1GB free email from Google (Gmail)

Karoma

Originally posted by ChipZilla
They haven't even had an IPO yet, so they're still a private company. And if you look at the links in my previous post their previous spoofs were not all "just changing (pronunciation of) words,etc ". They've got a sense of humour. It's just that some people reading this stuff don't...:rolleyes:

bah. let it go.. i was leading up to something. but it's all fallen flat


ah well:)

dsab

It`s still going around today, even in more serious papers...and it is already the second. Google sharply denied, that it was an April Folls Joke...

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/apr2004/tc2004041_5024_tc120.htm

Rabies

Looks like I could have been wrong
Maybe it is true

Link

Hoping to turn a profit from Gmail, Google has programmed its computers to dissect the topics being discussed in the e-mails and then deliver text-based ads related to the subjects. For instance, an e-mail from one friend to another discussing an upcoming concert might prompt Google to include a link from a ticketing agency.

Google had an April fools joke but it wasn't the email one.

Link

Google is interviewing candidates for engineering positions at our lunar hosting and research center, opening late in the spring of 2007.

dod

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3591589.stm

Timing makes Google an April Fool

The first rule of public relations: check the calendar before your big product launch.
Google, one of the savviest firms on the internet, has learnt this lesson the hard way after announcing it was taking a leap into the e-mail market.

Thanks to the date on its press release - 1 April - most of its target market was convinced the launch was a hoax.

Despite the firm's reassurances, online message boards have been full of speculation about Google's Gmail.

"It's going to go down in history as one of the biggest pranks ever pulled," wrote one visitor to Slashdot.org, a major talking shop for tech workers.

No kidding

Google's insistence that Gmail was genuine was undermined by the oddly jokey style of its initial announcement.

A Google user, the release said, "kvetched like crazy" about existing web e-mail programs.

"Millions of M&Ms later, Gmail was born."

The company has a reputation for unconventional humour, and did publish a genuine April Fool's joke - a fake advertisement for engineers to work on the moon.

"It is April Fool's Day. We were having fun with this announcement," said Jonathan Rosenberg, Google's vice-president of products.

"We are very serious about Gmail."

chakotha

I reackon they're serious and fair f**ks. Email is going at a rate of knots. I thought the powers that be would soon invent another mail protocol altogether and charge like pay-as-yu-go or something but Google are onto it.

On the page http://gmail.google.com/ it says

No pop-up ads. No banners.
You see only relevant text ads and links to related web pages of interest.

so they might create another Adwords/Adsense thing there and use the advertising revenue to pay for the hosting. They will have a bit of time to build up funds before they have to pay for acres devoted to 1Gb per user using it mail storage and they might restrict messages to 1Mb or something.

Dunno how they'll stop all the spam though.

sceptre

I'd assumed it was a prank as well.

Some more more denials of prankdom.

Where do I send that application for the moon job?

gs39t

http://gmail.google.com/gmail/help/terms_of_use.html

At the very end there's something that says "V033104" which is obviously the date it was released. Seems to be legit

smoke.me.a.kipper

now it says happy birthday april on the site.

Rabies

Originally posted by smoke-me-a-kipper
now it says happy birthday april on the site.

link

halkar

Who is April ? who is Paul? multi million - billion $$$ company and Paul and April , linked from the main page of gmail.google.com. Maybe it should have read Happy April fools Day

Ok, Not sure about 1000mb claim but a little whois reveals that gmail.com is registered to Google so there is probably something in the pipelines.

Stark

Maybe GMail won't allow you to store attachments?

Silent Bob

If it is for real the privacy implications are huge. Firstly they can hang on to your mail for bloody ages (the policy mentions it not being deleted if you close your account) and you have to accept that the mail is read by Google. Secondly they use cookies to track every search you make, the Google cookie lasts till 2039 or something crazy like that. Thirdly, if you use Orkut they have a load more information about you.

Put these all together and you have a marketing persons dream.

dod

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3602745.stm

Google's Gmail sparks privacy row
Internet search engine Google's plans for a free email service have come under fire from privacy campaigners.

Google is devising Gmail as a rival to Microsoft's Hotmail and to Yahoo!

Privacy campaigners have objected to plans to send users adverts linked to the content of messages, and to the permanent storage of email.

Campaign group Privacy International has filed a complaint with the UK Information Commissioner, Reuters news agency reported.

The Information Commissioner's job is to make sure organisations comply with a web of laws safeguarding privacy and freedom of information.

Online snooping?

Privacy International objects to Google's plans to send users links to advertising based on a computer scan of their correspondence, and presumed interests.

At present, users of Google's internet search engine receive advertisements for commercial sites linked to their search topic arranged down the right-hand side of their screens.

Gmail would use similar technology to scan emails and offer advertisements.

Google says the content of users' email would remain private because the process would be fully automated.

"No humans read your emails to target the ads," Google's web site says.

But Simon Davies, director of Privacy International has called the proposed system "a vast violation of European law".

Too much of a good thing?

Gmail's proposed message storage systems are also angering privacy campaigners.

Google has promoted free storage for each user of the equivalent of 500,000 pages of email among Gmail's benefits.

Google says this will enable users to retrieve vast amounts of old emails, and that it will back this up with superior spam filtering.

However, its terms of use acknowledge that "residual copies of email may remain on our systems, even after you have deleted them from your mailbox or after the termination of your account".

"If a person deletes an email, he should be confident that email is actually deleted," Bits of Freedom founder Maurice Westerling said.

Google has a commanding lead in the global internet search engine market, although its market share has shrunk sharply during the past month after Yahoo stopped using Google technology to power its searches.

Google is privately-owned, but expected to float on the stock market later this year, a deal that could value Google at up to $25bn (£14.7bn) - slightly more than listed online retailer Amazon.

The California-based company was founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

Tenshot

Google have an option on their GMail page to sign-up for notification of developments as the service gets ready for launch. If anyone is planning on doing this, you might want to read this article first:

http://www.google-watch.org/email.html

Essentially, Google keep a cookie associated with your PC which means they have a permanent record of everything you've searched for (unless you block cookies from Google). Once you sign up for GMail notification - which is a page on the same site, so gets the same cookie - then Google can associate your email address with all the searches you've been doing; this is a marketing person's wet dream.

(I should point out that Google's Gmail notification page explicitly states they won't do this, and I'm sure they're sincere - at least as long as Google isn't taken over or bought out by someone less scrupulous.)

Note that you can easily block Cookies from Google.com in IE if you choose: just go to Tools / Internet Options / Privacy / Edit and add a Block for Google.com.

Paulw

Interesting offer, but I certainly want any mails I delete, deleted !! I don't fancy someone/something snooping through my mails.

It just feels wrong.

vorbis

I'd imagine the delete comment is taken out of context. It probably relates to how the data on the server is managed. I.e. messages are tagged for deletion and are erased all at once every week or something. Think about it rationally. there will probably be millions of users. What benefit would accrue from storing user deleted emails?

PowerHouseDan

its a limit of 10mb per email sent for attachment:) just got spon a account today

flogen

It had to be done...

Flogen

Spunog UIE

hardly old OLD, 2 months :S

likes the sig

flogen

ah maybe your right.... 2 months aint too bad... I do apologise :D
I guess I got a little card-happy.....

Flogen

aphex™

Originally posted by flogen
ah maybe your right.... 2 months aint too bad... I do apologise :D
I guess I got a little card-happy.....

You realise how cool you look with those cards?
You must have been one of the most popular kids in school, a pillar holding up the general student body, as every day you stood in the middle of the playground, with the latest and greatest "Magic the Gathering", "Star Trek" or "Alf" pogs (whatever you brought to school, the kids ran out and bought, just so they play against YOU) with countless suck-ups trying to cheer you on, and get your attention, as you cleverly outwitted your opponents every move, with the telling grin on one side of your face, a cigarette on the other, and the prom queen at your side.

Yeah, *cough right.

Sorry, i really hate those stupid cards you have.

flogen

thats really great aphex, thanks for that.

And whats wrong with Alf, or Pogs? Or Alf Pogs?

get a sense of humour btw, theyre not the real Magic The Gathering cards, and even if they were, so what? You dont like them, dont buy them, like me

Flogen

aphex™

Originally posted by flogen
And whats wrong with Alf, or Pogs? Or Alf Pogs?

They were all sent back to the planet Melmak, which then promptly exploded. Although some pogs lived on in packets of "Wots-its" and "Skips" for a time, but they gradually fizzled out.

Oh and Just to keep things on topic:

*************************************
Gmail invite needed. Willing to trade simpsons pogs or prayers

thanks
*************************************

Blisterman

Since most email is mass email, maybe they've developed a way to just keep one of the message, so it wouldn't really be anywhere near 1gb.
Also they may have an email size limit.