Category: Web/Tech

Gmail, Archiving, and Spam (aka UCE)

Despite having long thought web mail a necessary evil, I am beginning to enjoy using Gmail, the recently introduced web mail application from Google. Although I am not interested in it for my “personal” email, I have been routing most of my email discussions lists there. It is nice to know that I can search for information that I once read via email, rather than having to use the limited search facilities provided by yahoogroups, for example.

I’ve also been interested in the way that Gmail filters Spam. If something spam-like ends up in the Inbox, I can mark it and click on a “Report spam” button. (Did Google get a special dispensation from Hormel? Or has Hormel decided to stop fighting this battle?) When I check the spam folder, I find not only those things that I have marked, but an accurate filtering of spam items I never saw in my inbox, including mail that discusses spam. Drive-by spammers are not unusual on some of the art discussion lists which I frequent, and one spam will frequently lead to five posts condemning it, which seems rather pointless.

Gmail

For the past few days, I have been using Gmail. I now have a few invitations.

I think this is a very smart type of viral marketing by the gmail group. What better way to get people to start using your product than restricting initial invitations? Then everyone in the initial group invites their friends, and it becomes cool, and people check it out rather than saying “oh just another webmail application.”