrific. If this was the case, the bottom line is that Google have become what they have always intended to keep out - the spammers. Am I just being over zealous here, or does anybody else agree?

Power to direct spam??? Google will be fighting spam, not directing it into their inboxes. Sorry, cannot understand at all what you ae getting at here.

[colr]

It was something I had read somewhere that spurned this obviuosly premature posting. Can't find the source now ...

[esiegel]

I just got the newsletter too...


Second, we're extending the reach of contextually-targeted advertising to ads in approved email programs, including Gmail and HTML "

<Picture my surprised look here> (eyes and mouth wide open...hand slapping forehead).

to quote Popeye..."Well blow me down!"

[abbeyinternet]

Google announced a new free email service at the end of their West Coast day yesterday, ensuring a media blitz on the holiest of hoaxter holidays - April Fools Day. Is this upcoming service the real deal?


Gmail is no hoax, as confirmed by the fact that the Gmail beta is already online:

https://gmail.google.com/


-

Abbey Internet
www.abbeyinternet.com (http://www.abbeyinternet.com)

[robloom]

May seem like a hoax but spymac.com is now offering the same deal. 1gb of email space, 350mb of additional storage-all free.

They make a point to say - "NO HOAX"

http://www.spymac.com/

[bjones_y]

Just scroll to the bottom of the "beta" site at https://gmail.google.com/ .
Happy Birthday April says it all. This is a Hoax, Google is having fun with us.

[Dave Hawley]

Hi Bob, I think you will find it's no hoax.

[Elite Skills]

People would use it for archiving and the large warez site would definitely exploit it putting hundreds of broken down zips. 1 gig is just too much. 20 gigs would beat the competition. Google is a company and will do what is in their benefit. Heck 100 mb is a lot. I think it's publicity stunt. The more you give people the more they exploit you. Restrictions are very necessary, especially in email.

[Andilinks]

I think Google is trying to lure corporate users away from their enterprise mail systems which typically allow 100 MB, BUT are notoriously difficult to search and organize.

I think Google is quite capable of identifying warez storage and other abuses.

My experience (and just read some of the threads on this forum and other seo boards) is that people who try to scam Google get away with it for a very short time and are then brutally shut down.

Many people are envious of Google's success and are simply trying to create issues where none exist.

Go Google! :)

Andi

[Elite Skills]

If resources are offered they will be exploited. Google search is massively exploited all the time. It will not be able to monitor and manage all the thing people come up with to screw it over. There's plenty bots now making masses of email accounts and member names. Given the size of the resource offered it may be more costly for google to monitor such activity. They could have easily blown away the competition with 500mb storage starting up. I've never seen a corporation just do something to be nice. I see this as a likely media ploy, even if they do come up with it later and lower the mb.

[Dave Hawley]

I have good faith in Google, judging by history. Sure, some things will be exploited, but Google would be wise to that.

I think it's a ingenious move on Googles part! They have known for some time that MS will be stepping up to the SE blocks and that one BIG edge that MS has is Hotmail. I believe Google is going to change that over the coming years. So while MS is frantacily trying to better (or catch up at least) Google in the SE wars, Google are going to take all/most of their Hotmail customers. This seems to have come right out of left field and MS never saw it coming.

Go go Google!

[Elite Skills]

I like the way you put it ;). I hope you're right. How long do you think they've been working on the project?

[Dave Hawley]

Not sure how long. Google seem very good at keeping things 'under wraps'. I would guess it's been on the back-burner for year or so.

[cbp]

Here a screen shot of the gmail inetrface:
https://adwords.google.com/select/images/gmail_screen.gif

CBP

[Dave Hawley]

I like, flows on nicely from the rest of Google.

Go go Google! Fight fire with fire. I believe Bill G has finally run into a very serious competetor.

[abbeyinternet]

Just scroll to the bottom of the "beta" site at https://gmail.google.com/ .
Happy Birthday April says it all. This is a Hoax, Google is having fun with us.

April is Paul's girlfriend, pictured on the page in question. ;)

https://gmail.google.com/gmail/html/april.html

[cbp]

bjones_y wrote:
Just scroll to the bottom of the "beta" site at https://gmail.google.com/ .
Happy Birthday April says it all. This is a Hoax, Google is having fun with us.


Yes - its way past April 1st - its not a joke...

CBP

[Andilinks]

Well, I think it is not a hoax, but the "hoax" part is a hoax.

In other words, Gmail is real. But by inserting little cryptic hints that it might be a hoax Google is getting us to carry its marketing water for it.

All this BUZZ... it's free for Google and all they had to do was play with us, or make us think they might be.

Ahhh.. such cleverness is indeed rare.

Andi

[colr]

Dave Hawley >>

Todays webproworld newsletter has in a way backed up what my previous post had said, raising concerns about privacy and what is essentially the potential to direct targetted advertising emails (i.e. spam) into mailboxes.

Next time I would appreciate a more polite and intellectual response, particularly from a 'veteran' member.

C.

[Dave Hawley]

colr, nothing makes the papers sell like hysteria and nobody screams louder than those that are unsure. Much, if not all, the concerns over privacy are about a robot scanning the emails for keywords so they can place relavent Ads. No really that much different than a virus protector.


Next time I would appreciate a more polite and intellectual response, particularly from a 'veteran' member.

Again, I have no idea what you mean? What I have typed that was inpolite? Please enlighten me.

[cbp]

I think Google are either absolutly brilliant or they screwed up...

Either
1) They screwed up by launching gmail on April fools day and got the adverse publicity

or

2) They made a brilliant deliberate decision to launch it on April fools day and got a lot of extra publicity

CBP

[Dave Hawley]

I'd put money on #2. Our West Oz paper even had a write-up about it, but only because it was announced on April 1 . Google is very smart IMO.[/b]