Gmail vs. Hotmail

[Dissipate]

Those who have had the pleasure of using Gmail will probably agree that it is 10x better than Hotmail. What I'm wondering is what Microsoft is going to do to keep millions of users from switching?

Comments?

 

[vshah]

a lot of the people who use hotmail as their primary account will be too lazy to switch.

-Vivan

 

[JimRaynor]

probably add even more storage space for starters... 250mb is ok but 1gb is a lot better.

 

[lokiju]

Well for starters they are in the process of increasing the mail box sizes, and for those that pay the $19 per year to have the upgraded account, they will be getting 2GB worth of storage for no additional charge.

 

[Dissipate]

Originally posted by: vshah
a lot of the people who use hotmail as their primary account will be too lazy to switch.

-Vivan

Yeah, some might, but let's see here, 2 MB of space vs. 1 GB. Let's do the math. Not to mention all the other features that gmail has that hotmail doesn't.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

They will start offering more space (they already have). It will be like MHZ wars... GMAILs 1GB is its selling point, but the lack of spam and responsive servers are what really makes it > hotmail. MS will have to address those issues too if they want to keep users.

 

[Aharami]

Originally posted by: vshah
a lot of the people who use hotmail as their primary account will be too lazy to switch.

-Vivan

ive already made the switch. all it took was one massive email sent oout to all the poeple on my guestlist notifying them that my gmail acct is my primary acct. i still check my hotmail acct every now and then for the newsletters

 

[HardcoreRobot]

Originally posted by: vshah
a lot of the people who use hotmail as their primary account will be too lazy to switch.

-Vivan

This is a really good point. I had to beat my woman to get her to switch for this reason, but of course she loves me for it now.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Most Hotmail users will still probably keep their accounts for things like MSN Messenger.

 

[Dissipate]

Originally posted by: HardcoreRobot
They will start offering more space (they already have). It will be like MHZ wars... GMAILs 1GB is its selling point, but the lack of spam and responsive servers are what really makes it > hotmail. MS will have to address those issues too if they want to keep users.

Exactly. Gmail actually has a feature where you can report spam. So its like one big spam fighting network.

 

[RussianSoldier]

Hotmail, as well as yahoo are increasing storage space, and offering more benefits... but I'll still switch when g-mail goes full.

 

[cain]

my hotmail account just gets junks. so no big loss for me. and yes gmail is the sh1t, but it needs IMAP or POP support.

 

[Gurck]

My primary hotmail account has 25mb now, my secondary is still at 2 though. They don't have to do anything as far as I'm concerned, and it's not because I'm lazy. I won't use gmail because I don't need the space, because my hotmail address is established (been using it for nearly a decade now) and because gmail is such a hit with the little kiddies (ie. remember all the "OMGZORZ U NED TEH GMALE ITZ DA B3ST" and "NE1 PLZZZZZ PLZZZZZ HAV FRE GMALE INVYTE 4 ME??/?/?/?/???" posts?) - I hate children & avoid them and things that appeal to them at all costs.

Most Hotmail users will still probably keep their accounts for things like MSN Messenger

I don't use it

And as far as spam, if I get more than 2-3 in a month it's a bad month.

 

[3chordcharlie]

All the spam has stopped coming to my hotmail account in the last 3 weeks; MS must have improved some things. I'll be pretty satisfied with 250mb anyway.

I have a gmail account but haven't really used it yet. I don't even have enough messages in it to use all the sorting features!

 

[Abhi]

I ll keep my hotmail alive for Messenger and Outlook integration...

And do all the "work" from gmail

 

[Kelemvor]

I don't use GMail because I don't have any way of knowing if I have a message waiting. I use the Yahoo Companion toolbar in IE which tells me if I have mail wiating there. If there's some add-in to IE that will show me when I have a mail waiting, then I might use it more. But I won't install a whole nother bar...

 

[Scouzer]

I won't be switching to Gmail. I don't need a single megabyte of email storage, so I really couldn't care less.

 

[Confused]

Originally posted by: FrankyJunior
I don't use GMail because I don't have any way of knowing if I have a message waiting. I use the Yahoo Companion toolbar in IE which tells me if I have mail wiating there. If there's some add-in to IE that will show me when I have a mail waiting, then I might use it more. But I won't install a whole nother bar...

Firefox has an extension that tells you when you've got email

 

[So]

Gmail has the only web based e-mail interface that I've ever been able to tolerate for day to day e-mail.

 

[User1001]

Just curious how does yahoo, google, and ms make money off their free services (or enough to keep going).

 

[HardcoreRobot]

Originally posted by: User1001
Just curious how does yahoo, google, and ms make money off their free services (or enough to keep going).

ads

 

[Lenine]

Well I have g-mail, but I agree with most of the sentiments in this thread. Most users don't need 1 gb of email storate and if they already had a hotmail account it would be a waste of time to tell everyone the new mail, e.t.c.

 

There is no way Microsoft can do anything short of:

1) Dumping 75% of their interface.
2) Removing all the flashy ads.
3) Killing the 10:1 spam to genuine email ratio.
4) Removing all the crappy, slow Javascript and steal how gmail uses JS.
5) Get rid of all the MSN whoring.
6) Make it work right on other browsers (fsck IE).
7) Offer at least 1GB of storage (not including spam).
8) Stop whoring Hotmail plus. Why pay for that crappy Hotmail when gmail is free?
9) Make it less klunky and slow. Gmail is amazingly fast.
10) Aw, screw it. Lame-ass Dell owners will continue to use it. What's the point?

 

[SuperTool]

I like Yahoo mail, and I am not switching to Gmail, even though I have an account.
Yahoo does a great job filtering spam. It integrates with my yahoo webpage, where I can have stocks, news, maps, weather, bookmarks, everything on one page.
It's 100MB free, which is plenty. It's not like you can use that 1 GB to send massive files, since gmail has 10mb message limit.

 

[TJN23]

20$ a year for yahoo mail gets you 2 gigs...not bad for a great email system with excellent spam filtering...

gmail is an easier, faster, and more powerful system though if you ask me