Lost Gmail Emails and the Future of Web Apps

brajesh writes "Recently some people lost all their Gmail emails and contacts. The problem seems to be contained and fixed, but this incident shows how far are we in terms of moving all communication online on services like Gmail for your domain(beta). Will it ever be possible to do away with desktop solutions like Outlook and Thunderbird? Given the nature of the internet, will it ever be possible to truly move to an 'online desktop'?"

Comments

Simple answer: YES.

[dada21]

I use Gmail for Domains and love it -- we've even been moving customers over to it and they love it.

I still use a POP3 e-mail app to download e-mails for archival purposes or to better format them for printing. I also use POP3 to get my e-mails to my cell phone/PDA (HPC Trinity P3600, best product ever) and it works fine.

I am ready to move to a virtual online desktop TODAY. Anything I need to backup I will -- everything else I'd rather pay someone else to host for me. While graphics design and high-data jobs require me to work locally, almost everything else works just fine remotely. I can see Wordpress evolving to the point that it could compete with Word locally, and I already use Google Spreadsheet for all my spreadsheet work (I've actually removed my office suite entirely as of last week).

As long as it works over my T-Mobile EDGE connection (bigger than a thin client), it is fine with me. Those days are quickly coming that I won't care what OS I am running as long as my browser is compatible with my online desktop.

Re:This is not about 'potential'...

[motek]

...whatever you mean by that. This is about control over my stuff. Or rather perception of control. I am a control freak. Almost. And I am not alone. I had an issue with using software like Outlook in the first place (file format and such) because I may lose access to my archive. Now someone is trying to convince me to give up yet more control. Thanks, but no, thanks. My willingness to trade this control for release from my responsibilities (for taking care of my stuff) only goes that far.

I hope and expect the on-line desktop to be as successful as Java-station (or whatever it was called).

-m-

You can still do your own backups.

[Kadin2048]

The nice thing about GMail is that having your email on the server, and having it on your desktop, are not mutually exclusive. It's trivial, if you know what you're doing, to set up your GMail account so that it's always backed up to a local machine. There are even step by step instructions for doing it. You just set up a POP connection and suck down your entire mailfile, and then set up your local mailreader to download the new ones periodically.

Google rightly doesn't make any QoS promises, because it's giving you a free service. However, it's a pretty good bang for the (lack of) buck; and it doesn't preclude you from doing things to protect your data on your end. Until Google came along, I don't think most free webmail services let you have this level of desktop/web-service cooperation. (Though I think Yahoo's mail does POP access now. Not sure about Hotmail.)