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Yahoo! Mail Superior to Gmail ?
ynotme writes "In his column, Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal writes that the new Yahoo! Mail beta provides a superior webmail experience to Gmail. Some quotes: 'The new Yahoo Mail is far superior to Gmail. Yahoo more closely matches the desktop experience most serious email users have come to expect ... Gmail has none of these new, fluid, desktop-like features ... Google's engineers have decreed that familiar email practices are no longer useful, and have substituted approaches they prefer, arrogantly denying users any choice.'"
While it seems a lot of advanced users on Slashdot seem to love being derived of features by our Google overlords (more in response to Google Talk than GMail), the plethora of features in Eudora were the most appealing reasons I still use it and I'm glad WSJ is recognizing Yahoo for its new interface and features.
Whenever I checked my mail remotely in the past with either Yahoo or GMail, I would always reminisce about how fluid the process was at home with Eudora. Scanning email by opening new pages for every email with old web interfaces was quite frustrating, even with GMails quicker load times. The new web interface on Yahoo is actually making me consider finally leaving Eudora.
So, I for one am glad to see Yahoo head in the direction of both panes and continuing to focus on adding useful features (and unlike some products, doing it without ads or clutter). Improving the initial load time would probably be enough to get me to make the transition.
The new yahoo mail has drag and drop.
TAKE THAT GOOGLE
Does Yahoo mail let you use an interface like gmails? Or do they 'arrogantly' deny us that choice?
If I remember correctly Gmail came out almost 2 years ago. What would be more surprising is if Yahoo mail did not have a better engineered GUI. In 6 months or less Gmail will be better than Yahoo and the cycle will begin again.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
but no one else delivered.
* A nice user interface that is very responsive.
* Web-based.
* Auto-complete/tab-completion of email addresses.
* Ability to search my email.
* Advanced sorting and rules. I can place my mail subscriptions into different labels and archive them for later.
* Reliability. Gmail is much more reliable than previous hosts. My mail is delivered and I receive my mail.
* Group email threads together.
* Mail filters.
* vi-like keyboard shortcuts.
Does Yahoo mail have or plan to implement free secure POP access like gmail has?
-- Knowledge shared is power lost. -- Aleister Crowley
Log in to your Yahoo! Mail account and click What's New. From there you can sign up for the Beta, and they'll eventually upgrade your client. It's a random beta.
...arrogantly denying users any choice.
Well they have the choice to use a different bloody email service for one.
C17H21NO4
The author makes the accusation that google are 'arrogant' by throwing away common email metaphors, and one of them is the common 'folders' practise that just about every mail system except google uses.
However, I think Google's way of doing things is FAR better. Folders is great, it allows you to file your mail away in a flat or hierarchial organisation. however, it DOESNT easily let you file a mail in TWO locations, unless you make a copy of the mail, and that in itself is really awkward.
Applying labels, or some kind of keyword system, or however you want to call it, is in fact a far more natural and flexible way of doings things, and I fully intend to apply that idea to a few other projects I'm working on, where 'file away into nested folders' was the original way of doing things.
So... perhaps Google needs to play a little catchup, but Google's idea of 'labels' instead of 'folders' I think is far superior.
The author of the article, with his accusations of Google's "arrogance", is really letting his "must put google down at all costs, because it's the cool thing to do" attitude really show.
You've obviously never gotten an e-mail from your mistress....
1984 was supposed to be a warning, not an instruction manual.
I am troubled by the title of the post: Yahoo! Mail Superior to Gmail ?
I know 90% of people here dislike microsoft more than google. There is also an obvious bias against all-thing-not-google (which includes Yahoo!). But do we need to be biased even when we are submitting a story?
"Yahoo! Mail reported Superior to Gmail" seems more balanced.....does anyone else agree?
The only thing is, since I started trying to integrate myself back to my original look, I keep getting one that's real close, but something's just not fundamentally exactly right about it...
Did you remember to add a constant?
Based on his comments in the article, he just seems pissy because GMail works differently than the mail client he is used to, and he isn't given an option of working the way he wants.
One clear indication of this is: he complains about having labels rather than folders. Labels are essentially the same thing as folders, except labels allow you to put the message in several labels/folders. The only difference is how they are stored in the filesystem, which is irrelevant in a webmail environment. If they put folder icons on his labels, I bet he would love it.
He also complains about the "Conversation" view of e-mails (threaded view). I like the conversation view. But, I can see his point that it should be an option (even though I still think threaded/conversation view is a better way to use e-mail, because it allows for better context).
He complains about the ads in GMail, which cannot be turned off. Okay.. I guess that's a point. If it used large distracting banner ads, like Yahoo! Mail, I would want to turn them off too. But, the small text ads in GMail blend in and don't distract at all.
There is certainly room for improvement in GMail. But, Mr. Mossberg is a bit harsh when ranting about Google's arrogance for deciding they have a better way to do e-mail..
I often wonder if I'm the only person in the world who likes to delete things that have no value whatsoever.
Yes, if I need to migrate my mail or back it up for some reason, do I want to have to worry about whether I 've gotten all of the 1,800 emails, most of which are junk? Or do I want to rest assured knowing that yes, there's those 200 emails that are really worth saving, and sigh it's so much easier to know I've backed them up safely.
Really, the only good reasons to use gmail is the 2.5GB of space and [like any webmail] you can check it from anywhere. But there's one more excellent reason - pop3. With gmail, you don't have to stop using Eudora. You can use gmail's decent interface when you're not at your computer, and otherwise use the same email client that you love.
:). NZ doesn't support pop3 for free members anymore, so I had to find something else. I had heard about gmail a while before, but who really cares about searching through your mail? Besides, if I needed to, I could do that in OE. But when I was looking at the site, I realized they had free pop3. HOLY DAMN.
That's the only reason I made a gmail account. I wanted to keep using (don't throw things at me... please) Outlook Express. I used to have a NetZero account ONLY because of the free pop3 email access, screw getting online with it
I hate web interfaces. I'm on dialup. I don't want pictures and an interface to have to download every time I check my mail - I just want the mail. Thus... gmail via pop3. It's worked marvelously for me so far.
Don't forget the sub-address support.
:)
I sign up to almost all online things with
example for my slashdotaccount
carl0ski+slashdot@gmail.com
a + symbol and any string can be added between you gmail account name and the at symbol.
They are vaild addresses an delivered to you.
In my case i use them for security purposes, suspect sites i use carl0ski+spam
as my address.
then filter it straight to trash
Archiving the message certainly sweeps it out of view, but it's the digital equivalent of throwing a rug over garbage in a corner of your room. Sure, you cant see it, but it will eventually stink up the whole joint if you don't toss it out for good.
Being that one of Gmail's most touted features is its powerful search mechanism, it should be obvious that the less useless data that exists in the search database, more relevant your search results are going to be.
Why in the hell do you want to keep messages that you KNOW you never want to see again? It makes absolutely no sense, and is one of the stupidest Gmail advocacy points I've ever heard.
You know, I don't think Gmail really needs to offer the kind of options our author spoke about -- individual messaging, folder options, etc. Those are the very things I was trying to get away from when I switched. If I wanted a desktop e-mail program, I would use Thunderbird or Kmail. I wouldn't go looking to Yahoo!. But that's just me. About the invitations, they're really not that hard to get. Everytime I give away an invite, I get another to replace it -- and I'm not the only one. Hell, go into almost any chat room, find a gmail user, and just ask them at random for an invite. I'm sure they wouldn't mind. Google just did it to spark interest. People always want what they can't have.