I've been using free mail service since about 1993, starting with Yahoo!'s mail service, shortly after it became free. Since then I've also signed up for nearly every other major free mail service as well, including Hotmail, Gmail, and AIM, as well as the semi-subscription based .Mac mail service. Part of the reason that I signed up for them was to hang on to the asmetana account name, which I guess I claim as my own. The funny thing is that my brother's name is Andrew and it turns out that asmetana would often times have been his first choice but I got it first so it was an accidental bit of comedy.
When I worked at the University of Nevada, I had a project where I researched the possibility of running student mail through a hosted service. At the time, only Microsoft (with their live@edu, a variant on the Hotmail service) and Gmail were the only ones available as a no-cost option. I looked closely at features and performance and determined that between those, for the academic setting, Microsoft's offering had some very worthwhile advantages, such as blogs and photos integrated, along with hooks to Active Directory for simplified account management. Gmail was more attractive to many of the academics just because it wasn't Microsoft (many academics think Microsoft is the true evil empire). I had reservations about both because neither had an interface as elegant or rich as Yahoo!'s but Yahoo! wasn't in the business of free hosted mail for a college or university. Of course, at the time, neither had IMAP connectivity for a fat mail client (such as Outlook, Outlook Express, or Mail or Entourage). It really came down to being a judgment call but if you were using Microsoft's Active Directory, their solution, while still a little buggy, would be easier to maintain and had more accessible features.
As time has gone on and I continue to look at each of them critically, I become more enamored with Gmail. Gmail recently added IMAP functionality, the spam filtering is the best of all the free services I have used, you can use your Gmail account to receive and send mail from other accounts, and the quotas are growing daily (mine is now at more than 6 GB!). I just configured my freshly hacked iPod Touch to access my Gmail account via IMAP and there's a nice little application for my BlackBerry to access a mobile version of Gmail that works great. There's a large community behind Gmail and its related features so it is quickly becoming a favorite.
I am still not in love with the whole idea of the labels but since Gmail added IMAP access, I don't need to login to the Gmail web interface very often so I don't have to worry about it. The IMAP implementation leaves much to be desired technically but as far as most people are concerned, it works just fine.
Speaking of IMAP and fat clients for mail, if you're using Eudora, STOP IT! Until it's adopted and integrated with Mozilla's Thunderbird, it's a dinosaur. I don't really understand why but in academia it's still wildly popular, even to pay for it (and this is the land of people trying to violate licensing agreements)! I asked one professor how attached he was to Eudora and he said, in all seriousness, more than he was to his own children.
So, where does that leave us? It really depends on your priorities. If you're looking for a hosted business solution, Yahoo! has the richest web interface as far as I'm concerned but its spam filtering is very weak compared to the others. Hotmail has a nice web interface but like most things Microsoft, only when viewed through Internet Explorer 6 or higher. Their spam filtering might be slightly poorer than Yahoo!'s based on my personal experience. Hotmail's advantage is the nice integration of additional features and services, such as the blog, web pages, and photo hosting, although I think I'm probably one of about 12 people who know about it due to poor marketing. Gmail has the least attractive web interface as far as I'm concerned and even after 3 or more years I still don't like the label system but again, if you're using a fat client, who cares? They also have lots of other services tied in but it's not as obvious how to use them but they will improve their accessibility. For me, it's Gmail. I've even started routing my personal e-mail domains and my other free services to it. I only want one mail box, and Gmail has it.
P.S. I mentioned AIM in the title but haven't mentioned it until now. It's actually a really nice service with good spam filtering and secure IMAP access. If you're looking for a nice unlimited quota and traditional, standards based IMAP access (their web client is average), AIM is also worth a look. There's not much status in the domain name and there's a part of me that wonders when AIM free services will dissolve or charge for them as well. Gmail/Google seems to be more solid financially using the current business model, at least for now.
P.P.S. About.com has a write-up about the various mail services and mail programs.
No comments:
Post a Comment