Gmail Goes Public

An anonymous reader writes "Google has apparently given the green light for Google's e-mail (Gmail) to be open to the general public." From the registration page: "As we make room for more Gmail users, we want to first extend invitations to Google users. We're still working to make Gmail better, so for now, we're just inviting a small number at random. Looks like that's you! We're really excited to share Gmail with you and we hope you like it." Observed at the P-I Buzzworthy Blog as well.

Comments

I can't even

[stoolpigeon]

people to take my gmail invites any more. I think it's a little late to open it to the public-- everybody already has an account.

Re:I can't even

[NeoSkandranon]

everybody already has an account.

Everyone who wants one anyway.

Some of the people I invited promptly followed my lead and abandoned their six or seven hotmail (and ISP-based) email addresses and had everything useful forward to Gmail.

Others made an account and check it from time to time.

The bigger group is the last one: The people who really don't care (either through lack of understanding or sheer apathy) about Gmail's advantages.

These days I can't give away an account, because I've sent them to all my group 1 and 2 friends already. The only ones left are the "Why should i switch from Yahoo/Hotmail/Webmail?" crowd

Re:I can't even

[jp10558]

And me, the why should I switch from my own POP3/Imap/Webmail server? I hate webmail !

Re:I can't even

[Drooling Iguana]

Gmail lets you connect via POP3.

Re:I can't even

[lucabrasi999]

why should I switch from my own POP3/Imap/Webmail server?

Ladies and Gentlemen, I believe that I have found and anti-Google Blashphemer in our midst!

Re:I can't even

[mabinogi]

your own server lets you do what the hell you want, and POP3 is a horrble mail protocol from a user's point of view. (IMAP is horrible from a developer point of view, but that's beside the point)

when Gmail does IMAP it'll be interesting to those of us with our own servers, but only a little.

Re:I can't even

[ZephyrXero]

Same here..I've had 50 invites for over a month now, just sitting there.

I don't see how Gmail is "open to the public" or whatever yet though.... there's no link on the main google.com page and when I log into my gmail account it still says BETA in the corner... did someone jump the gun or what?

Re:I can't even

[spuzzzzzzz]

And yet those ipod/mac mini spammers still think they can get people to sign up by offering them gmail invites.

Re:I can't even

[CrankyFool]

There are actually valid reasons for some of us to not use gmail for general-purpose emailing.

Aside from the obvious privacy issues -- any company who has its people put company information on another company's systems is a little nuts -- there's also the power and flexibility of running your own MUA/MTA pair.

For example, I've got my own wildcard domain -- anything at this domain goes to me. In addition, my MUA (mutt) is configured to automatically make my replies come from the address to which the email had been sent. I consider this useful to me, and a way to give out specific addresses so as to see how spam ends up getting to me.

gmail actually takes a step in that direction -- they let you use '+' notation (eg 'user+whatever@gmail.com'), but they don't do the next step -- making it so you can automatically respond as 'user+whatever' to emails sent to 'user+whatever'.

And, frankly, it's just _faster_ for me to use my own CLI MUA to go through a bunch of emails, and more convenient and familiar.

On the flip side, my dad recently decided he finally wanted to get an email account, so I created a new domain for him and had all mail sent to this domain forwarded to an account I set up for him at gmail. So he'll be using gmail for mail. I really do like gmail -- I use it for some specialized purposes -- but it's not the one-size-fits-all-so-everyone-should-use-it-alread y that you seem to be thinking it is.

Re:I can't even

[DigitumDei]

I have my gmail forwarded to my home account where I access it through my local IMAP server. When at work I use gmail, at home I use thunderbird. And offshore backups of email thrown in for free. ;)

Re:I can't even

[nfs3hp]

Froogle still has BETA in the corner, does that mean its not open to the public too? GMail will probably always be in "beta" because that way they have no liability if it fucks up. As for it being open to the public, I'm guessing that it's slowly being offered to those random users until the point where they feel that they can handle everyone and their brother signing up for an account. Sure all of us who know about it and want an account have one already, but we're nerds.. you can't say that about the rest of the sheep. :)

Re:I can't even

[hab136]

For example, I've got my own wildcard domain -- anything at this domain goes to me. In addition, my MUA (mutt) is configured to automatically make my replies come from the address to which the email had been sent. I consider this useful to me, and a way to give out specific addresses so as to see how spam ends up getting to me.

I'm in the same boat.. any pointers on how to make mutt do this?

IMP (webmail client) already does this, but you have to set up each address individually (ugh). I haven't tried the 4.0 release yet, though.

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

You, of course, are speaking only for yourself. :-) I run my own mail and Gmail is still very useful for me, most notably for the very effective search. I have procmail bouncing a copy of inbound mail to gmail that I can access on the road if I am not using my laptop to ssh in my own server (I am not running Squirrelmail or Imp, etc.). I also like sending all my list mail to my gmail account which for me makes it easy to read. I like the 'conversation' method of threading for lists. A year later and I am currently at 29% capacity.

Re:I can't even

[El_Muerte_TDS]

everybody already has an account.
No I don't

Re:I can't even

[m50d]

POP3 sucks compared to IMAP though. Myself I'm happy with my ISP mail, pop and imap access, unlimited mailboxes, unlimited storage space, and a no-nonsense webmail interface if I need it. (Shameless sponge: if anyone else in the UK likes the sound of that, take a look at http://www.plus.net/, just put sdonag as your referrer if you decide to go with them. Thanks.)

Re:I can't even

[stoolpigeon]

do you want one?

Re:I can't even

[nickname225]

I am a lawyer - although products liability is not my area of concentration. If we ignore for the moment the fact that software developers almost never have any liability when their products fuck up. It is very doubtful that any court would let Google escape liability simply by putting BETA in the corner. If you make a product and offer it to the public - substantially as a non-experimental product - you will be held liable. The courts generally look, not at technicalities, but at the substance of the transaction

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

POP3 sucks compared to IMAP though.

IMAP is great until your internet connection goes down and you no longer have access to your folder hierarchy. I'll take POP3 downloads to mail every time, so I can at least get to my messages during an outage.

Re:I can't even

[artemis67]

I think that that was the point. Google was trying to capitalize on the word-of-mouth thing to build up their user base. By the end, they put a little form field box on my GMail page and told me that I could invite 50 of my closest friends.

Ummm... yeah.

That's like when you see those cubic zirconium rings advertised on TV, and they say, "There's a strict limit of five per caller!" (It always makes me want to call and order six, just to see if they'd do it. They probably would.)

Re:I can't even

[edesjardins]

This comment baffles me. Why on EARTH would you still want to use POP3 mail? I manage an Exchange server as well as my own POP3 server and now use neither for my personal email in favor of Gmail. Why? Simply because I have so many computers that I use! With Gmail I have pretty much unlimited space, the ability to SEARCH my email and actually find what I'm looking for (ever tried to find something in Outlook that you've filed away a year ago?), and I always have ALL of my email on any computer I use! I don't have to think "Wait, I sent this at home on my Mac, but I wish I had it at work on my PC in Outlook... Blah blah." Those days are gone, and frankly... GOOD RIDDANCE! Just my opinion, of course.

Re:I can't even

[alexandreracine]

Well, would you like a spambox?

It's very usefull when you dont want to give out your real email :)

Or for all those websites that require registration with email and that does not have a bugmenot account :)

Re:I can't even

[justkarl]

I don't have one; got a spare?

Re:I can't even

[nfs3hp]

I didn't necessarily mean legal liability, but more like: User: MY GMAIL IS BROKEN!! WTF?! FIX IT! Google: It's beta, leave us alone.. we don't have to support you.

Re:I can't even

[Nos.]

I am building a setup similar to the one we saw on slashdot a while ago that had pictures of a burglary in progress mailed offsite. I've been slowly piecing it together (off an on since around November) and have dug up an old Connectix Quickcam that I'm going to hook up. If the system detects the door opening (not through camera, but through other sensors) it will run the script to grab an image (or 2 or 3) and email them to google. Aside from that, I dont have a real good use for gmail.

Re:I can't even

[CrankyFool]

It's remarkably simple (though, true to OSS principles, it's also remarkably non-obvious if you don't pore through documentation). You need two things in your .muttrc:
A) Specify what addresses might be valid addreses for you, using 'alternates'. e.g.:
alternates user@dom.ain.com
alternates otheruser@other.domain.com
alternates @myspecial.domain.com
The last line is the one that says that any mail address @myspecial.domain.com is a valid address for you;
B) set reverse_name=yes

That tells mutt that, if you get an email that's to one of your addresses (see A above), even if the current machine name is not that address, it should formulate the 'From:' address based on the recipient address, rather than the local machine name.

That should be all you need.

Eagerly awaiting my Offtopic moderation ...

Re:I can't even

[mattyrobinson69]

wouldn't a "its not our fault if gmail deletes all your emails, sleeps with your sister or swears infront of your grandmother" kind of disclaimer in their TOS that you have to agree to?

Re:I can't even

[jp10558]

I don't know - I like the lack of ads. I like the speed of Eudora on messages on my local machine. I like being able to look through messages and not have to be online. I like the lack of "tags". I like unlimited attachment size. I like GPG plugins.

I like e-mail being separate from websites. I like not having my mail processed to show me ads.(wait I already said that didn't I?)

Oh, wait - I like not getting spam from those people who try every combination of @gmail, @yahoo etc....

And, I like VNC through Java applet for checking my mail or anything elsewhere! Just me though, I like taking the whole interface if I can(which I can do via broadband).

I also like not being more beholden to big companies for my communication.

Re:I can't even

[NeoSkandranon]

Ah, sorry, I don't mean to put across the thought that GMail is perfect for *everyone* --especially in your situation, where you have your own MUA to play with.

However for the average internet user who'd otherwise be getting their email from Yahoo or Hotmail or a local/regional ISP, Gmail seems to be really superior. There are probably some things I haven't encountered or considered (Lotta people copmlain about POP3 access, I was glad I didn't have to use Tbird anymore) --If you think Gmail isn't ready in that kind of capacity I'd be genuinely interested to hear why

Re:I can't even

[SphericalCrusher]

Yeah, I'm sure that was their plan though... since they gave every Gmail user 50 invites. Those 50 invites are sent to 50 people and then from each of them, sent to 50 more people -- which turns into 2500 people from just one person. And still... it spreads more and more. I didn't think that new users would actually be given 50 invites until I invited a close friend to it the other week... and a few days after, he received it.

I'm not complaining at all though. I was one of the very first Gmail users and I will be here for a very long time. Gmail is excellent and it should be shared with the world... just like software source code.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

IMAP downloads the messages too. I can read my IMAP messages just fine when I'm not connected. There aren't really any advantages of POP over IMAP.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

I think the world might be a tad better place if not everyone runs to GMail. It certainly isn't the be-all and end-all of email, and if you're just going to check via POP3, it loses some advantages. I have my own mail system on my Linux box. At home, I generally use Pine, which works directly with my (rather large) collection of folders. I have IMAP installed so I can use Thunderbird from work. I don't really see any point to GMail. If I have to change addresses, I'll just send out a form message to my address book.

Re:I can't even

[thedustbustr]

I also like not being more beholden to big companies for my communication.

Oh, like yahoo, hotmail, and ?

Re:I can't even

[dBLiSS]

I agree.. I have 50 invites and can't get rid of any of them

Re:I can't even

[tomjen]

[url]www.mailinator.com[/url]

Re:I can't even

[mabinogi]

hmmm...I hadn't thought of doing that, it might be worth trying.

I use IMP at the moment when I use someone else's machine and can't just use Thunderbird or Mozilla Mail, but IMP's interface definitely has room for improvement.
I wonder how long before apps like IMP or Squirrelmail start imitating GMail's interface?

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, whatever. If you use bad tools, you'll get a bad result. If you use proper catagorization and filters on your incoming mail, finding stuff is dead simple in almost any client; even Outlook. I've never once had a problem finding an old email using KMail, and I have nearly four years worth of mail now.

Why anyone would think a webmail service is the be all and end all of email is beyond me, even it offers POP3. It's email, for crying out loud.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

A big thing is privacy. Google may be wonderful, but what about tomorrow? The other is web interfaces suck. A third is the problem of using POP3 access, but still having to hike your mail client mail via SMTP. If you use your own ISP, you're at risk of getting flagged at some point in the future of failing SPF.

I've had few problems with POP3 access, IMAP is a dog but better, though I'm not at all interested in permanent storage of mail on someone else's server.

Re:I can't even

[Uptown Joe]

I set up one. Just 'cause I didn't want anyone to nab my last name.

Re:I can't even

[tomjen]

I agree with you.
I have found that www.nerdshack.com fills my email needs better than google would have. Aside from the cool domain name, they offer pop3 over ssl/tls and apop.

Re:I can't even

[k.ellsworth]

email me to k.ellsworth@ THESPAM gmail.com and i send you an invite... as anyone else need one i'll send back invites. i have 50 left

Re:I can't even

[jp10558]

I see you can't even read my earlier post in this thread.

Re:I can't even

[rikkards]

Hell I have 50 invites I can't get rid of.

Re:I can't even

[edesjardins]

I've never receieved ONE piece of Spam at my Gmail address since I've had it - I got the account in August. Just sayin'.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

with encryption :)

Re:I can't even

[nolife]

I collect my email to my own IMAP server via fetchmail so it does not really matter to what the host server is running. What does matter is if the host supports some type of secure login instead of just plain text password. fastmail.fm supports secure IMAP access on their free accounts. I've been using them for a while with no problems. I'm sure there are others.

Re:I can't even

[JFitzsimmons]

http://www.spamgourmet.com/

Re:I can't even

[alanh]

>For example, I've got my own wildcard domain -- anything at this domain goes to me.

I used to do this as well. If I needed to give my address out, I'd come up with a company specific one on the spot. However, I abandoned the "forward all" account when someone started spoofing the From: line of their spams with <random text>@alanhoyle.com addresses. I started getting thousands apon thousands of bounced spam messages showing up in my inbox. My choice was either to train my mail filters to catch these bounces as spams, or quit the forward-all account. I still get more than 100/day, but the load is greatly lessened.

In my experience, the vast majority of my spam comes from email addresses posted on either my web site or from WHOIS information. Only one of my company-specific addresses ever seems to have made it onto a spam list.

Until recently, I prefered my tweaked solution with Pine, bogofilter, and a modified version of IMAP Spam BeGone. With an SSH client like PuTTY, I was using the same interface I was used to wherever I went in the world.

However, I've become hooked on GMail as it's so much more convenient to deal with Spam there. Click, click click, poof! it's gone....

Re:I can't even

[SilkBD]

A big thing is privacy. Google may be wonderful, but what about tomorrow?

Hold On... so you trust Microsoft(Hotmail) and not Google?

This nonsense about privacy issues is crap... Microsoft can look at your emails as much as any ISP or Webmail host.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have shell access, what is wrong with just using Pine? If you don't like Pine, you have your choice of cat, tail, less, or more the files in your $MAILDIR... ;)

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

According to ratsnapple tea (686697): Whatever, dude. Mac OS X Mail.app had incremental searching (just like in iTunes) from the very beginning.

Whatever, dude. I'm typing this on OS X/Safari right now. But my point was I can access/search my mail when I don't have access to my own computers which is often enough for wanting another outlet to get at it. Is that clear enough?

Sorry for being an obnoxious Macboy. I can't seem to stop myself...

Perhaps you should consider masturbating more often.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

I don't trust any of them. I have an old POP3 account through an ISP. Works fine, and I can use IMAP if I feel like it. I store my data on my own drive, and wipe it off the mail server. I'm not interested in webmail at all, save to test the mail servers I administer.

Believe it or not, there are some people who don't give a damn about GMail, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail or whatever other free web mail service out there.

Re:I can't even

[Red Alastor]

And everybody who signed on the "please tell me when it will be open to the public" list got an invite from Google about a month ago.

Re:I can't even

[SeventyBang]

No kidding. I'm sitting on ca. 150 invitations across three accounts. I've found a few people who are pretty knowledgeable but cast doubt because they've never heard of Gmail and I've tossed invites their way, but they haven't registered. I finally set up an email address for people to post requests: gmail@70bang.com

Re:I can't even

[shellbeach]

Ah, Gmail misinformation. It's a wonderful thing ...

A big thing is privacy. Google may be wonderful, but what about tomorrow?

If you're that concerned about privacy, you could still use POP3 and SMTP with GPG or similar. Why would you bother, then? Well, having a non-ISP linked email address is a highly useful thing - for those of the community who don't run a mail server (e.g. don't have broadband or don't have the skills) this is vital to being able to switch providers and get the best deal.

The other is web interfaces suck.

You've obviously never tried Gmail then. I was a diehard PINE user before seeing Gmail, I hated Yahoo, Hotmail, Fastmail, etc interfaces and thought Gmail might be a good mailing list replacement for my yahoo account because of the greater storage space. I think it took about three days to forward all my mail to it and use it as my primary account. It's a beautiful interface, runs with some incredibly neat javascript - you have to see it to believe it.

A third is the problem of using POP3 access, but still having to hike your mail client mail via SMTP. If you use your own ISP, you're at risk of getting flagged at some point in the future of failing SPF.

But, you see, Gmail actually provides an SMTP server for you to use. That's right! You get POP3 and SMTP. And if they ever decide to stop that, there's still mail forwarding so you can throw everything else over to the email address of your choice.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

But what's the point? Gmail through a pop3 account is just the same as my ISP's mail through a pop3 account. And with gmail going public you can't even claim any geek cool for using a gmail address.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

If you're that concerned about privacy, you could still use POP3 and SMTP with GPG or similar. Why would you bother, then? Well, having a non-ISP linked email address is a highly useful thing - for those of the community who don't run a mail server (e.g. don't have broadband or don't have the skills) this is vital to being able to switch providers and get the best deal.

Well, my address book is a whopping twenty strong. Switching email addresses ain't a big deal. I recognize there's a use for it, but I've had to switch a few times, and it's no more than a few days pain.

You've obviously never tried Gmail then. I was a diehard PINE user before seeing Gmail, I hated Yahoo, Hotmail, Fastmail, etc interfaces and thought Gmail might be a good mailing list replacement for my yahoo account because of the greater storage space. I think it took about three days to forward all my mail to it and use it as my primary account. It's a beautiful interface, runs with some incredibly neat javascript - you have to see it to believe it.

I've seen it. I don't think it's anything particularly wonderful. People insist that it is, but I think Pine still beats it hands down.

But, you see, Gmail actually provides an SMTP server for you to use. That's right! You get POP3 and SMTP. And if they ever decide to stop that, there's still mail forwarding so you can throw everything else over to the email address of your choice.

There's a lot of faith being put into things remaining the way it is. As to forwarding, it's still an issue for SPF. As I said, I'm sure it's wonderful for lots of people. I hate webmail. I barely tolerate Slashdot as a messaing forum. To me, Usenet is still the superior form of public posting.

A lot of what people say for and against GMail is simply personal perceptions. I can't imagine trusting my data that much, and if I'm just using them to bounc POP3 mail off of, then I see no point whatsoever.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Yahoo: zero spam in 2.5 years of use. I order tons of stuff on it through my business account.

Google: never sent one e-mail, I get hundreds of spam a week. It's showing up in my spam folder, however it's all too common that were I to use it for real it would be a huge hindrance--- having to check for ham.

Re:I can't even

[fadir]

mind to invite me?
I doubt that anyone who wants to already got an account. i tried twice (don't feel like flooding google with requests) and didn't receive an answer yet ...

so yes, I'm happy that they finally launch this service even though i cannot find anything related to the news on their webpage (yet).

Re:I can't even

[antarctican]

Actually, I still consider pine the most versatile mail client to use. I can do pretty much everything I want to, including using the "pipe" command for a few things into custom scripts for processing.

Combine this with screen, and pine is always running on my server. Just connect via ssh, reconnect with the screen, and there my email is exactly how I left it. Even in the middle of typing a message if I want. As well, no worries about sudden network outages.

The thing I do find my gmail account VERY useful for is attachments and graphics. Those I (b)ounce over to my gmail to read.

However for some things gmail is also nice with it's conversation threading. I used my gmail account when backpacking across China last summer, only downside of that is occational the great firewall of China blocks access to anything-google.

To summarize - a healthy conbination of pine and gmail provide a very productive environment for this geek.

Re:I can't even

[Noose For A Neck]

IMAP solved all these problems years ago, and isn't run by one big corporation in the business of information warehousing and other dubious practices. You can access all your mail from any client anywhere with a network connection and access to your IMAP server, and proper searching is taken care of by competently-programmed clients, anyway.

I personally have deep reservations about throwing all my personal data into GMail - there's no telling what exactly Google will be doing with that information in the future.

Re:I can't even

[advid.net]

Well, I'd like to have one...

Aren't you afraid of the /. effect overwhelming you by gmail account requests ?

Re:I can't even

[jazman_777]

I have found that www.nerdshack.com fills my email needs better than google would have.

They're not accepting any new users right now. I need to check back in Feb, 2005. What that really means is "Loser! check back sometime when Time Machines have been invented"

Boy, they better hope that day never comes!

Re:I can't even

[InfiniteWisdom]

I have IMAP installed so I can use Thunderbird from work
Would you mind telling me how you did that? I've been trying to setup an IMAP server to serve my Pine mboxes without much luck. Could you e-mail me pointers at:

fn=vinay
ln=pai
email=$fn@$fn$ln.com

Thanks

Re:I can't even

[gad_zuki!]

Google doesnt support unique message headers, so I cant access gmail from a different pop3 client. I'm stuck using one client, so no mobile access for me. No mobile browser can handle the javascript mess thtat is gmail either.

That along with the privacy issue make sure I dont switch.

Re:I can't even

[LordoftheWoods]

Sure it does -- at least for me. And its been like that for like a week now.

It alternates between
"New! Get Gmail - Google's free email service with 1 GB of space."
and
"New! Get Gmail - Google's free email service with 1000 MB of space."

Re:I can't even

[LordoftheWoods]

Ah, posted before knowing how this stuff works. I must be one of the "random users" that they are inviting at this moment.

Guess this is a good time to check it out.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

I didn't do anything complex at all. Just went to http://www.washington.edu/imap/ and downloaded their imap daemon and added the following line to /etc/inetd.conf:

imap2 stream tcp nowait root /usr/sbin/tcpd imapd

As I recall, a

kill -hup `pidof inetd`

was all it took and then it was off to the client. The only thing to remember is that you have to set the root mailbox to "mail", otherwise your entire home directory will show up in your mail client. I actually can use Thunderbird on the same machine, but though I like Thunderbird well enough, I stil prefer Pine. Next step for me is OpenLDAP, so I can grab my address book wherever I go.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Pine!? Eww, haven't you heard of mutt?

Re:I can't even

[ducman]

I'm one of those people who are still asking, "why?" I admin my own server and use IMAP. Since I travel regularly, I'm more likely to have my PowerBook than an internet connection. Mail.app lets me have my mail with me, search it, work offline, move things onto and off of the server, if I want to. And of course I can use the web mail client on the server to read mail from any other machine. So why would I let Google search through all my mail and target me with ads?

Re:I can't even

[violent.ed]

ditto, if you have an invite i can get that would be nice :)

Re:I can't even

[stoolpigeon]

I just sent an invite to the address in your profile.

No I'm not worried. I still have 149 invites left and you are the only person to ask so far.

Re:I can't even

[Dolda2000]

You forgot about group 4: Those of us who run our own servers. However good g-mail is, I still prefer running my own server for flexibility. I can get new mail notifications instantly, Kerberos authentication, do any kind of filtering I would ever want, and plug in any kind of software into it that I could ever think of (and although g-mail has 1 GB of storage, using my own server gets me even more -- not that I'll ever use that much).

I can also use a local e-mail client, rather than wait for the page-load lag when using a webmail client.

Sure, it may be a minority group in general, but probably not on Slashdot.

Re:I can't even

[stoolpigeon]

send an email from the address you want invited to
bittercode@gmail.com

and I'll shoot one your way.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone might send you an invite if you provided somewhere to send it...

Re:I can't even

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

Gmail lets you connect via POP3

So long as your mail client isn't Netscape 7.1
Then it lets you connect, but it doesn't actually download any messages. Grrrr.....

Re:I can't even

[ratsnapple tea]

More?!?? Man, is there no end?

Re:I can't even

[gammelby]

Thanks, _really_ useful! I just needed a few small additional tweaks to make it perfect in my configuration: The real-name part of the from-field should IMHO not be taken from the message, as this might often have been omitted, leaving the empty string in the reply. This may be fixed by adding the following in your .muttrc:

set realname="Ulrik Gammelby"
set reverse_realname=no

Ulrik

Re:I can't even

[DerekLyons]

I've never receieved ONE piece of Spam at my Gmail address since I've had it - I got the account in August. Just sayin'.

Then either you've been lucky, or you haven't actually bothered to look into your spam folder.

Gmails spam blocker is about 99.9% accurate. Despite posting my email adress on Usenet only about 8-9 pieces (out of thousands) have leaked through, and only about 5 false positives.

Re:I can't even

[ratpack91]

No mobile browser can handle the javascript mess thtat is gmail either.

There is a plain html version.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

To me, Usenet is still the superior form of public posting.

Yeah, i like Usenet. It is much nicer than mailing lists because in mailing lists it is almost impossible to reply to a message which was pasted before you started subscribing. It is simplve via Usenet. HOWEVER, that does not solve the main problem of usenet, which is the spam.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't believe you didn't mention mutt.

Re:I can't even

[skweegee]

They have a scaled down version of the interface now, supposedly more comptabable than the javascript mess.

Re:I can't even

[ImpTech]

> I also like not being more beholden to big companies for my communication.

Of course even when running your own server, your ISP is ultimately in control.

Re:I can't even

[mabinogi]

The fact that I don't want to?

Re:I can't even

[gad_zuki!]

Yeah. but there's no URL. More of the "half-assed" gmail approach to doing things. It blows my mind I cant use multiple pop clients and I have to play around with "download all mail from now-on" nonsense. Both MSN and yahoo have mobile pages. Wow, gmail is out of beta and they still dont have a mobile.gmail.com site? The problem is so bad someone had to go and create their own gmail "lite" portal.

http://gmail.blackhaloinc.com/

Third party wants my login/pass? No thanks.

So, according to that page I should be directed to their html site. Err, Blazer (on a treo) is probably the most well known mobile browser and gmail isnt even doing the redirect.

Not to mention gmail's pop also downloads sent messages. Err, no thanks.

Re:I can't even

[willfe]

I don't know - I like the lack of ads. I like the speed of Eudora on messages on my local machine. I like being able to look through messages and not have to be online. I like the lack of "tags". I like unlimited attachment size. I like GPG plugins.

You can use POP3 to fetch mail to a local mailbox (or another server elsewhere) and send through gmail via SSL+SMTP. Apart from the attachment size limit (not sure if SMTP lets you break it or not), where's the problem? Your local mail client won't offer up ads (and you can keep Eudora). It can use GPG plugins. It can skim through messages without being online. And much to my annoyance, those pesky "tags" you dislike are completely stripped when you pull mail via POP3 (it'd be handy, whether you specifically think so or not).

I like e-mail being separate from websites. I like not having my mail processed to show me ads.(wait I already said that didn't I?)

Yes, you did already say that. You repeat yourself a lot in this post, but that's okay. We still love you :) Besides, now I get to repeat myself too. Use POP3+SMTP and you're back on local client, no webmail interface.

Best I can tell, mail is parsed real-time for ads when you view them on gmail.google.com; presumably if you just POP3 them they're never parsed for ads. Then again, it's not as if Google's the first to do this; Yahoo and friends sometimes shove interstitial ads into their mail interfaces. They want you to pay for POP3 access too.

Oh, wait - I like not getting spam from those people who try every combination of @gmail, @yahoo etc....

Sorry, but spam's a problem everywhere, not just gmail.com; the only reason a dictionary spam attack hasn't been launched against your domain is they haven't gotten to it yet.

And, I like VNC through Java applet for checking my mail or anything elsewhere! Just me though, I like taking the whole interface if I can(which I can do via broadband).

Wait. So you want to use the VNC Java client, via your @!#$ing web browser, to read your mail on the local machine sitting wherever you're not when you get the burning urge to check your mail? Yet somehow just using the original damned webmail interface is beneath you?

I also like not being more beholden to big companies for my communication.

Please, take yourself off the cross. You said you like Eudora, so you're "beholden" to them trusting their stuff isn't spying on you. You use VNC via Java, meaning you're beholden to Sun and their Java implementation (or one of the few other vendors, like IBM and Microsoft, who ship VMs of their own) for the viewer. Then there's the VNC vendors. Then there's the people who wrote the OS you're running.

I won't make the "if you have nothing to hide, why do you want to hide?" argument because it infuriates me and because I do think privacy is important, but please, please, please stop acting like e-mail is your achilles' heel. For truly secure communication you shouldn't even be using e-mail in the first place, but Gmail provides enough tools to encrypt mail as needed if you plug a mail client into it (like Eudora, which you already use).

Re:I can't even

[jp10558]

Wow. I didn't really mean to preach. I'm just saying that my e-mail experiance got lots better once I started running my own server and using that via Eudora. I got tired of paying (this was some time ago) for pop3 that would go down, or webmail that was painful to use.

I also am somewhat weird in that I can count the # of times I *needed* to check my mail away from my primary computer on my fingers. And the number of times I've wanted to I can plan ahead and use my throwaway yahoo address to check my pop3 mail (without deleting from the server).

My basic point is that if I can't get my mail, it's my fault, so I don't get that frustrated, powerless feeling I do when the ISP or whatever mail server goes down. I can do something to fix it.

So GMAIL offers pop3. So what? I've already got that, why should I change? GMAIL offers web acces. So what? I've got that, and I use it all of 4 times a year. Why should I change?

All of this is just my personal preference though. Almost everyone I know prefers web mail (though I'm not sure they know there are other kinds of e-mail), I just don't.

My experiance with webmail so far has been far less than impressive compared to Eudora. GMail web based dislikes Opera, and I don't have any need to change browsers for a service I'm disinclined to want in the first place.

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

Hey, it worked for me! :-)

Re:I can't even

[IrishMASMS]

I personally grew tired quickly of everyone & their brother posting spammy "I have free Gmail accounts for anyone who wants one".... Bah! By the way, have you seen this article: Before you go running around for an account - Gmail, Safe or Conspiracy? http://www.templetons.com/brad/gmail.html

Re:I can't even

[Steward5732]

I agree. right now gmail is not as much as marketing anymore. it's better for them to make it public when it still hot news

Re:I can't even

[glesga_kiss]

Since I travel regularly, I'm more likely to have my PowerBook than an internet connection.

Many of us have been doing IMAP through our mobles as well for years. There's a little device in my pocket that can access every mail I've ever received, from any developed country on the planet. You can also setup your own webmail server easily with the likes of Squirrel Mail, giving you access to the same mailbox over the web. :-)

I like Gmail. It gives the average joe-public the same as I have, but a lot less hastle to set up. I won't be using it much myself, but it's good that it's there.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Pine sucks, use mutt.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

agreed..pine is a bloated peice of shit, and cannot handle large mailboxes very well, and is VERY limited when compared to mutt.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

> The fact that I don't want to? ...means either, you aren't very knowledgable as far as MUAs go, or you are just too lazy/ignorant to setup mutt, or you just don't care, in which case, why did you even bother to post the first post?

You suggested that another poster use pine, so what makes that any different from us saying that they/you should use mutt? Don't be such a hypocrit.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

...i dont see how any free email service could gain anyone anykind of positive points...cept for the domain name...i miss the free email at microsoftsucks.org :(

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Big words from someone who admins Exchange...

Re:I can't even

[edesjardins]

I look in my spam folder, it's empty. I guess I'm just lucky!

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Good call...spamgourmet is a great [free] service,...iirc they even let you download what they are using so you can setup your own in case the emails may be sensitive data (as your emails go through them and hence open to comprimise or data collecting)...

Re:I can't even

[innosent]

Why not just use Outlook Web Access from Exchange? Then you get your calendar, too (which is really the only reason left to use Exchange)

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

You suggested that another poster use pine,

Re-read the thread, A/C. You are mistaken. Someone else did.

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

I have a 90mb inbox mail spool, and mail folders/files of similar size. In conjunction with running screen, I leave Pine on for weeks at a time. So tell me how it's not handling a large mail box very well, I am really curious.

Funny how the Mutt cops all post as AC. Mutt's perfectly fine; has great configurability. But I have been using Pine for the better part of 15 years and it's comfortable like an old shoe. What the fuck do you care what other people run if it works fine for what they need?

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

...agreed, sorry...

Re:I can't even

[emfster]

I'd like one if you don't mind.

efausett AT mail DOT com

Thanks.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

humans feel compelled to voice their opinions..that's human nature, get used to it.

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

More accurately, A/Cs like to do the dogpile on pine campaign for mutt. That I am quite used to, but felt compelled to post a reply since all they are really saying is 'pine sucks' over and over. Get used to it.

Re:I can't even

[alienw]

Your ISP can't randomly delete your email account if you run your own server, and you can always change ISPs. Google can delete your account whenever they feel like it, and you have absolutely zero recourse -- it's a free service. Sure, their policies are nice right now, but Hotmail used to be a really nice email provider, too.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

fair enough, but fact is, pine really does suck.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

There is legislation that makes these terms void, at least in where I live. (Not living in the US though)

I'm not sure how exactly it applies to software though.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

> I hate webmail ! .. you can't hate it too much since in the same post you state that you use a Webmail server...

and how is this insightful? How is him asking a question and stating his own opinon show insight?

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

I've gone further than not wanting a GMail account, I've instructed my mailserver to block any and all email originating from GMail.

I won't have Google snooping everything sent to or by me and using it to build up a profile they can use for whatever they wish.
I'll not consent to their TOS which allow them to retain for whichever purpose anything I send or receive using their service for eternity even if I delete it, and I don't want anything sent to me to be similarly retained.
Blocking GMail is the only way to make sure of that (at least no more than one message from any somewhat sane person should be sent when it's bounced).

Re:I can't even

[permaculture]

I prefer IMAP to POP3. POP3 defaults to moving the email off the server onto the local machine. IMAP's default behaviour is to leave the email on the server (where it's backed up and available from anywhere.)

Doesn't IMAP send the account password in clear? That's a mark against it from a security standpoint.

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

We might as well complete the circle now, right?

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

A year later and I am currently at 29% capacity.

So in just over three years you'll be maxed out at gmail.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly how would him posting as a non-AC change the validity of his post? Perhaps you want the username so as if have your friends mod him down?

A/C or no A/C, it does nothing for the value of the persons post, it only open the person to unfair attacks.

The argument of the A/Cs comments being somehow less relevant just because they posted A/C is nothing more than a classic cop-out.

Re:I can't even

[carnivore302]

(slightly offtopic)

You can access all your mail from any client anywhere with a network connection and access to your IMAP server, and proper searching is taken care of by competently-programmed clients, anyway.

where kmail is not a competently-programmed client. It takes forever to synchronize the mailboxes using kmail. Thunderbird and outlook {,express} do a much better job at it. The developers of kmail state that their way is the only way to do it right, but somehow I doubt this is true.

Re:I can't even

[surferbill]

Or use the Gmail invite spooler

http://isnoop.net/gmail/

Re:I can't even

[baker_tony]

>And, I like VNC through Java applet for checking my mail or anything elsewhere!

Hey, if you don't mind telling, were did you get your Java vnc applet from?

Re:I can't even

[baker_tony]

Ahh, hell! Don't worry, VNC hosts the java applet itself! Just need to go to http://:5800/ which the VNC server is running on (making sure you've ticked the box in VNC options to Serve the Java viewer via HTTP on whatever port you want, 5800 by default)

Re:I can't even

[Matje]

the trick is not to accept all mail. If you use a suffix or prefix for your emailaccount (like qmail supports natively), then you don't have any problems with bounced spam.

so on every website you will in prefix-website.com@alanhoyle.com. Now in procmail you filter out the prefix-.*@ messages. Anything that doesn't start with prefix- goes to the junk bin.

I've been using this scheme for a couple of years. works wonders.

Re:I can't even

[osvejda]

but there's no URL

You mean like this one? Works even in lynx.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

penis enlargement pills Our penis enlargement specialists has conducted extensive research of a number of different penis enlargement techniques, penis enlargement pills and natural penis enlargement programs. Our goal is to find sensible and sustainable ways for enlarge your penis based on a long-term basis. webmaster@penis-enlargement-methods.net

Re:I can't even

[raduf]

Oh no! you'll be targeted! For the love of god, for the children, don't let them target you!!!
Come on, do you really want to watch detergent commercials? Targeted ads are definitely not evil, and they have the potential to be quite a good and useful thing. There are a lot of products and services i don't know anything about and i wouldn't mind them beeing promted to me, preferably google-style, ie unobtrousivly. Anyways it'a lot better then seeing the same crap over and over again (I DON'T LIKE BRITNEY SPEARS!!!)

Re:I can't even

[dave420]

You're using the internet. You ARE beholden to big companies. Do you think some mom'n'pop company owns the backbones of the internet? Just make sure you're beholden to the good guys as best you can.

As for everything else, you don't sound like the targetted gmail user - you're putting your own ideology before the technology :)

Re:I can't even

[mdwh2]

Comparing to Outlook is hardly fair though - in my opinion, that's the worst email client around. In my client of choice (Eudora), I can search and find what I'm looking for. I have far more space too. Accessing all your email from anywhere is certainly an advantage, but many people probably only use one main computer, so it's understandable that this isn't enough of an advantage to switch to it (also I'd have to have one computer downloading all my mail anyway, since I dislike the idea of not being able to access it offline, or worse, gmail suddenly closing and losing all my email, as sometimes happens with free email accounts).

Re:I can't even

[mdwh2]

You said you like Eudora, so you're "beholden" to them trusting their stuff isn't spying on you.

How? Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but surely if Eudora had any back doors that allowed spying on the email it would have been found out (eg, by using a firewall, or by people who run their own mail server)? Not that I'm saying I agree with the original poster, but I can't see how a client puts you at the same risk - a better comparison would probably be that you have to trust your mail server (but some people run their own, or use a friend's, or in general someone that they can trust more than Google).

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

"To me, Usenet is still the superior form of public posting."

I think this pretty much sums up the type of person we're dealing with. Are you sad you can't troll like in the old days? Or do you simply enjoy disorganized public communication that has no means of ensuring your message will actually reach half the servers out there, thus rendering you mostly ineffective in spreading whatever message you're trying to send? And lets not forget about the time lapse issues of Usenet over pretty much every other public forum/message system developed since.

Get with the times, gramps. Yeah, Pine does rock, but Usenet is pretty much obsolete now for the majority of communications purposes.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

I dunno. My messages seem to propagate within a few minutes. Nowadays, the people who seem to bitch about this are the ones on crappy news servers. I'll tell you this. My usenet account has been up more than every web forum I've ever dealt with.

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm my own ISP..you Insensitive Clod! ;D

Re:I can't even

[m50d]

You can set it up as disconnected imap though, and any sensible client will cache messages, so you're pretty much as good as with pop. With pop you either have to delete all the messages from the server when you get them (bad when you go to use another machine, worse when your machine crashes halfway through reading your new messages and you lose the remainder) or leave them there (fills up your inbox).

Re:I can't even

[bhtooefr]

I've got a friend who uses Hotmail that I tried to give an invite to. Her reasons for not switching: Hotmail was a better domain name, and she had 250MB - why bother switching to 1GB?

(And that was BEFORE I told her GMail was by Google - for some reason, she hates Google, yet uses MSN).

Re:I can't even

[kevcol]

My friends? On slashdot? Check my friend list then get back to me. Obviously you wrote without thinking much.

The point was, it's only A/Cs that are bashing pine or it's users in this thread, and when A/Cs use bad argument tactics to do a hit-n-run, then I assume they are afraid to use UIDs so as they don't take a karma hit when they get knocked as flamebait, etc. for the same content. Nowhere are they using cogent arguments to back up the assertions, it's just the tired old 'pine blows' arguments. No one answered a rebuttal I gave when someone said it couldn't handle large mailboxes. Just more 'pine sucks'.

If an AC even brought up the licensing issues involved with pine versus mutt, I would be impressed. But it's mostly ad hominem.

Is that clear?

Re:I can't even

[drsquare]

Not me. Everytime I go to the site it won't let me sign up. You need nerd friends who obsess over irrelevent run-of-the-mill webmail services to get invites, and I hate nerds, therefore no invites. Normal people generally don't give a damn about gmail or how much 'greater' it is than other e-mails, not everyone is a google fanboy.

And when someone does offer an invite they always want my e-mail address. Eh, why would I need to give away my existing address just to get a new one? That's like forcing people to drive to the car dealership. When I go to yahoo or hotmail I just sign up on the spot. Is google trying to harvest e-mail addresses?

Re:I can't even

[Anonymous Coward]

How fortunate for you to be on the Last Good Usenet Server. The majority of ISPs I've encountered don't even offer Usenet servers anymore, and those that do toss it in as an afterthought; outdated hardware and crappy maintenance. So the people who bitch about it might have crappy newservers, and thats because thats all we can expect anymore from our ISPs.

On the other hand, I've not had issues with getting to any of the computer hardware forums I frequent, nor with finding answers to my questions in other random forums via creative Google searching. So you must visit some pretty crappy sites for them to be down that often.

Re:I can't even

[MightyMartian]

I have generally found that the usenet archive via google is far superior to almost any tech support group or mailing list, many of which I have to join just to ask the questions. As to the news server, I'm using Individual.Net. It's retention ain't the greatest, but I've never had a problem with propogation. I have yet to find a single web forum interface that's even half as good as Usenet.

Re:I can't even

[willfe]

It isn't the "same" risk but it's a similar one; there's no guarantee that a closed-source client isn't doing the same keyword scanning of your mail that Google Mail does for its targeted ads. Not saying they do so, but just pointing out there's no guarantees they're not.

Show of hands

[Anonymous Coward]

Who has not had a dozen opportunities to get an account by now?

Re:Show of hands

[blogeasy]

Or who doesn't already have a dozen gmail accounts by now?

Re:Show of hands

[Anonymous Coward]

Those of us with a real mail server. Why would piss about with fred732@gmail.com when I can have any number of accounts on a domain I can own for life?

Re:Show of hands

[Anonymous Coward]

a real mail server? as opposed to a pretend one?

Re:Show of hands

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. POP3 via. Gmail is a pretend mail server.

Re:Show of hands

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be stupid, gmail isn't pretend. God damn e-tards.

the link is one-time

[eobanb]

the link that appears on the front page of google for certain people only works that one time. There is no universal link for creating a gmail account right now. You need to just go to google.com and it may or may not show up.

Re:the link is one-time

[Mr. Sketch]

No, but you can always get an invite from the GMail invite spooler. It has almost 500k invities waiting to be given out.

Re:the link is one-time

[WormholeFiend]

I doubt it.

I noticed a few days ago that the 10 leftover invites I had were removed from my account.

Made me wonder if something was up, but having no one else to invite, I just shrugged it off.

Re:the link is one-time

[Anonymous Coward]

It works. I sent all my invites (50) to the website. A few weeks later I'm finally starting to see them being taken.

Re:the link is one-time

[Rummey]

I opened up google.com in Firefox and saw no link, but then I went to google.com in IE and I got an invitation: "New! Get Gmail - Google's free email service with 1000 MB of space."

Woo hoo! Ohh wait, I have 104 invitations still pending to give out.

Mike

Re:the link is one-time

[x0n]

Bizzare -- I have 50, yes, fifty invites just sitting in my account for the last couple of weeks -- I had 6 for ages, then it just went up to fifty. I receive ~100 spam per day due to an old 1992 account .forward, so I wonder if it's related to my perceived activity? can't see why though...

- Oisin

Re:the link is one-time

[Rummey]

Even better! The message toggles between 1000MB and 1GB. Wierd!

Mike

Re:the link is one-time

[pyro_dude]

No, from what I can tell the 50 invites are standard. Makes you wonder why they're keeping it concealed at all, if everyone sends out invites to all their contacts who in the world is left without gmail access?

Re:the link is one-time

[Sentry21]

Hell, if anyone wants a gmail invite, I have 50, as does everyone else I know. I'm sure those on Slashdot with accounts could easily provide invites to those without accounts.

Re:the link is one-time

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe people who don't want a gmail account. But Google wants to get everybody... ;)

Re:the link is one-time

[ikkonoishi]

I think that is kind of the point.

It keeps people from signing up for the accounts with a bot better than the obscured numbers thing does. (Although it is possible to automate joining still.)

Re:the link is one-time

[Arctic Dragon]

I was unable to see the Gmail link despite refreshing Firefox 20+ times (even when identified as IE6 SP2), but I immediately saw the link when using IE6 SP1. Strange coincidence?

Re:the link is one-time

[Anonymous Coward]

I was unable to see the Gmail link despite refreshing Firefox 20+ times (even when identified as IE6 SP2), but I immediately saw the link when using IE6 SP1. Strange coincidence?

Yes.

Re:the link is one-time

[nine-times]

Yeah, in case anyone's confused, Gmail still isn't exactly public. It's still saying "beta", and if you go to gmail.google.com, there won't be an option to "sign up for a new account" yet. It's just that it's really easy to get a Gmail account, as though it wasn't easy enough already.

Re:the link is one-time

[Poppler]

Strange coincidence?

I would say yes.

I use Firefox at work and at home, (Windows at work and OSX at home), the link showed up the first time I loaded Google in each location.

Re:the link is one-time

[cicho]

It's an interesting experiment in propagation. How fast and how far will gmail spread just by way of invitation, without it being officially open and without a costly advertizing campaign?

Re:the link is one-time

[masterQba]

i have 50 invites still left (since 2 months or so)

Re:the link is one-time

[jeffb]

I suspect it is indirectly a browser issue.

You may be missing the Gmail invite link when using Firefox due to Google's persistent cookie being present in your Firefox session, but not when browsing in IE.

You might want to try clearing the cookie Google has set in Firefox, and trying again. Best of luck.

Gmail public

[stanmann]

Except that the links appear broken and everyone on Slashdot who wanted an invite already has at least one.

Re:Gmail public

[ikkonoishi]

Its a random invite on Google's main page.

So its a one time deal.

I got one last night.

Basically instead of the usual blurb like "New! Create your own customized Google News." you get an invite if you hit the luck random number when the page is loaded.

Thanks, but no thanks...

[lucabrasi999]

we want to first extend invitations to Google users

Thanks, but I've already received about 1,000 invitations.

why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been using the beta for awhile and i'm amazed this didn't go live sooner. Rock solid, score one for google.

Re:why not sooner?

[lucabrasi999]

Rock solid, score one for google.

Yeah, they really made huge advances in e-mail technology and turned it into something special.

BTW. Can anyone tell me how do I turn off my sarcasm tag?

Re:why not sooner?

[daniil]

BTW. Can anyone tell me how do I turn off my sarcasm tag?

You can't. I've tried hard, but the only way seems to be to stop posting.

Re:why not sooner?

[andy753421]

I haven't been able to test the new sign up system but I was thinking they wanted to get a good one that wouldnt allow spammers to just flood the google servers with a gig of spam for hundreds of different accounts.

Re:why not sooner?

[interiot]

What happened when Blizzard released World of Warcraft to the public? Its popularity far outstripped Blizzard's predictions, and their previous rock-solid product became an endless string of "emergency maintenance" announcements.

Same with Google... GMail requires space to be dedicated to each new person. If the influx of new people is greater than the rate at which they can aquire new hardware and squash new scalability bugs, then it won't be rock-solid anymore.

Controlling popularity is important. Google might be overdoing it a little bit... But in this game, it's far better to err on the side of going too slow, especially when you're as popular as google is.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW. Can anyone tell me how do I turn off my sarcasm tag?

Yeah, we'd all be thrilled to help you with that, sure.

Re:why not sooner?

[yelohbird]

Dude...switch off the sarcasm. Before google, we were getting a measly 4MB from Yahoo. Google pushed the bar and made large mailboxes a standard.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

Before google, we were getting a measly 4MB from Yahoo.

If you used Yahoo or Hotmail, yes. If you were like many of us, you used POP3 from an ISP. Many ISP's already provided large amounts of space. It's not like Google was the first place to provide it.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

BTW. Can anyone tell me how do I turn off my sarcasm tag?

Remove your head from your ass?

Re:why not sooner?

[nosilver4u]

Yes, but you were also paying for that space.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

And, I don't receive any advertisements. You get ads with Gmail.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

Note that everyone that has a home internet service provider pays for some access. All ISP's provide an e-mail service as part of their fee. I choose to use my ISP's advertising free e-mail service.

Chances are, you have a home ISP that gives you a monthly bill. You don't use that home ISP e-mail's service. You apparently use gmail. So, what? You are still paying for your ISP. And, you are getting advertising in your e-mail.

Re:why not sooner?

[Accipitradea]

So your server is down today too?

Re:why not sooner?

[learn fast]

Another post from someone who's never taken a MARKETING class.

This has nothing to do with server space. Gmail would never be as popular as it is today if they hadn't used their ingenious "give these codes to all your friends!!! -- or else you can't get in" promotion. This has nothing to do with a beta stage it's a marketing promotion. Sometimes, making your product artificially scarce makes people want it more, and I for one am once again awed by Google's awesome duality of marketing and technical brilliance.

Re:why not sooner?

[interiot]

So why is GMail the ONLY product they've released that quite strictly limited the influx of people? (not simply hiding a Beta link one or two levels deep, but requiring limited registration)

Warcraft requires a $50 up-front fee, and has $15 ongoing-revenue to fund server enhancements, yet is swamped. This is a technical problem. It happens to have ingenious marketing side-effects, yes, but the login-queues and dangerous lag on super-populated continents are still fundamentally a technical problem.

Google requires $0 up-front fee, and probably gets less than $15/mo in ad revenue from GMail users. They have to devote max probably 300MB per user. They do have the benefit that new users will use much less space on average than existing users, but still, the negative effects of popularity on server infrastructure are still simply a reality, especially for a free service.

Re:why not sooner?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been paying for an Earthlink account for years and they send me adverts for Earthlink products all of the time. They also only give 10MB of email space.

Re:why not sooner?

[fjb4]

"GMail requires space to be dedicated to each new person."

Really? Do you really think they set aside 1GB of space for every user that signs up?

Re:why not sooner?

[Joel from Sydney]

their previous rock-solid product became an endless string of "emergency maintenance" announcements.

Apologies for going OT, but huh? Did you play the same WoW beta as me? The Beta days were *anything but* "rock-solid", the severe problems you're referring to didn't even really start until the holiday season in mid-December.

Initial shipments of the game were very limited for the precise reason of stopping new account bottlenecks. However, the second wave of shipments coincided with the Christmas break, so suddenly hundreds of thousands of new people are joining, in addition to the existing players who suddenly have more free time (due to work/college/school holidays).

The three weeks between launch and the second shipment was probably the most stable period the game has enjoyed, while the beta was most definitely the opposite of "rock-solid".

Re:why not sooner?

[HeliumHigh]

Nope.

Re:why not sooner?

[drsquare]

That's hardly innovation. And probably won't last once they make it public, and people start filling it up. Expect to see serious limitations coming in when people start abusing it.

Re:why not sooner?

[drsquare]

Don't be silly, only evil money-grabbing companies would do a thing like that, and Google are perfect and holy, their slogan even says so: 'Don't be evil'. See?

They only did it for technical reasons, they don't care for things like PR and veiled marketing-stunts. It's a mere coincidence they have so many sycophantic fanboys who excuse every single 'evil' thing they do, even when they're clearly in the wrong.

Also their e-mail system is a complete revelation, re-thinking the way we send e-mail. And it's only been in beta for a few years, that's great progress when they have so few PHDs working for them, and so little money.

I like the way they never rip-off other people's copyrights with some illegal caching system, and the way the search results are always so irrelevent. I hate those other search engines where the commercial sites always rise to the top, and where the sponsored links are made to look exactly like normal links. Also I love the way they haven't ruined their Usenet front-end.

Re:why not sooner?

[spyder913]

I always thought the whole reason they were doing the invite thing was get a free set of relational information about everyone.

3 Months?

[testtrack321]

Remember when Gmail was supposed to debut in 3 months? 3 months after it was announced. Now it's more like 10 months. I guess the HTML version was what they waited for before the release.

Open to everyone? Great

[filmmaker]

There goes my best pick up line.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[spac3manspiff]

Was it "Hey, want a gmail invite"

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[mekkab]

I dunno about that. I tried to brag to my wife about my gmail account when they were semi-rare and she said "GAY-mail? You have a GAY-mail account? HAHAHA!"*

*Yes, my wife has a Catholic school girl's sense of humor and is down with poop jokes. Its quite endearing.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[filmmaker]

Worse.

I make Beavis and Butthead look like Don Juan.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[lucabrasi999]

"GAY-mail? You have a GAY-mail account? HAHAHA!"*

"Yes, dear. I DO have a Gay-Mail account. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Reignking]

Gay-mail account? Sounds like hot-male, to me.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Deliveranc3]

Yes homophobia endearing. Hahaha.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Acer500]

You should have seen the look in my grandmother's face when I made her an account in HOTmail :-)

It seems techies are no good at choosing names (or have a sex fixation?).

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[KarmaPolice]

I dunno about that. I tried to brag to my wife about my gmail account when they were semi-rare and she said "GAY-mail? You have a GAY-mail account? HAHAHA!"*

I believe that would be a hotMALE.com account...

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Marthisdil]

She ever star in a German Scheisse video? :P

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Le Marteau]

Yes, it IS endearing. There are certain things which are just inherently funny. One of them is homos. Another one is farts. It's just the way life is constructed.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[bonch]

Uh...what was homophobic about it? Do you know what homophobia is?

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[coolfrood]

Homophobia is so gay!

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

*Yes, my wife has a Catholic school girl's sense of humor and is down with poop jokes. Its quite endearing.

we know.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[white1827]

gay.com email addresses are actually easier to get than gmail addresses. www.gay.com

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

You should get her a Nintendo GayBoy Advance! (that's what everyone at school called it...)

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[SilicaiMan]

I believe that would be a hotMALE.com account...

Too bad femail.com is taken.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

Yikes! You're back!

--Short Circuit

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[mekkab]

I do not think that word means what you think it does. Especially in the given context.

P.S.- as to your sig, I've defended lawyers in YRO threads. I know all about D.A.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

"You have a GAY-mail account? HAHAHAHA!"

Sounds like she's mighty 'fraid of them homos.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[recursiv]

You are probably homophobic if: You think anyone who mentions gayness is homophobic.

PS. gay homo gayness queer gayity gay mcgay.

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

..oh yea...she's definatly a keeper..:|

Re:Open to everyone? Great

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a pickup line you can borrow:

"Excuse me miss, does this rag smell like chloroform?"

You can always get an invite

[Mr. Sketch]

Of course, if you're not one of the chosen, you can always get a GMail invite from the GMail Invite spooler that has almost 500k invites waiting to be given out.

Re:You can always get an invite

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL, each time you post this message in a reply to a post in this story, it's modded +5 ;-)
see how many you can get!!

Re:You can always get an invite

[stanmann]

That is OK, he'll get his in META.

Re:You can always get an invite

[Mr. Sketch]

Not always. But in case you do need an account, you can get one at the GMail invite spooler. It has almost 500k invites available.

Re:You can always get an invite

[Garabito]

LOL, each time you post this message in a reply to a post in this story, it's modded +5 ;-) see how many you can get!!

And this is how it's have been going so far:

You can always get an invite Tuesday March 15, @03:25PM 1 5, Informative
Re:the link is one-time Tuesday March 15, @03:28PM 1 2, Informative
Re:Gmail public Tuesday March 15, @03:30PM 0, Redundant
Re:now if they only had group emails Tuesday March 15, @03:41PM 1 -1, Redundant

Who Cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who cares? I have 50 invites sitting in each of my Gmail accounts right now, and keep offering them to whoever wants them.

Re:Who Cares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why, you're just a regular Daddy Whore-bucks.

SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

Enough google news!

Googledot. Google for Google. Google that Googles.

Re:SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

[antifoidulus]

Now if only we could turn "Ask Slashdot" into "Ask Google" we would be set!

Re:SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll take 1000 more google news over a single more iPod, mini, or other iCrap news.

Re:SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

[SlayerofGods]

http://answers.google.com/answers/

Google Section

[dadybeef]

1st Post Recommendation - Google Section!

Should have fixd the problems first

[Anonymous Coward]

Gmail hangs too much. Couldn't they have done something about this first?

Re:Should have fixd the problems first

[__aamcgs2220]

Justify your existence. Never seen or heard of that problem. Details, please.

Re:Should have fixd the problems first

[Anonymous Coward]

annoying gmail errors

That's why they gave me 50 invites!

[ManDude]

The plan is all coming together.

Re:That's why they gave me 50 invites!

[eobanb]

Actually, the plan DOES seem to be coming together, for Google anyway. I remember several months ago, I asked about 20 people if they had heard of Gmail, and of course the people that read Slashdot had, and ordinary people in my History course hadn't. Now I have people emailing me who are completely non-technical (e.g., have other people come and fix their computer for them), telling me that their new address is @gmail.com. I have high hopes for Google; like it or not, places like Yahoo have some nice free services, yet Google was very successful in getting a lot of users switching to their services quickly.
Partially, it has to do with simplicity; I'm really hoping that eventually users will come to appreciate neat and clean appearances instead of whiz-bang embed-tag-wav-file nested-tables best-viewed-in-IE ad-clogged flash-driven interface X.
I just hope Google can apply this to other things. For a long it seemed as if it was Yahoo's way or the highway, which in turn reminds me of Microsoft.
Do more stuff, Google. Do more stuff! XMPP!

Just refresh...

[mobiux]

if you don't get it the first time, just keep refreshing.
It took me 3 times to get the invite on the screen.

Re:Just refresh...

[trentblase]

I can't get it to go away. I keep refreshing and it keeps going back and forth between touting the service as having "1000 MB of space" and "1 GB of space".

Re:Just refresh...

[snuf23]

Or just send me your email address and let me finally use up my 100 mojillion invites that nobody wants.
I promise your email address will not become inundated with pornographic spam.

Maybe just penis enlargement ones.

Re:Just refresh...

[dokkeri]

Or just get an invite from a spooler..

Re:Just refresh...

[Anonymous Coward]

Curiously enough, I refresh the page and something different shows up. Try One for http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=gmail&btnG=Go ogle+Search
"Results 1 - 10 of about 5,150,000 for gmail. (0.11 seconds)"
"Welcome to Gmail
Google-owned, search-based service that includes 1 gigabyte of storage.
gmail.google.com/ - 11k - Cached - Similar pages"

Try Two, same link:
"Results 1 - 10 of about 9,420,000 for gmail. (0.05 seconds)"
"Welcome to Gmail
Welcome to Gmail, A Google approach to email. ... You see only relevant text ads and links to related web pages of interest. Gmail Sign In. Username: Password: ...
gmail.google.com/ - 11k - Cached - Similar pages"

It seems their result caching is buggy.

Re:Just refresh...

[drsquare]

It's amazing how a pseudo-scarcity marketing campaign can get so many people jumping through hoops for an e-mail account.

Sorry Google, but there are plenty of e-mail systems about, and not much to choose between them, if you want my custom you jump through my hoops, not the other way around. Who do you think you are, Microsoft?

now if they only had group emails

[danwes]

about time, I'm sick of friends begging invites off me....

Re:now if they only had group emails

[mrsev]

echo

If they're begging for an invite, tell them to go to the GMail invite spooler. They have almost 500k invites to be given out.

echo

If they're begging for an invite, tell them to go to the GMail invite spooler. They have almost 500k invites to be given out.

echo

Re:now if they only had group emails

[Mozk]

Seriously, how many times must you post this?

Late

[Anonymous Coward]

I got my invite from gmail (not from someone, but from google) weeks ago. I signed up for it way back when.

Bad Gmail link.

[Osty]

The link to Gmail in the story goes to a page that says:

Account Already Created

The link you followed to this page has already been used to create your Gmail account. To access your account visit http://gmail.google.com and log in with the username and password you chose during registration. To create another Gmail account, you'll need a shiny new account creation link. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Here's a better link for Gmail.

I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[Behrooz]

2. How do I sign up? When can I get a Gmail account?

We're currently only offering Gmail as part of a preview release and limited test. We don't have details on when Gmail will be made more widely available, as that depends in part on the results of the test.

Uh. Without a way to create public accounts, this is just another form of beta. Looking on the main gmail page, it sure looks like there's no way to create an account for someone who doesn't have a google account yet.

Beta? Yes. Public? About as much as it was before.

On the other side, I've got about 50 invites left.

Re:I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[Anonymous Coward]

If you enter in a non-existent user name and hit enter you will be brought to a registration like looking screen with a captcha.

Re:I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[doc_holliday814]

Well, that's the thing, they haven't gone public yet. The original poster merely gave Google his/her (what am I saying, it's /., his) email address back when the GMail debuted. I did the same thing and last week I received a similar email. Of course, I've had a GMail account a long time now so I don't need it, but that's what's really going on. So, to recap, GMail is still beta, they're just sending out invitations to those people who signed up when GMail debuted.

Re:I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[Nuclear_Physicist]

On the other side, I've got about 50 invites left.

Everyone in gmail has 50 invites left. They currently replenish your used invites daily. I've handed out a few gmail accounts in the past few weeks and my number of invites continues to peg at 50.

As a result, gmail was effectively completely open quite a while ago.

Re:I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[Suicyco]

Its a link on the front page of google.com that appears at random. I just got the link myself while googling.

Re:I don't see any way to create an account yet.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've had a Gmail account since late last year and I never got any invites. Or do you have to actually be USING the Gmail account to get invites?

clever spam tactic

[Anonymous Coward]

The whole "invite" scheme was just a really clever way to get people to spam their friends.

Re:Wee.

[Anonymous Crowhead]

Google threw a party and only the nerds cared.

This happened 3 weeks ago

[BenEnglishAtHome]

which was hen I got an email from Google inviting me to sign up. I had filled out that "Yes, I'm interested" form back when GMail first became public knowledge and I assumed this contact by Google was a result of that registration.

That would mean the GMail has been public for nearly a month. Which would mean that Slashdot has been tardy reporting something. Say it isn't so!!!

Re:This happened 3 weeks ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Which would mean that Slashdot has been tardy reporting something.

I'm sure it will be made up for by reposting this a half-dozen times over the next day or two.

A bit late

[BibelBiber]

A bit late considering that every user in the world already has a gmail account. I mean if you wantet an account you could get one, for example from that isnoop.net like I did. And, mostly it's almost redundant since gmx.net offers 1GB as well along with their MediaCenter, a WebDAV disk for free.

Invites

[kc0re]

So what do I do with my 50 invites I have?

Re:Invites

[Anonymous Coward]

Stick em up your ass?

Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

Gmail is great but there is one thing that I hate about it. Whenever I'm sent an attachment, I can't just forward it on to someone else. Has anyone figured out how to do this? I'd rather not have to download the attachment and then make an entirely new email with it attached.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

Well they must have fixed this recently cause I just tried it and the file was attached...

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about trying that nifty link named "forward"...?

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

Actually this problem occurs when I am sent an image that is attached but is embedded into the email. If I try to forward the image, it won't get attached. I tried it with a ppt file and it did attach... Is there a way I can submit a bug to google?

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

If I am sent an image, gmail embeds it into the email and then when I try to forward it, it won't attach it. If it's another type of attachment, though, it works fine.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[ares284]

Umm, ever since I got my account over a year ago, if you click the "forward" link (instead of reply), then it will have the attachment along with a check mark box that you can select/deselect individual attachments from the old email.

-Ares

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

Have you tried this with attached images? I should have been more clear with my post but I'm doing a few things at once here. When I recieve images, gmail won't attach them when I try to forward them.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[ares284]

Ahh... Gmail *will* forward attached images - just not embedded HTML images... =\ So yeah, what you really want is HTML support in the editor, and I second that. If the pics are attached as simple files, it will forward them - but those pesky Outlook users that have the pics showing within the message always mess it up for us Gmail users lol. -Ares

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[Deagol]

No, but I have problems sending attachments to begin with. Seems the combination of Linux/Firefox/56k_modem makes it a bitch to send attachments. I can fire up IE6 in a Windows XP VM and send attachments just fine (on the same machine, mind you). On Linux I just keep getting that damned "oops!" message.

I know I'm one of a dying breed of modem-only users, but it's still bloody annoying! I can HTTP PUT files just fine 'till the cows come home, so I wonder just was javascript voodoo gmail uses under the hood.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[DustyShadow]

FYI...There is a section in Gmail's help that says there is an issue with some Firefox versions on Linux. It says it usually occurs with versions that were not downloaded from Mozilla.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[MightyMartian]

I've never really seen a Webmail that comes anywhere close to the functionality of a full-blown email client. Forwarding is a biggy for me, particular forwarding of entire messages with headers intact. Besides, I think the Web sucks as an email client, though it is nice when you're on the road. I have Yahoo and Hotmail accounts and both offer enough storage for my uses.

Re:Anybody have success forwarding attachments?

[dhofstra]

The author of this thread I think means forwarding inline HTML images. As of last week, I can verify that forwarding inline HTML does not work with gmail... one of the reasons I cannot still recommend it for family/friends. People I know still recieve (and forward) all kinds of HTML email in the form of humor/jokes email.

Why doesnt gmail just forward the entire html from the original email as an attachment? Seems like an easy fix to this problem before they go public. Seems to work pretty well on Yahoo mail (forwarding html emails as attachments)

I love google as much as the next guy, but with gmail not having the ability to forward html, and with Picasa not having an option to apply changes to the original pictures, I am frustrated that they have come soooo close to making public ready software, but they miss the mark in important areas.

Is it still style over substance?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can POP it, it's got a lot of space, but do they still parse for advertising keywords in the web-based interface? (checks) yeah, they do.

Those invites were just about viral. Get people thinking they're part of something exclusive and people flock to it. Now, as it's been pointed out, everyone's got a gmail addy... except for those of us who stopped for a second and asked ourselves "why? so we can feel like we're in the club, like Orkut?"

Re:Is it still style over substance?

[stanmann]

As for me, I got mine just so I could reserve my prefered name, in case in the future, I wish to use gmail.

Re:Is it still style over substance?

[stanmann]

And after giving it out to no-one, I've already recieved 4 pieces of spam.

Re:Is it still style over substance?

[lachlan76]

Really? I've given mine to everyone...it's on my home page even. Not a single spam.

Re:Is it still style over substance?

[adpowers]

After turning on Yahoo! Mail a few weeks ago (to check out the interface), I had like three spams the first day. I have a number of spams coming to my Gmail, but that is only because I plastered it all over the place for a little while to see how Gmail handles spam (it is much better than it used to).

Give us folders

[Anonymous Coward]

Give me folders over search anyday!!!!!

Re:Give us folders

[spac3manspiff]

Agreed,

Seems like they ignore the "Suggest a feature" emails.

Re:Give us folders

[Poromenos1]

There is such a feature, it's labels. It does the same as folders, although a bit differently.

Re:Give us folders

[Albert Sandberg]

You can use labels pretty much the same way you'd do with folders.

At least I don't see the need for the folders.

Re:Give us folders

[Anonymous Coward]

The labels work like folders... only better.
An email can have more than one label (so its like being in more than one folder).

Re:Give us folders

[turtled]

What's terrib;e about not having true folders, is that when I use a mail client like Mozilla Thunderbird, all messages come into the inbox. So, if I labeled one on the web at work "project", when I get home, it'll be a new mail message in the inbox. I agree, we need folders.

Re:Give us folders

[Tribbin]

You can label your emails.

Emails can have more than one labels.

Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Neil Watson]

Please fix the interface so that replies do not top post. (Yes, I did submit this to Google when I first discovered it).

Google invented beta...

[kmartshopper]

Well of course, Google likes to keep everything in beta as long as possible - you didn't really think they'd bring it out did you? Just because they are under immense pressure from other free-mail sites to move out of beta doesn't mean they will fight their long enduring trend towards beta forever.

Besides -- if they are always in beta then they can't ever be held responsible for bugs in their software now can they?

Re:Google invented beta...

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps Google is the only really honest one out there, and everyone else is releasing software way, way too soon.

That's my experience, anyway.

IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

If they support IMAP I want one.

I had a gmail address; but never used it because my email clients don't have a sane way to connect. (and no, POP is not a sane way to access 1GB folders. IMAP is).

Re:IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be almost pointless. GMail doesnt support folders, just labels (which have a many-to-many relationship with emails) and emails are stored in conversational format. The beauty of imap is that it keeps all your folders no matter where you access it from, since GMail has no such folders, why bother?

This isnt to be seen as a weakness however. The whole idea of GMail is to let your email sit there in your inbox and use Google search to find a specific message.

Re:IMAP

[Anonymous Coward]

One folder works well with IMAP. I keep about 1GB of email on my own IMAP server. The main benefit of IMAP over POP in this case is that the IMAP protocol has better server-side searching features.

Re:IMAP

[emanuelez]

I don't agree. IMAP is useful even with no forders. Just think of Pine and its wonderful support for virtual forders and the ability to store settings on an IMAP server. I wish more email clients could do that! If Google goes IMAP i'll definetely start using my accout.

Re:IMAP

[2centplain]

gmail could emulate IMAP folders using the label attribute. The combination of IMAP folders and labels are actually quite useful. I often save a message in several IMAP folders because it is related to more than one subject. That's a waste of space. Using labels and "emulated" folders would be an improvement for me. (That being said, I still thing storing all my email on gmail is just creepy.)

Bit late

[Turn-X Alphonse]

After the 50 invites each of us have on Gmail run out I suspect there won't be many peopleleft on Earth without a Gmail account.

Hell I've got half a mind to go and make 50 Gmail accounts with the invites purely to use them up..

Re:Bit late

[CrankyFool]

Umm, that won't work so well. Bastards will just refill you. These days, I get refilled to 50 within about a day of giving out an invite and having it used.

Face it -- we're stuck with having 50+ gmail invites until they finally open up the service. :)

Re:Bit late

[Anonymous Crowhead]

I created a gmail account (gigabyte.of.mail@gmail.com) and signed it up for 20-30 high volume mailing lists plus a ton of google and cnn news alerts.

You are currently using 366 MB (37%) of your 1000 MB.

We'll see what happens at a gig.

Re:Bit late

[ryanvm]

Hell I've got half a mind to go and make 50 Gmail accounts with the invites purely to use them up..

Half a mind is right. I kid, I kid.

Re:Bit late

[StalinsNotDead]

Face it -- we're stuck with having 50+ gmail invites until they finally open up the service. :)

It's Google's way of making everyone with a gmail account realize they don't have enough friends.

Re:Bit late

[legirons]

"Hell I've got half a mind to go and make 50 Gmail accounts with the invites purely to use them up"

And what would you do with your remaining 2500 invites then?

Re:Bit late

[Anonymous Coward]

I made up 2500 accounts and now I'm stuck with 125,000 invites. :-(

If by some chance I make up addresses for all of those, then I'll be stuck with 6,250,000 more.
email1@gmail.com, email2@gmail.com, ~~ email1338498@gmail.com
ad infinitum . . . ad nauseum

when will they change

[blanks]

when will they change the 6 character minimum for user names. I can see 4 characters maybe (dont know why they would do this in either case) besides planning on "saving" the 6 character accounts for some type of paid user.

Re:when will they change

[CdBee]

I reckon it was to stop some clever sod registering liamG@Gmail.com

Although moc.liamG@Gmail.com has almost certainly already been taken.

Re:when will they change

[mattstorer]

from the GMail help docs, available online here, which states:

Studies have shown that short usernames at popular domains receive significantly more spam due to the generation of automatic addresses. Gmail's requirement that all usernames be at least six characters in length is meant to keep spam out of your inbox.

I don't know about you, but I wouldn't trade a 6 character username for a 4 character one if it meant receiving bucketloads of spam for the privilege, and I sure as hell wouldn't pay for one.

Matt

Re:when will they change

[jonadab]

It may be that the lower-limit on usernames is so that spammer-style brute-force
attacks on the namespace can be better thwarted. Although, it doesn't do much
about dictionary attacks, so maybe I'm misguessing.

Re:when will they change

[BrodeCo]

They're probably not going to change that ever. It's not being saved for anybody, they just want to minimize the damage spambots can do by randomly generating email addresses.

Re:when will they change

[Anonymous Coward]

But this argument is bullshit, since it's trivial to brute force the majority of even 6-7 character usernames with a basic list of names (available from census.gov) combined with a dictionary and some simple algorithms. If you want to avoid spam you'll need significantly longer addresses, and avoid anything easy to remember (as it'll likely be based on dictionary words/names)

Re:when will they change

[Anonymous Coward]

I have 5 email addresses essentially on the same account: (2 addresses 3 aliases but I feed the two addresses into the same inbox in my mail client)
a 7 character email name from when the ISP was 'max 8 letter usernames'. 65% of my spam comes here.
a 5 character email name that's been my standard alias for 6 years or so. 30% of my spam comes here.
a 6 character, very random looking email name that is my ham radio callsign. (a 2x3 style call, xx#xxx). I use it anytime I have to give an email to a site that is ham radio related. 4% of my spam comes here.
a 13 character email name from my blog. the remaining 1% of my spam comes through here (it's also the email I signed on my domain registration).
a 4 character email name that is the character name I use on mmog's. It has never been taken when I've tried to make a character, and is not particularly exotic imo. I've received 1 spam (nigerian scam) in the last 6 months on that account (which isn't spam filtered) and it's even listed (slightly obfuscated) on two guild websites.

The youngest of these email addresses is... 2-3 years old. (the blog one).

Therefore I call BS on the ease of attack of short names angle. Admittedly I may not be a representative sample.

Go figure...

[BishonenAngstMagnet]

Gmail was cooler when nobody had it yet.

Re:Go figure...

[0racle]

Its gonna be cooler not to have a gmail account

Wow, I'll be cool.

Re:Go figure...

[Anonymous Coward]

You are mistaken. Gmail was never cool. The only people who thought it was cool were Slashdot wannabe's with too much time on their hands and no real skills to invest in something useful. These are the people who invest all their spare time in rubbish such as web logs, Orkut and Gmail fanboyism. Those of us with something more interesting to do don't really have the time to piss about with Orkut invites, or even something as stuningly useless as a webmail service.

I've been getting Server Busy errors

[bigtallmofo]

For the past few days while using my GMail account, I've been getting Server Busy errors. This has been happening both when logging into my account as well as actions within the account (sending email for instance).

Nothing anywhere near the frequency as my old Hotmail account, but I guess they're still ramping up their userbase slowly so as to avoid this type of thing.

As a side note, I have 49 Vintage GMail invites currently and will sell them for $1,000 each.

Re:I've been getting Server Busy errors

[bostonsoxfan]

The same thing was happening when gmail initially was given to blogger users. The large influx of people slowed down the servers a lot then and they did not really handle it too gracefully. This time google has gone through the change much better (or at least I haven't expirienced many slow downs).

Re:I've been getting Server Busy errors

[sjaskow]

I have 49 and I'll let them go for $999 each. :)

POP3

[FiReaNGeL]

I just hope that the best feature of Gmail will remain free now that they've gone public.

POP3 access, no strings attached (read, stupid Hotmail requiring Outlook). Gotta love that.

Re:POP3

[qa'lth]

Actually, if you get the httpmail plugin for Mail.app on OSX, you can connect to a hotmail account.
There's also a Linux/UNIX daemon that I forget the name of that can do the same thing, it makes the HotMail account appear to be a normal POP3 mailbox.

It doesn't just require Outlook, fortunately.

Re:POP3

[ad0gg]

How would google make money off ads if people pop'ed their mail?

Re:POP3

[m50d]

Not insightful. Any half-decent email service will offer you not only free pop3 access but also free access with the superior imap protocol. If your service doesn't, find yourself a better one.

Re:POP3

[whm]

POP3 access, no strings attached (read, stupid Hotmail requiring Outlook)

It wouldn't be quite as bad if Hotmail required Outlook - the silly fact is it only works with Outlook Express. The logic in that "feature" will be revealed some time around when Velikovsky's Worlds in Collision is proved accurate.

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of hotmail: does Gmail need javascript, cookies or any of that other scum?

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't suspect they'll charge for it, but if they do, you might want to have a look at mrpostman.sf.net. It can get mail from just about any webmail service, including gmail and hotmail. (Not that you need it for gmail at the moment.)

Re:POP3

[captwheeler]

Latter versions of Outlook work with Hotmail. (2002 an XP for sure, I think 2000 also.)

Still a proprietary connection protocol, but above was this by qa'lth (216840):

Actually, if you get the httpmail plugin for Mail.app on OSX, you can connect to a hotmail account.

There's also a Linux/UNIX daemon that I forget the name of that can do the same thing, it makes the HotMail account appear to be a normal POP3 mailbox.

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

mrpostman.sf.net (Win32, X11) - Reads webmail w/o POP3 access

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy sh*t. I read the first paragraph and almost thought you were serious. I guess I need to re-enable the sarcasm tag in my browser :)

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone wonder what they're going to do with that list after all this is done?

Yeah, but how many on that list would be hotmail, and how many people do you know that would keep their hotmail account after they got Gmail? I still have mine, but I only check it every 27 days or so...

Re:POP3

[captwheeler]

How would google make money off ads if people pop'ed their mail?

Its the interface they're selling. Look at their 'why use gmail' page and you'll find:

(1) The secret is search
(2) It's all in how you look at it
(3) Never lose a message again
(4) Filing email is not the best use of your time
(5) Frying your spam
(6) It has ads. But only good ads.

Every point here is tied to the gmail interface; there is no claim that 'you get 1 gig.' So it looks like they are betting that the client you use won't be as good as gmail. I use pop3 for gmail, but I've also found myself logging on and thinking about their interface more and more.

Re:POP3

[arekq]

https://gmail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?ctx =gmail&answer=15049

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

Ideally, their 'labels' serve the same purpose... While I prefer labels to folders, sometimes I do wish they had both available.

Re:POP3

[ad0gg]

Interface is nice but doesn't allow people to view their emails offline Ads can be pretty weird at times, sometimes inappropriate. I've been experimenting with their ad logic, sending myself emails that I copy from websites. One thing I noticed if you put funeral in the subject line, you get 0 ads no matter what the content of the email is. I sent myself an letter about struggle of dealing with keeping a pregnancy or not, and got ads for baby related material. Its actually quite fun, just google for content and send it to yourself and check the results.

Re:POP3

[Antony-Kyre]

Best to do checks every 21 days. Falls evenly on the same day of the week, but also gives a nine day buffer incase something happens.

I'm sticking with Hotmail. I personally like Hotmail more than GMail. The look, the feel, and just everything. But that's my personal preference.

Re:POP3

[captwheeler]

if you put funeral in the subject line, you get 0 ads no matter what the content

If you search funeral on google you do get adds, but not in email, strange. Wonder if there was a reasoning to this, or they just used different algorithms that happened to have that result.

I've been thinking about using gmail account for other things: people made a file system from it, and picture sharing in picassa, but how about a database. If you label the entries the right way you could use the fast sort/filtering to store records. Its ideal for blob/large string type data. No triggers since their filters only work on incoming mail. Interesting, but not really a fair thing to do to google. (Wonder why you can get free web hosting but not free database service?)

Re:POP3

[fuzza]

If you search funeral on google you do get adds, but not in email, strange. Wonder if there was a reasoning to this, or they just used different algorithms that happened to have that result.

This is apparently as designed. From the help:

Privacy is an issue we take very seriously. Only ads classified as Family-Safe are distributed through our content network and to your Gmail inbox. For example, Google would block certain ads from running next to an email about catastrophic news.

Makes sense...

Re:POP3

[ad0gg]

Would you like to see "Buy great caskets cheap" ads on an email talking about a loved ones funeral? It would be in bad taste.

Re:POP3

[Anonymous Coward]

..bad taste perhaps...but insanly funny to 3rd parties..

Re:POP3

[adolf]

I'd rather have IMAP.

In unrelated news....

[wpiman]

EMC says order are up 50% suddenly.....

Two things

[SweetAndSourJesus]

• You fail it.
• That's a swell idea

Re:Two things

[Frank T. Lofaro Jr.]

Maybe he wants a google.slashdot.org with it's own horrible color scheme and possibly a new slogan (such as "Politics for Nerds" on the political section).

BTW, anything .slashdot.org will at least work.

Such as this:

http://usa.homeland.security.slashdot.org/

Re:Wee.

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone who wants a gmail account has one. I still have 50 invites left untouched.

Everyone who wants to know that everyone who wants a gmail account has one, knows. There are 50 posts saying so.

Direct link

[turtled]

Here:
https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount
Just truncated from the paragraph. The posted link was the result of someone singing up already. I also have 50 invites... but, with the link I posted, everyone is ready...

Re:Direct link

[turtled]

My fault - that's just for a "google Account" not the email. My mistake.

Re:Direct link

[ral315]

Er...that's a link for a GOOGLE account. It's not the same as a Gmail account.

Once again, Gmail accounts are NOT available to the general public, just a random sampling of the population.

Re:Direct link

[stanmann]

If by random sampling, you mean anyone who goes to www.google.com. Then yes.

Re:Direct link

[izakage]

On that link you posted, does anyone else find it interesting that there's a listing of "Google Store?"

gmail is still buggy

[Anonymous Coward]

Frankly, I'm surprised. Google has introduced a few bugs in its latest release of gmail.

For example, the "mail forwarding" feature cannot be disabled once it has been enabled. Any change to it does not not save.

Re:gmail is still buggy

[FreeUser]

For example, the "mail forwarding" feature cannot be disabled once it has been enabled. Any change to it does not not save.

I wished I'd known about this yesterday. I'm suffering from having my gmail account spam another account right now, and can't get the damn thing to stop. I'm thinking about creating a new gmail account for myself, but that involves changing my email address, which is itself a pain.

I really hope they fix this soon. Another day or two and I'm simply going to start blocking gmail traffic for a few days.

Re:gmail is still buggy

[rmohr02]

If it's anything like setting a "Reply-To:" (which you also can't turn off), just tell it to forward email to itself.

Re:gmail is still buggy

[Anonymous Coward]

"does not not save"

So... it DOES save.
I think YOU'RE still buggy.

Re:gmail is still buggy

[Ahnteis]

Just set a filter to forward it to some other account. Like one of the huge 1GB gmail accounts. ;)

Re:gmail is still buggy

[Zeno]

The mail forwarding (disabling) seems to be fixed this morning.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Anonymous Coward]

Please fix the interface so that replies do not top post. (Yes, I did submit this to Google when I first discovered it).

Bottom posting is for grizzled usenet hippies.

Took a year

[hey]

Remeber the Gmail announcement was on April Fools Day last year. Many thought it was a joke. One Gig, sure! Congrats to Google for not rushing it out the door.

Re:Took a year

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately, over the last year we all found out that the joke was indeed on us. Now it's on the rest of the world!

Technicality

[Poromenos1]

Actually, this is more of a technicality, since most people already have Gmail. It will just spare you the trouble of using one of your 50+ invitations when a friend wants a new email address. Plus, google already hinted they would be opening Gmail when they gave everyone 50 invites.

Old news?

[The Bungi]

Back way when I 'registered' with Google when the gettin' was slim and the service had just launched. Supposedly I'd get an email when I could join.

A few days later I got an account through Blogger and forgot about it. The email with the invitation that I had registered to recieve must have landed in my inbox a month ago, at least?

theory

[genomicon]

It's not so weird that Google has waited almost a year to go public with Gmail. Clearly it's the finale of a very large marketing experiment. First, Google develops an initial core of beta users, who upon registering for the email system get to invite more beta users. Then Google gets to sit back, watch the whole thing percolate, and collect valuable data on how long it takes for word-of-mouth to translate to market saturation, or how often free invites turn into new users, etc. From a research point of view, to get all of this they would need those several months they took.

darn

[Arctic Dragon]

So much for selling my invites on eBay.

Re:darn

[SmokeHalo]

Just wait ten years, then they'll be collector's items. As long as they're still in the original packaging, that is.

Re:darn

[spywarearcata.com]

Heh. I made several hundred dollars selling invites. Now I am waiting with a lot of 6 letter single-word accounts to sell when Google permits it.

How much would you pay for the account dragon@gmail.com?

Re:darn

[drsquare]

It would be funny to see people spend a load of money on gmail accounts, just for Google to declare that selling accounts is against their terms of service, and close them all down.

Exclusive??!

[dauthur]

Oh great. I've been around since the first month? that it opened and now they go public, after being so exclusive. But I still had 40,000 invitations left! :(

Random?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just out of interest, does Gmail give invites out randomly? (Normal invites to Gmail users that is, not these new ones) I've been using Gmail for about 7-8 months, and I've gotten a grand total of 2 invites, whereas everyone else seems to have like 50.

Re:Random?

[stoolpigeon]

It took me a while to start getting invites. Then as I gave them out, I picked up more. But even when I got 5 at a time it was getting hard to give them away. I sent some to myself to set up a few accounts for different purposes and now I have around 150 invites that I can't unload. I quit trying a long time ago.

Re:Random?

[niteice]

It seems like the more you use your account, the more invites you get. I had about 4, then signed up for a couple of mailing lists and got the load of 50.

Unload them quick ....

[KevMar]

Oh, crap

I need to unload my invites before they become worthless. Once this finally goes public, I will not be able to give them away.....

I still have 50 that I couldn't get rid of before. How am I going to get rid of them now.

Damn you, google!

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[CanSpice]

Yes it is.

Bottom posting is for grizzled usenet hippies.

Hopefully features stay the same

[SteelV]

I've been using GMail as my primary email since it first came out into beta. I love it. I just hope now that it's opening to the general public, they don't take away features (such as POP3, forwarding, etc.)!

I'd like to note...

[Roguelazer]

I'd like to note that I pointed this out on March 05 and only got to +2. link.

Re:I'd like to note...

[SmokeHalo]

Go run and tell your mommy. We'll wait for you.

Re:I'd like to note...

[halleluja]

I'd like to note that I pointed this out on March 05 and only got to +2.

For higher rates you need to be invited.

Ponderable...

[Duncan3]

What happens if everyone that wants an email account already has one? What if they are all "good enough". What if email is just more trouble then it's worth now that many cellphones have unlimited minutes.

Will the free email bubble burst? Do we care anymore? Can google's 1000 PhD's come up with something that hasn't already been done?

What gmail needs to do

[Monkelectric]

host MX! I'd be glad to pay money for to host my domains email accounts!

They're missing a huge revenue stream IMHO. How many small and medium sized companies systems admins could get BACK to work (instead of writing spam rules).

Re:What gmail needs to do

[Yolegoman]

Oh yeah man. It would kick some posterior to be able to use the Gmail interface with my own domains.

Re:What gmail needs to do

[evilmousse]

I accomplish this somewhat, but it doesn't work in the webmail interface.

first, i went to zoneedit.com and set up my account so my domain uses their nameservers. then i configured a lot else, but what's relevant here is their mailforwards. I set up one private and one catchall address to send to my private and spamdump gmail addresses, respectively.

The biggest lacking is that you'll need your own SMTP server, as using gmail's will force the return address to be your gmail address, whereas you'll want to use your domain's. I set up my own SMTP with a login/password to forward to my isp's smtp server.

so in my normal mail client, i DO use my own domain address for email, but it all just forwards to gmail. when i need to, i can use the web-interface if i don't care that the recipient will see my gmail return addy. either one goes to the same place.

Re:What gmail needs to do

[Anonymous Coward]

here is what I would like: (besides gmail supporting personalities, like fastmail)

hack the gmail web interface so that one can be using the web interface and it's own SMTP. (and forward to it from its own domain, like you do.)

I'm sure its doable. I just don't have the cycles to do it.

How to get your free gmail account

[Anonymous Coward]

Go to www.google.com. Click the link for Gmail from there. I just go my new gmail account.

Going straight to gmail.com doesn't work. Also the link in the original post does not work.

Nooo!!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's too soon. You're supposed to put that out on April 1st!

Don't see registration

[SteelV]

Is this just about the registration link that sometimes shows up on Google.com? If so, I posted an article about that about a week ago, it was rejected!

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Mr. Sketch]

I believe you mean, make that an option that we can turn off at will. I, personally, like the top post method of replies.

Move along people....

[kiehlster]

Isn't this old news? I've seen the gmail links on google search a while ago. It's not something new to me. They've been sneaking in gmail invites into their popular Blogger service for a while as a way to slowly increase their user base while they probably sit back and build the infrastructure to hold more users. Yeah, gmail's been boosting the amount of invites lately, but I still don't see a signu form on their gmail page. I think this is all just more invite leaking. It's not public until their signup page is public. Just look at the trail of evidence: techwhack guardian.co.uk Some other SEO news

What about Google Service Integration?

[Rude Turnip]

The "killer" feature I'm waiting for from Google is a single sign-on service. Now, I'm not advocating a MS-Passport system that gives me one login for numerous and distinct companies and services...that would be crazy. But I would like to use one login much like I can access all of Yahoo's services with just one l/p. Currently, I've got separate logins for Gmail, Blogger.com and AdSense.

Re:What about Google Service Integration?

[mrsev]

...so what are you advocating?

Re:What about Google Service Integration?

[Narchie Troll]

A single login for a single company's myriad services, I'd imagine.

Should still be Beta

[Anonymous Coward]

GMail definitely needs to stay in Beta. It has a long way to go before it is as good as my hotmail.

With hotmail, I got hundreds of fantastic e-mails offering me all sorts of fantastic merchandise EVERY DAY. With GMail I only get a few, they need to work on that.

Also, their ads aren't nearly as effective as they could be. They need big flashing banners that just implore you to click on them like hotmail. I can hardly even notice GMails ads. They have a lot of work to do

Have they figured out folders yet?

[glrotate]

Thier label system just doesn't play well with many mail clients. Why move away from something tried and true?

Re:Have they figured out folders yet?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thier label system just doesn't play well with many mail clients. Why move away from something tried and true?

Dude,

Now that I've used GMail labels, the limitations of folders annoy me to the point of making Outlook/Exchange (at one job) and PINE/Thunderbird/IMAPS unusable.

Could that be Google's plan for world domination? I, for one, would fork-over a healthy chunk of change to our new single-folder-but-with-labels overlords if they would simply release GMail commercially.

Re:Have they figured out folders yet?

[dbavirt]

Labels are better. I can apply several labels to a message, but I can only put a message in a single folder (without having multiple copies...)

Re:Have they figured out folders yet?

[asqui]

But unfortunately you can't group labels (yet).

So many e-mail addresses collected

[Antony-Kyre]

Remember way back when, when GMail had a way to opt in to be notified when it became public? You entered your e-mail address.

Anyone wonder what they're going to do with that list after all this is done?

Re:So many e-mail addresses collected

[BrodeCo]

Those people are all being sent invites (even though it specifically said that's not what it was) and have been getting them for at least a week according to my friend who was just excited to get one (before I let him know I had 50 invites to spare).

Re:So many e-mail addresses collected

[phpsocialclub]

I actually got my email from google telling me that that it was time to join in Feb, granted I had had a gmail account for 8 months, but it was nice they thought of me :)

Hi there,

Thanks for signing up to be updated on the latest Gmail happenings. We hope it's been worth the wait, because we're excited to finally offer you an invitation to open a free Gmail account! Just click on this link to create your new account:

Hooray!

[Anonymous Coward]

What an UNLUCKY mail to get!

"You've are invited to have your mail searched and ad bombed by it! Congradulations!"

whee

Spammers?

[mecro]

Its too bad its beginning to go public. As of right now, pretty much anyone who wants a gmail account has one, with isnoop.net's Gmail Spooler at something around 500,000 invites. I just hope people don't start signing up for mass accounts and spamming everyone with 1 GB worth of junk.

Re:Spammers?

[Bruno_me]

so far, one, maybe two spams have gotten through gmail's filter.. and that's after having an article submitted to slashdot

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[NewWazoo]

A: Because it breaks the flow of information.
Q: Why is top-posting irritating?

B

They're doing research on you

[Anonymous Coward]

they are experimenting with the terms '1000Mb' and '1Gb' to see which gets more click-throughs. If you refresh you'll see this change. Sneaky bastards doing research on me.

Re:They're doing research on you

[VoidWraith]

I was under the impression it was 1 GB. 1Gb would be a little disappointing with all the hype.

Sort on size

[Tribbin]

You still cannot sort on email-size as far as I know.

Quite important as your mailbox gets full quite fast when emailing many photo's.

Re:Sort on size

[Anonymous Coward]

What about using the labels to actually tell you what's in the email with the attached image? That's quite easy because they can be searched for and categorized under many topics and are also available at a glance. I'm satisfied with the service so far.

They might as well try to give it away

[museumpeace]

I ran out of people to give my 150 invites too...

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[rhavyn]

Which is great when I'm the one who asked the question and don't feel the need to re-read what I already wrote to get to the important bit. And I would argue that the vast majority of email replies are going to a single recipient and that recipient doesn't want to re-read what they wrote.

What's the deal?

[Major Lame Brain]

I see the offer when I load google's main page but after multiple reloads the offer switches between:

"Google's free email service with 1 GB of space"

and

"Google's free email service with 1000 MB of space"

Re:What's the deal?

[rayzat]

I saw the same thing and was equally curious. The link for each one also takes you to a different page. I guess I am one of the few people who never got GMAIL.

Re:What's the deal?

[radeyes]

Probably for marketing data to see which version gets more clickthroughs...

Re:What's the deal?

[Narchie Troll]

Test marketing, maybe. Perhaps they're trying to figure out which number is more attractive -- thus the different URLs.

In fact, that's probably it. They just want to see whether they should advertise 1GB or 1000MB.

(Goddamned flood control.)

Re:What's the deal?

[Roguelazer]

You get 24MB more with the 1GB deal... You should probably click on that one...

Re:What's the deal?

[Major Lame Brain]

Right U r!

HERE IS THE LINK

[jester22c]

Here is the actual link to sign up.

Good grief.

https://www.google.com/accounts/NewAccount

Re:HERE IS THE LINK

[jardin]

No it's not. Good grief. :P

Re:HERE IS THE LINK

[Anonymous Coward]

Please sir, take your asshat off while commenting.

Re:HERE IS THE LINK

[Anonymous Coward]

I'll bet you regret this post about now...

Beta?

[SnprBoB86]

OK, now how long before it is no longer considered beta?

Re:Account Signup Link (global)

[Anonymous Coward]

What is this -1 for, cheating the system?

Next question

[sharkey]

When will Gmail be presented in valid markup? Putting everything except controls into 5 pixel high table cells seems rather silly.

Randomly Putting Link on www.google.com

[Anonymous Coward]

Last night I went to www.google.com and had a gmail link on the front page. Since I already had one, I didn't use the invite. However when I was going to email a buddy that just wanted one to mess around with to let him know, I rechecked the page and there was no link. I think they are just randomly placing the link periodically.

Speaking of your wife... :P

[EvilStein]

I tried to open gspotmail.com but some damn domain squatter already had it taken.

Man, I could have made a fortune off of that one. :|

I second that

[jrushton]

Ive had plusnet for 18 months now and theyre excellent. The customer service really sells them, as those BT monkeys have put diggers and all sorts through our line and plus has kicked them into action :)

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Anonymous Coward]

I assume you are talking about the cursor being positioned at the beginning when you click on 'Reply'? That's the correct position for it.

If you put it at the bottom, you have to go back to the top before moving down, snipping out the irrelevent bits and replying to each point in turn.

Putting the cursor at the bottom by default just makes it easier for those retards that quote 100+ lines that somebody else wrote, just to put "Me too" at the bottom. That's only marginally less annoying that top-posters.

I saw this a few weeks ago

[nighthawk127127]

A week or two ago I went to Google and saw the "Start Using Gmail Now!" link (or whatever it says, I don't remember the exact wording). I already have an account, but I went ahead and set up one for my parents. Maybe this is just another way for them to increase users without going completely public? Like invites distributed randomly to users who visit Google's front page?

slashdotting google

[Anonymous Coward]

> if you don't get it the first time, just keep refreshing.

I just imagine the hord of slashdotters that keep refreshing the Google home page. The term "slashdotting" will reach new heights!

Gmail updates.

[nrlightfoot]

I signed up to get e-mail updates on gmail availability several months ago, and they sent an invite to that e-mail on February 18th. I'm not sure if they sent those at random to people who had signed up for updates or all of them.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[m50d]

F'in hell, it's debateable enough on usenet, in email there is NO REASON ON GOD'S EARTH YOU WOULD NOT WANT TO TOP POST. Go back to flaming newbies on what you probably laughably insist is called a newsfroup.

I invited myself

[gosand]

I finally took up someone on it after about 5 offers. Then I tried to invite other friends. Everyone who wanted an account already had one. The only person I could get to accept my invite was myself. I accepted.

10 months?

[count_schemula]

Try being an Apple user waiting on the 3GHz G5 that was gonnna happen within a year, 2 years ago. Why do these people even make promises? Everthing is "coming" and everything is "beta."

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Anonymous Coward]

But if I ask many questions, or discuss many topics, then it makes sense to indicate which part you are referring to. It also often makes sense to re-read what I wrote, since I have been dealing with many other things since I wrote you. I also often get copied into the middle of a thread, so I have to read from the bottom up to figure out what is going on.

I generally prefer to quote the relevant line, and then reply to it. Repeat until done. The problem is that since Outlook made top-reply the standard, everyone has become used to it. Now you'll get the entire email thread in every single email, and some people can't live without that. It's a waste of space (and dangerous, since people don't bother to read what they're forwarding sometimes). It would be far better to have a good threaded mail reader, but unless MS does it, it's irrelevant. People are trained the Outlook way, for better or worse.

Then again, I still use a text-only mail reader.

this just in

[btnheazy03]

Yahoo! Mail filtered my Gmail confirmation e-mail as spam

gmail has been public for ages....

[halleluja]

Quote:

Currently, we have 493,639 invites available to share. Thanks to the generosity of folks like you, we've distributed 533,379 invites since this page went up on Sep 13, 2004.

See http://isnoop.net/gmail/
Found thru http://www.google.com/, what else.

Invites...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-1d9728f9d0-937f85c 626-c1e9e04bad
http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-1d9728f9d0-3ce29c0 b30-378104d98c
http://gmail.google.com/gmail/a-1d9728f9d0-1fc5491 c9b-5d7e6b287f

Re:Invites...

[killa62]

they don't work
damn bastard

Re:Invites...

[Anonymous Coward]

i posted almost 50 gmail invites here

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[jonadab]

> Bottom posting is for grizzled usenet hippies.

Bottom-posting (quoting the whole message and then putting your reply at the bottom) and top-posting (quoting the whole original message below your reply) are both cretinous and bad. The correct way to quote is interleaved, i.e., you quote a relevant excerpt, reply to it, then if necessary quote another relevant excerpt, reply to it, and so forth.

Gnus gets this right: it quotes the whole message (depending on how you have it set up) (except the signature (if it can tell where the signature starts)), but if you go to any point in the message and start typing, it breaks there and rewraps the quoted portions above and below, and your reply gets inserted at the proper place, unquoted, as a separate paragraph. Any parts of the quoted message you don't need to reply to, you're supposed to delete before sending. Gnus warns you if you try to send a message that's mostly quoted material and very little original response (though it'll let you do it if you insist).

But I don't suppose it's reasonable to hold a webmail interface to the standard of functionality set by Gnus.

Some people don't know about Gmail Yet

[JMPrice]

The highest moderated post in response to this story says that everyone who wants a Gmail account has one already. I don't think that's the case.

Sure, us Slashdotters and most other serious webheads know about/have Gmail--but I bet there are plenty of Google users who don't even know Google has an e-mail service and if they knew about it would like to give it a try.

Keep in mind that outside of blogs, some tech news sites, and a few articles in some general newspapers, Gmail has been on the relative down-low. It's never been on the Google front page before, which is all most Google users ever see.

I think putting a teaser about it on the Google front page will let a lot of people (like your less tech savvy friends and acquaintances) know that Gmail is an option for them.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

And the fuss is because.....

[samael]

I tried GMail out for a bit. I'll be sticking to IMAP + Thunderbird, a combination which seems vastly more powerful and user friendly.

Re:And the fuss is because.....

[Anonymous Coward]

useless posts yeah, they just rock

-1 streetcred

[Anonymous Coward]

Having a gmail account back in the early days had a psuedo-1337 feel to it. Now everyone can get one. Meh. Time to find something else...

Besides, I can't access my pop3 accounts from gmail like I can from Yahoo! and others.

Don't even talk to me about 1GB storage. Store your pr0n somewhere else.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[mzieg]

Yeah, Slashdot is upside down! What's up with that?

MOD PARENT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

its funny, laugh

google != gmail

[Anonymous Coward]

Try again.

Free Gmail invites

[combcox]

Free Gmail invites http://isnoop.net/gmail/

Re:Free Gmail invites

[La Camiseta]

I know that I personally have sent something like 300 invites to this spooler, and that there were over 500,000 invites available at last count.

Re:Free Gmail invites

[bluesilo]

Can u give me an invite?

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Anonymous Coward]

A: Because it breaks the flow of information.
Q: Why is top-posting irritating?

Not being an irritating prick a good reason.

in email there is NO REASON ON GOD'S EARTH YOU WOULD NOT WANT TO TOP POST

Which public?

[John Bokma]

Anyone interested in 50 invites? No? Hmmm...

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[MightyMartian]

Almost every newsgroup I've been subscribed to has been forced to wallop some clueless newbie using Outlook Distress. I personally wouldn't use Outlook Distress for anything. It's a sign of Darth Gates' true evil that he isn't apologizing everyday for that piece of crap.

wildcard domain

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, google lets you do a wildcard domain, too. I already snagged it, though -- the some of the stuff that ends up in my inbox!

Easy...

[Seoulstriker]

How would google make money off ads if people pop'ed their mail?

Not many people want to use clunky POP3 anymore when they have the beauty and simplicity of the Gmail interface at their fingertips. Gmail satisfies those who still want POP3 in addition to the interface. Otherwise, what's the point of having a Gmail account?

Google Mail now blocks all RAR files!

[jbridges]

As of last week, in the name of "security", Google Mail now blocks all RAR attachments, even a tiny test one with just a text file in it will bounce.

Google Mail does not block all ZIP files, only ones with Executable files.

Google Mail doesn't block TAR (or other archive) formats at all.

The supposed danger in RAR files is someone will have WinRAR installed and open a executable attachment inside the RAR. Yet there is the exact same danger in TAR files. In fact more danger since more archiving programs (like WinZIP) support TAR files!

no message numbers.

[oliverthered]

POP3 is poor compaired to IMAP, I keep getting dupes down because GMail doesn't support unique message numbers.

the googlenet

[mapmaker]

Google
Google News
Google Maps
Gmail
Froogle

Google's services now comprise something like 40% of my online activity. How much longer till they take over the world?

Re:the googlenet

[panck]

yes, indeed.

as i posted on my blog after Google Maps came out, here's my Google world takeover timeline:

• present: images.google.com, local.google.com, gmail.google.com, maps.google.com, news.google.com, blogger.com, et al

• 2006-2007: dating.google.com, jobs.google.com, groceries.google.com, voice.google.com, tv.google.com

• 2008-2009: dna.google.com, wherearemykeys.google.com, INeedToPerformAnEmergencyTracheotomyOnMyselfHowDoI DoThat.google.com

• 2010-2011: brain.google.com, LSD-over-IP.google.com, RealPhysicalSexSomehowContainedEntirelyInAURL.goog le.com, peaceOnEarth.google.com

• 2012-END: maps.hyperspace.google.com, quarks.google.com, beamMeUp.google.com, tomorrow.news.google.com, singularity.google.com

Re:the googlenet

[Reservoir Penguin]

Dude, seriously The World is bigger than your basement!

Craig Shergold is dying of cancer and wants gmail

[infonography]

Disclaimer, Craig Shergold was a kid with cancer who became a internet hoax. Please take this as a joke and don't bother him.

Because RAR files can be trojan'ed.

[Anonymous Coward]

There was a well-publicized buffer run exploit in RAR. You only need to open a RAR file to look at the contents - and the exploit can overrun various decompression buffers and execute code on your computer.

So that's why it's a prohibited file type: somebody can run their own code when you open their file in WinRAR.

Re:Because RAR files can be trojan'ed.

[jbridges]

Was fixed a couple years ago.

That'll be the realease date :)

[Anonymous Coward]

That'll be the realease date :)

it's still beta - look the logo

[diegocgteleline.es]

When I enter gmail.com i see "gmail BETA by google". It's still beta, the fact that they're giving away lots of invitations does NOT mean they're not beta.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[rhavyn]

But if I ask many questions, or discuss many topics, then it makes sense to indicate which part you are referring to.

Sure, and in that case I inline reply. Top reply still makes more sense for that.

It also often makes sense to re-read what I wrote, since I have been dealing with many other things since I wrote you.

Again, makes sense, but I'd say that isn't the common case. And nothing is stopping you from re-reading what you wrote if you need to.

I also often get copied into the middle of a thread, so I have to read from the bottom up to figure out what is going on.

Still not the common case.

Software should be written for the common case and top reply makes sense for that.

its over

[gunthnp]

google already closed the door the links down

Is this a paid placement?

[gelfling]

Seriously why is this here?

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Pastis]

How can the person who choses tp top post or to inline reply know what kind of activity has had the poster since they made their post?

And with increase usage it is logical to think that people are going to be more and more active, hence making top posting les and less obvious.

Top posting is only interesting: when the initial message doesn't matter. In that case, better to remove it alltogether.

And gmail has a solution: they hide the replied text. So whether the text is top posted or inline for someone who do not want to reread the message doesn't matter. But for someone who wants to reread it it does. So doing inline or bottom posting + hiding replied text solves everybody's problem.

And BTW, common case to me is bottom posting and inline reply. None of the mailing list I am on do top posting. It would be considered rude. I did my first top posting in years by mistake because of gmail...

Re:Account Signup Link (global)

[Storlek]

Well, for one, that's not the gmail signup page.

Top-Posting, Email Heresy

[Catiline]

YES!!! > Is it really all that irritating? >> It reverses the flow of conversation and makes relating >> parts of the message to the reply difficult. >>> Why? Outlook and most other email clients top post. >>>> Top posting. >>>>> What is the biggest email sin/heresy/faux pas?

Re:Top-Posting, Email Heresy

[jrumney]

>>>>> What is the biggest email sin/heresy/faux pas?

Clients that wordwrap nested replies complete with > signs.

Re:Top-Posting, Email Heresy

[Joel from Sydney]

What is the biggest email sin/heresy/faux pas?

Using HTML.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[MightyMartian]

In all my years of Usenet posting, I've never heard of there being a differentation between bottom-posting and inline posting. Those who quote a kazillion lines to say "ROTFL" are just as ignorant as those who top post on top of a kazillion lines. To me bottom-posting includes inline comments, but always leading off with the first portion of the text you're replying to.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Catiline]

Actually, the joke goes:

YES!!!
> Is it really that irritating?
>> It reverses the flow of conversation and makes relating
>> reponses to their originating comments difficult.
>>> Why? Outlook and so many other clients default to that.
>>>> Top posting; it's absolute email heresy.
>>>>> What is the worst faux pas to commit in email?

Cracked it?

[Zukix]

I can think of a reason why they have the invite system... they have just mapped the social networks of the net's most avid and active users.

Who might you ask does the spooler identify? The friendless.

RSS Feed

[Anonymous Coward]

It rocks the email world.

Everything starts over again??

[Easy2RememberNick]

I got one of those e-mail(s?) but I already have a Gmail account, does that mean I have to set up a new account now that it isn't Beta anymore?!

I can't see that happening. I really hope I don't have to fight over my username again!

Not the only ones.

[howlingmoki]

Until today, I hadn't bothered with trying to get a gmail account. My reasons were multiple:

1) I'm perfectly happy with my ISP's email service. Very little spam gets *to* *me* at that address, and what little does get through the ISP's filter is usually dealt with by my email filtering rules (go Eudora!).

2) I've got a Yahoo email address and a hotmail address. Those are used for online registration forms and whatnot. Ain't no way I use my primary email address for that stuff.

3) I never cared about the "l33t"ness of having a gmail account during the beta. It would've gone public sooner or later, and in the meantime why waste the effort tracking down "giveaway" invites or post pathetic whining pleas for an invite? Being l33t just doesn't matter to me.

Go ahead, take away my /. account or mod me as "troll" or "offtopic". See if I give a damn. :-)

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Anonymous Coward]

Software should be written for the common case and top reply makes sense for that.

My first thought is to agree that software default should be the most common case, but then I think of all the problems that come from having things enabled by default. Software should be flexible to do what the user wants, but default to "good" settings so that newbies cause the least pain. That's offtopic, though.

The question is, is the "common case" what you think it is? My experience tends to be different. When I email my family I generally have to catch up on the months since I spoke to them last, so we need inline. At work, we generally have long threads, and you have to read through the last couple just to keep context straight. There are also a lot of multiple questions things, and replies sometimes get numbered, sometimes inlined, sometimes colored. When most of the thread is top-reply, and suddenly someone inlines to answer multiple questions, it gets really confusing.

As I said, my idea for a solution is proper threading. If you could always keep track of previous messages easily, then there would be less incentive to always copy the whole message text, which becomes the whole thread, which becomes a mess. Then top-reply goes away, since in that case you don't copy the text at all. Maybe we can implement threading when we change the email system to kill spam.

Oh no...

[dshaw858]

I don't know why, but I get a distinctly bad feeling about GMail going public. I, myself, am an avid GMail user, and I do care about the program deeply. However, I do feel that once the program reaches it's peak users (who don't know to *delete* old mail), the GMail hard drives might start to be full... and I know Google's awesome, but I'm just amazed that they'll be able to handle terrabytes of information as accounts start to fill.

And, of course the spammers... but I'm sure those have tried already.

Also... what about the services, that GMail reserved for Beta Testers? I can't recall them offhand, but will they cost money now?

- dshaw

G stands for great

[inject_hotmail.com]

I've had gmail for quite a while. Maybe 6 months. I've handed out as many invites as I could to willing recipients...they've seemed moderately happy about them. My business clients seem to appreciate them a lot more, for some reason.

I think a gig of mail is great. I like how it has forced the other free mailers to up their meagre offerings (Hotmail and Yahoo) to like 250mb.

I like the interface, as it doesn't reload the whole page when switching between compose, read, etc etc as sometimes I am on my GPRS, which is similar to dial-up speeds :-/

To conclude, I use gmail far more often than my hotmail and yahoo accounts, because it's a MUCH cleaner interface, no spam, and I can pick it up through POP if I like. Oh, the last brilliant feature gmail gleamed in my eye is the fact that they trap outgoing mail into your sent items when using their SMTP...absolutely brilliant.

Gmail is the stuff.

Inject.

Best thing

[Jozer99]

Probably the best thing about GMail going public is the fact that it puts even more pressure on other free E-Email providers to improve their services. Anyone remember the pre-GMail days? Hotmail and Yahoo both charged to get you over 10 MB, POP3 access was almost NEVER free, and quite often you had to put up with tons of banner adds, popups, end-of-E-Mail footnote adds, and spam kindly sent by your E-Mail provider.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[jrumney]

For consistency with the point you are trying to make, shouldn't you have said:

Sure, and in that case I inline reply. Top reply still makes more sense for that.

Again, makes sense, but I'd say that isn't the common case. And nothing is stopping you from re-reading what you wrote if you need to.

Still not the common case.

Software should be written for the common case and top reply makes sense for that.

--- Original Message ---

But if I ask many questions, or discuss many topics, then it makes sense to indicate which part you are referring to.

It also often makes sense to re-read what I wrote, since I have been dealing with many other things since I wrote you.

I also often get copied into the middle of a thread, so I have to read from the bottom up to figure out what is going on.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[legirons]

layout text their with weird else anything do that like people do

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Pastis]

I agree with you. I made the difference because it was done in the post I replied to :)

BTW, I sometimes make a one or 2 line summary on the top of the mail, with all the reply below the original text. It's very occasional but I find it sometimes more natural to read.

Do you sometimes use it as well?

[we're going of topic :)]

Why Switch?

[jbarr]

I hate Web mail.

I personally LOVE Web-based email because it gives me maximum flexibility as to when and where I can access my email. Sure, it's easy to pop in a thumb drive with Thunderbird loaded, but not all connections allow POP or SMTP access, especially when firewalls are involved. Most places do offer Web access, however.

Plain and simple, Web mail offers huge access flexibility. The key (and it's very difficult, I might add) is to find a Web mail provider that is full-featured. With some extremely minor exceptions, Gmail fits the bill hands down.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

Not universal bottom post...please no!

Public forums, discussions, etc. bottom post and quote the relevant parts, or mix replies with the quotes. You rarely need to quote more than two replies behind.

Lengthy individual replies mix replies conversation-style with the quote: > Can you do this? / No. / > What about this? / Yes.

Normal/short individual replies (read: most e-mail) top post. The person who sent you the e-mail wrote the letter; don't you think he knows what he wrote already? An additional benefit of this style is it allows you to quote the entire original if necessary without forcing your reply to the next screenful.

Most of the people I see supporting bottom posting are people who participate on mailing lists and USENET and assume that everybody does, too.

Gmail Messenger?

[Achra]

I'm still waiting for Gmail Messenger. Everyone I know switched to MSN Messenger when they got their hotmail accounts (from ICQ) because it's convenient to add an email address instead of a 7 digit number. Unfortunately, those aren't the email addresses anyone uses anymore.. Next Google product, please?

Re:Gmail Messenger?

[gorjusborg]

One of the best features of using Yahoo Mail, IMO, is that gaim supports the IM notify messages yahoo sends out when I receive mail.

I don't know if I would switch to gmail unless I could do something similar.
I realize that I can connect with a POP3 client, but if I am going to use gmail, doesn't POP3 defeat many of gmail's touted features?

Does anyone know if this sort of feature is available?

Re:Gmail Messenger?

[Irashtar]

For windoze, there is gmail notifyer, which is simply a small taskbar program. for anything else, there is a firefox extention. take your pick.

Problem: MSN Hotmail sends Gmail to trash

[CHESTER COPPERPOT]

Does anyone else have the problem of hotmail sending gmail emails to the hotmail trash? I have sent numerous emails to friends with hotmail accounts and nearly ALL goto the trash. Not to sound like a part of the tin foil hat crowd but something is up with Microsoft and Google compatibility.

My Google

[mattm76]

When are they going to launch a decent start page like My Yahoo? They could probably do some really cool DHTML/javascript for RSS feeds and it would definitely get more people to use their other services.

Or...

[Craig Ringer]

What about the "why should I switch from my extremely fast IMAP server that I can access from anywhere, with optional webmail if I'm somewhere without ssh or IMAPs support" crowd.

Gmail doesn't interest me because (a) it doesn't have enough space and (b) it doesn't let me manage my mail how I want to.

I'd like its search features and awesome spam filter, but not enough to trust google with my mail, be forced to do archiving somewhere else, and have to manage my mail the way they think I should.

If you're wondering why I have a multi-gigabyte mailbox - time, mostly. I keep archives of most of the lists I'm on too as its faster and more convenient to search them this way than via their web search most of the time. That gets big after a while.

So what?

[Random832]

About a month ago, they sent out invitations to everyone who signed up for the "sign up to hear when gmail is available" mailing list.

it's done - over - everyone who wanted a gmail account has one. period.

Re:So what?

[klang]

..and they all have 50 invitations to spare .. Isn't that as public as you can get?

Programs of suspicious sexuality

[The Archon V2.0]

Back in the days of Windows 3.1 and (for me, anyway) high school, a classmate ran up to me insisting our computer teacher was gay. Since we were in class with his daughter (oldest of 5 or 6 kids) I doubted it, to say the least.

"No, I've got proof!"

I shuddered to think what this proof was, but asked anyway. "What is it?"

"On his computer! Porn programs! GAY porn!"

I was sceptical. "And you SAW the porn?"

"No! Well, not porn, but gay programs! He's not in the lab, come and see!"

"Er.... Okay...." Somehow I doubted the guy would keep gay porn on his class PC and then leave it running, but anyway....

In the lab, I was dragged over to his machine. The classmate insisted, "It's hidden in the 'Internet' group! Next to the groundhog program!"

"Gopher."

"Whatever! Look! Look!"

And sitting on the screen was the Internet program group. FTP, Usenet, Gopher, that newfangled Mosaic.... "I don't see it."

"RIGHT THERE! That icon of the guy in the hat! It even says 'FAG NET'!"

I looked closer. It was an icon of a shady-seeming character, face obscured by hat brim. And the 8.3 name said, quiet clearly, "FAGENT". Free Agent.

GMail as the Notepad of the Web

[Jon_Aquino]

Today I realized that GMail's latest features make it an excellent replacement for Notepad and other basic desktop text editors. (Use its Save Draft feature so that you can edit your text whenever you want.)

GMail has a number of powerful advantages over Notepad:

• Filename is optional. No need to think of a unique filename to save under -- just enter your content and go.
• Search all your past files at once. Try that, Notepad!
• Spell-checking on demand
• Load/save your text files from any computer in the world
• Cross-platform
• Undo Discard. Ever wish you could retrieve your file after closing it without saving? Now you can!

This is incredibly cool - a viable web-based replacement for basic desktop text editors. Yes, the Web OS is slowly coming together!

Is this a hoax?

[adeydas]

For some reason I don't see a 'Sign up' button. Also it is mentioned here that "We're currently only offering Gmail as part of a preview release and limited test. We don't have details on when Gmail will be made more widely available, as that depends in part on the results of the test."

What is Google? Never heard of it

[Anonymous Coward]

Where is this Google? What do you do with it?

I'm surprised..

[mdamaged]

...that noone mentioned gmailfs http://richard.jones.name/google-hacks/gmail-files ystem/gmail-filesystem.html ...it's a mountable linux filesystem that uses gmail as the storage medium. It works quite well..at times google breaks it, but the authors (so far) have been pretty quick to fix as it's usually a small change, like formatting for example.

If you use this for sensitive data, id recommend encrypting the file first.
Another plus, is you can actually RUN programs from gmailfs...and yet another added bonus...when googles gmail bot searches through your mailbox to gather ad targeting data..they'll be fed a bunch of garbage..and yes you can still use it for normal emails.

It's funny, I have gotten more requests out of...

[PotatoHead]

the blue lately than ever before. Of course, Google has 50 or so at the ready for anyone with Gmail to use.

I hope they keep it invite only.

[PotatoHead]

Wrote this to them a while back too. Know what? They seem to answer just about everything sent to them. I've mailed a few problems/requests in and they have either gotten them done (more than just me wanted those), have replied with some suggestions that might help, or are working on them. (Got mail on that too.)

Impressive.

Anyway, I like the invite system and here is why:

1. There is a nice chain of trust built in. Who wants to invite the spamming asshole?

2. Exchanging the invites, provided there are enough of them, is fun. I know 20 or so people now that I didn't before because of Gmail. That's kind of cool really.

3. It's an old-school Internet kind of thing. Those that are here have a reason to interact with those just getting started. Kind of the mentoring thing I experienced when using the Internet early on. Not quite the same, but --well I hope you get the idea. If not, skip this one.

4. Plenty of word of mouth for Google. It's a wonderful thing when users of your product do the selling. This is a lot less of a bother than Internet ads are. Can you imagine Gmail ads everywhere? Yuck! Good for Google.

Re:I hope they keep it invite only.

[mirko]

I once wrote to them and isnoop because I was concerned as I began receiving strange registration gmails after submitting my invites to isnoop.
They never answered (anyway iSnoop added a human-detection field on their interface).

You can do group mailing - here's how.

[Avishalom]

i read this in a gmail tips site.

you simpley put

address@one>,,address@three
in the address , no spaces

Re:You can do group mailing - here's how. fix

[Avishalom]

sorry , the plain text didn't work , and i didn' preview

let the LT operaor be denoted (
let the GT be )
address@one),(address@two),(add@three

again no spaces,

wait i'll preview

How about trust

[johannesg]

Ignorance? Apathy? How about this: we don't want our mail controlled by yet another large US company. We don't want them to know who our friends are, who we communicate with, what we are talking about, etc.

Sure, they may claim to "not be evil". Whether or not that is true I have absolutely no way of telling - they could just as easily be a front for a US security agency or some other sinister group. But I'd rather trust my friendly local ISP (and only to a limited extent, at that) than yet another faceless behemoth on another continent.

And free forwarding! Not many webmail services...

[Jon_Aquino]

POP3 access, no strings attached (read, stupid Hotmail requiring Outlook)

And free email forwarding! Not many free webmail services give you that!

GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachments

[Jon_Aquino]

I recently discovered another cool GMail feature: it lets you save all your attachments at once (as a single zip file). Other webmail systems (and even desktop mail clients like Outlook) force you to save each attachment, one at a time.

That's the thing about GMail - it is constantly being enhanced with new features, requiring no user intervention, with no updates to install. Features are being added to it more quickly than Yahoo Mail and Hotmail, and far more quickly than desktop mail clients like Outlook, which get new features (and bugs) on a yearly cycle.

Oh, and GMail is free.

Re: GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachmen

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent down, it REEKS of a google marketing drone...

NO SSL?

[Anonymous Coward]

check those guys, SSL all the way;) http://www.loftmail.com

peace

Re:NO SSL?

[Anonymous Coward]

umm...sorry buit no thanks:

organization: BizIntegrators, Inc.
email: hostmaster@bizintegrators.com

Any organization who uses the term 'biz' or 'cyber' and so on, is not one I trust. And any email that needs to be kept secret, I certainly would not trust that the free email provider isn't copying/saving them unencrypted then harvesting email address of all your friends who email you there, so therefore it would be best to only use it as a junk address, and if you are using it as a junk email address, why would you care if its (un)encrypted, as for the corporate option, that's even MORE of a worry since that data could be at risk of exposing [say] corporate data to unknown prying eyes.

Re: GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachmen

[Jon_Aquino]

My enthusiasm comes from my Mission, which is, silly as it may sound: "To influence humanity to use technologies that give individuals superhuman control over their information space". I'm a huge fan of GMail because it does so many things right (many of which are quite subtle). Ya gotta try it!!

Hotmail sends EVERYTHING to the trash...

[Anonymous Coward]

...including legitimate emails from universities.

What should I do with my blog now?

[pmagsa]

Recently I set up a blog for people to give away Gmail Invitations. You only had to send your invitation to the address showed in the page and it would be published as a post. It seems the blog makes no sense now. Anyway, let's see what happens now with it.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[drsmithy]

Bottom posting is for grizzled usenet hippies.

Indeed. We also like to start reading books at the first page instead of the last.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[kwoff]

Where I've worked, people leave the entire thread at the bottom of an email in case you later CC someone so that they can know what you're talking about. They write on the top so that you don't have to scroll down ten pages to get to the relevant part if you already know what it's about. On usenet, on the other hand, interlacing threads works well because you can always check previous articles in the thread.

i have already submitted that one month ago

[Anonymous Coward]

....unfortunately /. seem to have ignored my submitted message. i wonder why?

Received: from mproxy.gmail.com (216.239.56.243)
by hq.n3x.ro with SMTP; 18 Feb 2005 04:52:28 -0000

Hi there,

Thanks for signing up to be updated on the latest Gmail happenings. We hope it's been worth the wait, because we're excited to finally offer you an invitation to open a free Gmail account! Just click on this link to create your new account:

http://gmail.google.com/gmail/d-2-(email address)-(invitation code)

Since last April, we've been working hard to create the best email service possible. It already comes with 1,000 megabytes of free storage, powerful Google search technology to find any message you want instantly, and a new way of organizing email that saves you time and helps you make sense of all the information in your inbox.

And here are just some of the things that we've added in the last few months:

- Free POP access: Take your messages with you. Download them, read them offline, access them using Outlook, your Blackberry or any other device that supports POP

- Gmail Notifier: Get new mail notifications and see the messages and their senders without having to open a browser

- Better contacts management: Import your contacts from Yahoo! Mail, Hotmail, Outlook, and others to Gmail in just a few clicks. Add phone numbers, notes and more. Even use search to keep better track of it all.

We also wanted to thank you. For showing us your support and for being so patient. And to those who have already signed up for Gmail, thank you for giving it a try and for helping us make it better. Our users are what have made this product great. So whether you're just signing up for your account or you've been with us since the beginning, keep letting us know how we can build you the best email service around.

That's it for now. We hope you like Gmail and will share it with your friends. We've got lots of cool new stuff planned and we can't wait for you to see our work in your Gmail accounts! Stay tuned...

Thanks,
The Gmail Team

Uh oh Goggle already knows!! Re:the googlenet

[Anonymous Coward]

Fast-forward to the year 2009. The year Google punctured my Adam's apple.

Re: GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachmen

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh man, shut the fuck up with your gmail-love spam, it's fucking webmail, it's nothing that great, gmail is just another corporation that snoops in everyones emails they control, google is EVIL!

Re: GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachmen

[Anonymous Coward]

amen brother..

Re: GMail Coolness: Downloading Multiple Attachmen

[Anonymous Coward]

Your enthusiam makes me want to reach through my dsl and strangle your dumb, spamming ass.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[jonadab]

> Where I've worked, people leave the entire thread at the bottom of an email
> in case you later CC someone so that they can know what you're talking about.

You work with people who don't want to bother to think about what is relevent
and what is not. Under no circumstances is keeping a lengthy thread around
necessary just for someone to know what you're talking about, and even if
someone later does really need to see the whole conversation, that's what
archives are for.

> On usenet, on the other hand, interlacing threads works well because you
> can always check previous articles in the thread.

That used to be the case, but these days too many people are using online
readers, so that as soon as something expires off the server they cannot
easily go back and read it -- and with Google groups' interface rapidly
going into the privy of late, they may not be able to find it at all.
With email, though, unless you've got some kind of draconian storage limit
from hell as corporate policy, somebody's always going to have the whole
thread around and can dig it up and pass it along, if need be -- normally,
however, a three-sentence synopsis is a better to bring someone new into a
conversation in the middle, especially in this decadent era of twelve-second
attention spans when the probability of a coworker reading the entire thread
you send them is next to nil anyhow.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Maestro4k]

Normal/short individual replies (read: most e-mail) top post. The person who sent you the e-mail wrote the letter; don't you think he knows what he wrote already?

• OK, first of all, most E-mail for you perhaps, but most of my E-mails are quite a bit longer. Perhaps my friends and I are more long-winded than you and your friends, but this is a really bad assumption to make.

• And frankly we don't all have photographic memories. I'm pretty good at remembering what I wrote mostly, but I want the quoting there so I can refer to what I had said if I forget. I get very few E-mails where I don't find this useful at least once, and often more than once. E-mail's not instant messaging or IRC, there is a time delay before you receive a reply so it's easy to forget things.

An additional benefit of this style is it allows you to quote the entire original if necessary without forcing your reply to the next screenful.

• Why the hell would you quote the entire original and do a single lump reply? Interleaving makes a hell of a lot more sense, it's the same way conversation flows naturally. You reply to each part and leave a quoted section that's pertinent so the sender can recall what they wrote. You delete all that's unnecessary so that the message isn't cluttered up.

Most of the people I see supporting bottom posting are people who participate on mailing lists and USENET and assume that everybody does, too.

• Well frankly people supporting both top and bottom posting are annoying. Give me a normal conversational interleaving or just don't bother to respond. Of the people I correspond with regularly almost none top or bottom post, nearly all use interleaving. I've been writing and receiving E-mail interleaved since I first used E-mail back in 1992 so this isn't something new.

• At least it's not as annoying as HTML E-mail. I don't want pictures and fancy formatting, plain text does just fine and renders good in all E-mail clients. Microsoft should be shot for the mangling that Outlook and Outlook Express give to E-mail in the name of prettying it up. Frankly sometimes I simply can't read it in my normal clients (Gmail, The Bat!, Pine) and I just assume it's not important and trash it.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[m50d]

For goodness sakes, here on slashdot you can actually do a reasonable approximation of how that would work on usenet, post the "original" and reply separately. And yet you don't, because you know if you did it would be completely obvious that top-posting is superior. What you have posted is a nonsense, because usenet or indeed email messages are separate messages. There is a separate message for the post and reply.

Odd

[torstenvl]

Apparently it's only offered to the U.S. public. I've tried both http://www.google.fr/ and http://www.google.com/ (which detects my country as France anyway), and I am not getting any offers. Perhaps it chooses IPs randomly? Not that it matters, as I already have a GMail account. Or perhaps Google just do not like the French.

Be sure to first read their Indemnification clause

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the Indemnification clause in their terms of service and decide whether you want to take on the risk of indemnifying them and their expensive lawyers "against any third party claim arising from or in any way related to your use of the Service" (whether you did anything wrong or not, as I interprete it).

While you're at it, read Slashdot's and those of most of the other corporate web sites that you use.

Gmail forwarding bug FIXED!

[FreeUser]

Not a bad idea. I was about to do that, when I decided to try disabling it once again, and ...

IT WORKED!

The folks at Google have thankfully fixed this bug

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

That's a straw man, and you know it. Never top-post when there's more than one reply below you (or two in extenuating circumstances, but then you may want to refactor the original). Never top-post when there's multiple people involved.

If you really want to quote all that, I think the best form would be:

YES!!!
--
> Is it really that irritating?
>>>>> What is the worst faux pas to commit in email?
>>>> Top posting; it's absolute email heresy.
>>> Why? Outlook and so many other clients default to that.
>> It reverses the flow of conversation and makes relating
>> reponses to their originating comments difficult.

or:
> Is it really that irritating?
YES!!!
--
>>>>> What is the worst...etc.

Bottom-posting several past e-mails is as stupid as top-posting the same. If you really need that much history, look in archives. For most responses the size of this example, top-post concisely while quoting the most recent message, or interleave if it's can't be done concisely.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[kwoff]

You work with people who don't want to bother to think about what is relevent and what is not.

I work with a variety of people who think in different ways and use different means of communication.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Catiline]

That's a straw man, and you know it.

Bottom-posting several past e-mails is as stupid as top-posting the same. If you really need that much history, look in archives.

First off, since I explicitly stated it was a joke I thought that I wouldn't be rebuffed. Do I need to buy you a Frink Faultless Sarcasm Detector?

To reply to your "argument" -- I don't see a straw man. The only "argument" made is that "top posting reverses the flow of the conversation" -- something I'm sure you won't argue with. Granted, this isn't important for much more than archival purposes, but it is important. I will agree that including more than (about) two emails in the past history is unnessary. I don't normally do that -- but because the joke requires so many question / reply pairs, that rule had to be broken.

Re:Google: Fix the top post reply method

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

First off, since I explicitly stated it was a joke I thought that I wouldn't be rebuffed.

Yes, but the point of that joke (not necessarily by you, but by whoever wrote it originally) was to disparage top-posting by making it look absurd - which it normally isn't.