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GMail is Google’s web based e-mail service. One of Google's co-founders, Sergei Brin has been quoted as saying that “It started as an experiment to see if our search could be used on e-mail,�(Gillmor, S., 2004). Launched on the 1st of April 2004, it was originally thought to be an April’s fool joke because of the 1 gigabyte sized accounts that it offered to users, which was unheard of at the time. This sparked off an email war, with Yahoo subsequently increasing its mailbox size from 4 megabytes to 100 megabytes.
Because GMail is still in the beta phase, it is not available to the general public until yet, however Google plans to expand the service to the general public by year end(Keefe, B., 2004). At this point in time, users have to be invited in order to acquire the accounts, and during its initial release, invitations were auctioned off on sites like EBay for up to $150USD(Telecomworldwire, 2004). At present, the invitations are still for sale, albeit at much lower prices, averaging about $1USD. All this has gone on despite Google’s efforts to stop the sale of GMail invitations. There are sites, such as Gmailswap.com, that have been set up to connect people that are “nice� and have GMail to those who don’t have GMail. Gmail4Troops has also been set up so that people can donate their GMail invitations to troops that are serving Iraq.
With GMail, Google has adopted the approach of “Search, Not Sort�, which entails encouraging users to search through emails rather than putting them into folders. The service therefore does not come with folders per say, choosing to allow users to label emails rather than sort them out. GMail is powered by Google’s search engine technology, which enables users to quickly search through their emails.
What makes GMail different from other web mail clients, apart from the huge storage is that it operates like a desktop based email client. This can be seen when navigating through the interface; the speed at which the screen refreshes is almost instantaneous. This is attributed to the JavaScript used to code the interface, and the used of a text based navigation system, which uses words where many other companies have used icons like the mail button or trash can. Another feature which makes GMail like a desktop mail client is the use of keyboard shortcuts, which can be turned on or off to the user’s preference(Tynan D., 2004).
GMail makes use of a conversation view when presenting email correspondences. This means that instead of having emails scattered about, emails sent between two parties will be stored like they were “conversations�. This makes checking back on emails much less complicated(Bass, S., 2004).
Address completion is another useful feature in GMail. This allows users to enter just one alphabet, upon which a list of names of people with whom emails have been exchanged, or email addresses from the address book will appear. This makes the entering of addresses much quicker.
GMail also provides all the other standards that come with other web mail service providers, such as the address book, spam filter, and virus filtering. It should be noted that the virus filtering does not allow executable files to be sent through GMail.
Ads in GMail appear in the form of small text boxes in a corner of the page, like in the Google Site. The ads are contextual, and to achieve this, all emails have to be scanned by Google's AdSense software, which has some privacy activists concerned.
Recently applications have also been made available that notify users when new email arrives. They all work in a similar fashion, hiding in the system tray, displaying notices to alert users when email arrives. One such application is the Gmail Notifier, created by Google, and another is GTray, which is a personal project. There are also versions for other operating systems, such as the GNOME GTray for Linux.
A desktop application called GmailerXP that allows users to check use GMail independent of their web browser is already under development at Sourceforge.net.
People who want to import email from their desktop mail client to GMail can do so using the Google GMail Loader, which forwards all mails from an email client like Outlook Express or Firebird to a designated GMail account. Conversely, users who want to read mails from their GMail account on an email client on the desktop can download software like PopGoesTheGmail, which extracts HTML emails and sends them to a POP3 server.
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Gillmor, S. (2004, April 23) “Google's Brin Talks on GMail Future�, eWeek, Enterprise News and Reviews retrieved September 10, 2004 from eWeek
Keefe, B. (2004) “Google launches test of e-mail� The Atlanta Journal - Constitution, 2 April, pg. E.1
Telecomworldwire (2004), “Google invites users to test its Gmail service� Telecomworldwire, 21 May, 2004. pg. 1
Hiawatha Bray Globe Staff (2004) “GMAIL CONTROVERSY HIGHLIGHTS NET PRIVACY ISSUE� Boston Globe, 26 April, 2004. pg. C.1
Tynnan, D. (2004) "Google Gmail Beta" CNET retrieved: 10 September, 2004, from: Cnet
Bass, S. (2004) "Test Drive Of Google's Gmail" PCWorld Home Office retrieved: 10 September, 2004, from: PCWorld
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Sherwin Huang 11:42, 27 Oct 2004 (EST)
