GMail: The Backlash?

point 4 = the adverts seem pretty unobtrusive to me and certainly less annoying than the banners and pop-ups that are plastered all over other webmail sites. the example they quote is pretty sensationalist.

i've been following the gmail hype and backlash, and as far as i can tell all the privacy concerns came about because of some ambiguous wording in google's initial press release. here is google's side of things, in nice plain english: http://gmail.google.com/gmail/help/more.html

The people who put together that Gmail Is Too Creepy site are also behind other anti-Google sites which are equally absurd.

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you have to admit they've got your number

some friends and I tried sending the most offensive stuff we could to each other and learned that you can shut off ads in your gmail if you're willing to litter your emails with enough foul shit

You can turn off the ads by clicking on 'basic html' at the bottom of the page and then bookmarking that.

Or am I just too old? I hate the damn thing and the whole concept of "conversations." Which you can't turn off btw and have it treat e-mails like e-mails. Had an easier time configuring Sendmail and my own mail server than wrestling with this.

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government's gonna be PISSED

one time I was drunk on the internet and subscribed to david icke's newsletter. doors are now open.

some friends and I tried sending the most offensive stuff we could to each other and learned that you can shut off ads in your gmail if you're willing to litter your emails with enough foul shit

wait, what?

also, i can't imagine doing without gmail 'conversations' these days. whenever i look at someone else's email that doesn't have that it's just. urgh.

Yeah, old-style email seems like parchment and quills to me.

Well get off my lawn.

Have been sent over to gmail at work, and happy to experience it at last. Seems good in some ways.

One thing really puzzling me about it, though. It used to be described as infinite storage, massive storage or whatever. That was originally a big selling point for gmail, as I recall. But I have an account with 187 emails in it, mostly not with attachments, and that's already taking 2% of the space. If I import more emails from anywhere else - it's going to be full in no time.

What does anyone do about this? Buy more space? Is that worth it?

Hmm, I've been using it for about six years now, hardly ever delete anything and I'm only at about 9%.

That's interesting.

The reason that this account I mention is already at 2% is that I imported the inboxes (though not the hundreds of other saved messages) from two other email accounts. Could it be that they take up more space cos they're from another system? ... Maybe, but I wouldn't have guessed it.

I don't know, I've never imported anything from an outside account into Gmail.

I've been using it for seven years, sending and receiving dozens of emails a day, and I'm only at 42%. I think you'll be okay.

Um, 2% is nothing. You wont fill it up, trust me. Unless every single email you have has a 10mb attachment (gmail wont accept emails with files larger than that attached anyway) and even then - you wont fill it up.

Ive had my Gmail account since 2004. I am often sent mp3, pics, I get a TON of spam, I never delete anything, and I'm only at 25%.

i'm pretty sure they scale up and increase the storage all the time too.

I use google docs too - its like 5$ for 20gb for a year - AND you can upload files up to a gig = so you know, home movies

my gmail has gone above a gig! i never even noticed

I am now more content about the storage issue.

I now have another, different Gmail issue.

At work my old email is being migrated to a Gmail account. There is a LOT of this mail. Too much, I admit.

OK. When the mail arrives in my Gmail account, I can Search mail by a name for instance, delete some, and and then assign what I want to a folder (label?), eg named after that person, right?

No, apparently not. Within Search Mail, the only command that appears is 'Move to Inbox'. But this mail is already in the Inbox - I'm trying to move it out of the Inbox!

Any insight welcome.

are you using basic or enhanced version

I assume it's Basic.

My work Gmail is a modified version for my employer.

But I have another free (basic?) Gmail account that does the same thing.

gmail does attachments up to 25MB

Conrad, would like your view on the question about Searching then moving stuff that has been found.

I don't have cause to do any of this searching then moving stuff that has been found but will take a swatch

can't you select stuff that has been found and then "label" it and "archive" it? is that not essentially the same thing as putting it in a folder?

I just check mark the box by the mail message and click the move to button and move to what folder I want

'Label' leaves it in the Inbox. What I want, is to move it.

Maybe 'Archive' would do it!? Maybe that's the answer?!

one doesn't have that option with search results

crosspost

"archive" would do it

alternately try "Filter messages like these" from the "More actions" dropdown

I don't think that that moves them, from the Inbox. I did try it.

I think I have found a possible way:

Search
Check (everything? or only certain things maybe - but that makes it a lot slower)
Move to Inbox
go to Inbox - you find those things ticked
Click Move to ... folder
the ticked things move.

Might work but seems a bit slower / more counter-intuitive than I expected from Google.

... no, I don't know if that does work after all.

Move only works for the page of mails you're on.
So if you're trying to move stuff within 100s / 1000s of mails, no good.

Will try Archive again.

selecting the emails and labelling them and archiving them will remove them from the inbox

I think, to do what you're trying to do, you need to filter so that you can apply a new label to the messages, then archive so they get taken out of the inbox. The whole point of Google mail though is that you do your partitioning via searching so you never actually need to move anything out of the inbox.

pinefox, there is no such thing as a folder.

http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=118708

you can label messages but they appear with those labels either in the inbox or in the archives (to be found by searching).

xpost: ... surprised by your last claim -- you mean it's OK to have an Inbox with 1000s of mails?

Don't think I want that - though I have had it for years now!

I would have thought that 'partitioning' was via labels?

Think Conrad's statement, above, is correct, have just tried it.

I currently have 10,000+ emails in my inbox; whenever I want a particular email, I search for a keyword. I could be more organized and label everything; then, I could filter down using label selection before doing keyword searches. I have exactly zero problems with my mail.

everything in my inbox

i have set up filters that automatically label almost everything coming in

then i archive them; my inbox has like a dozen messages in it

/anal

See I like to only have things in my inbox that I haven't replied to or need to do something about.

I'm happy enough with everything else just being in the Archive though.

The Archiving thing did work

only one drawback - it only archives 20 things at a time

so if you have 100s of that thing it takes a while

pf - there should be a checkbox at the top of the page that will include everything rather than just the page you can see.

Oh!!

... no, don't think I see that, Fizzles.

I can see 'All' but I think that just means what's on the page?

yes search results will display only 20 emails (or "conversations") BUT

you can click the box that selects all the emails on that page and they all go a shade darker - at this point there appears an option at the top of the list that offers to select all that march the search. "All 20 conversations on this page are selected. Select all conversations that match this search"

yes. I THINK this has worked ...

just confused cos a search found 150 convos

then once I did the check and archive all thing

there were only about 20 of them, in the archived folder!!

don't give up PF

hm, I don't think it's working out.

stuff that goes to the archive is not going to the folders / labels, even though it's labelled.
It's just going into a massive searchable limbo.

basically, don't think there is any way to do, what I really want to do.

pity.

if you label as the first step before you archive they will go into that label/folder

I did, every time !!

I think that only Move To will put something in a folder

and, again, there is no Move To from Search

no

had another idea.

if you can look at mails sorted by sender, rather than by date -- then you could at least go through ticking a load of them, and then Move them.

can you do that, sorting by sender thing, under Settings maybe?

http://pic.phyrefile.com/b/bl/blind_io/2011/05/12/michael-jackson-thriller-eating-popcorn-animated.gif

OK, to simplify:

gmail does not have folders. It keeps everything in a giant clump of email behind the scenes. It has "labels" that you can apply to messages, including multiple labels per message.

"inbox" is actually a label of sorts, and has a few special features. That's why there's a "move to inbox" button, and the default view is the "inbox" label.

All "Archive" really does is remove the "inbox" label.

So if you want to tag, say, all correspondence with a certain company as "ilxor" you would either create a filter to automatically move them on receipt, and/or do a search and then label all resulting messages and then archive them.

I have no idea why the hell Dan has everything in the inbox still.

Because I don't need to organize anything in my email to find it?

In that case, how is what you're doing any different from archiving every single message?

... it isn't?

I was just thinking that you could actually use the Inbox for something, rather than having it be the same as the All Mail section! At the very least, the page would load a little faster.

All my email is "in" the inbox and it loads instantly.

I use "skip inbox" on all my filters then stuff I care about is automatically archived and labelled while everything else languishes in the inbox till I get round to trawling it.

Gmail is marking some stuff as "important" which is sometimes helpful as it's prompted me to set a couple of new filters.

Yeah I have labels (folders whatever) for everything - a ton of stuff that comes in, I just dont want to see most of the time, daily updates for the TV guide, real estate classifieds, that kinda thing. It gets in the way of the mail I do want to read so its set to be labelled and archived immediately. The inbox is left for personal emails, and that way I see them easily.

Also, in my perception at least, clicking into a label folder to find someone's message seems faster than searching for it, but I rarely use the search function so I cant be too sure.

You must be a big TV watcher!

Thats the funny thing, I dont watch TV at all anymore!

Gmail: question.

How can I set it so when I'm reading a mail and delete it, the screen shows the next mail down, rather than goes back to the Inbox?

can't find any info about this.

Go to 'Labs' under 'Settings' and enable 'Auto-advance'.

Fed up with reading a long email, clicking delete at the bottom of the screen, then when I go back to the inbox I'm at the bottom of the page there (I don't filter or sort anything, so there's a 100 emails on the page). Sure this never used to happen.

Thank you, JM, this did work!

what is this new list of names appearing on the right hand side of my window?

it's a new thing but has somehow pushed me over the edge. gmail used to be so slick and now about 30% of the screen is actually taken up by the emails i want to the read and the rest by toolbars, buttons, gadgets and adverts. can barely ever load the site on my netbook. i want to ditch it.

are there any alternatives ppl recommend?

can you maybe do the thing where you load it as HTML, the way it offers you an opportunity to when it's slow loading ..?

what is this new list of names appearing on the right hand side of my window?

? I don't see this

when you're composing an e-mail (/reply?), it brings up the little gang of people involved, i think in case you want to make them into a new tight-knit-friend-group in +

i could use the HTML version but i'm still interested in alternatives. there must be some new super slick lightweight webmail surely?

this new list of names is called "People" ?

it tells you what it is first time you see it, seems a pretty dece feature compared to most of the new stuff lately imo

anyway you can turn off most of whatever you don't want in the settings, and for everything else there's browser add-ons like:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/oddhbkghjoccbljmagcgoklbfdjeiinb

it offers five random people off the internet you might want to e-mail

it's all the people in the conversation you're looking at?

it's been offering me not not only people that have nothing to do with the convo - but also the last people i would want involved.

it's a way to one-up facebook, where it doesn't only reunite you with friends, but reconcile you with people you've chosen to forget. spare a thought + cc those people.

if you're getting new stuff then you might be in the group that Google+ is getting rolled out to

I noticed you cant make a gmail account now without giving your phone number to them

I don't mind that, because it makes me think that somehow I'm more likely to get my account back if it's hijacked.

Probably not, but hey, small comfort

no - they will just call you at 1 am and call you a Skink

How did they know?!?

Google is tracking you every time you self-pleasure

I they texted me a new pw when my account got hijacked. It was nice.

I like the auto suggestion: if I email my MIL it suggests her husband,two sons (a common email pattern).

I have filters on 90% of my mail and my set up is to only show filters iftheres something unread. That way my inbox only has recent, personal communiques. Love it.

are google profiles and google+ the same thing?

do not use google-

No, totally different

I dont see the google + yet

many xposts but in case you're wondering what the difference is between 'all mail' and 'inbox', if you use something like Outlook Express to read your gmails they get removed from gmail inbox once they've been retrieved using Outlook. They stay in 'all mail'.

can they just fix reader ffs

are you having the login problem jeff? just click the reader logo again and it'll go to the right screen.

current problem is that old comments have disappeared for me and many in my circle. we think it might be due to some weird spammers that friended us? but before that there was the disappearance of the comment box, etc etc. reader needs some attention.

Ah, I rarely comment so can't help ya.

I dont see the google + yet

Me neither.

LEFT BEHIND

it's a new thing but has somehow pushed me over the edge. gmail used to be so slick and now about 30% of the screen is actually taken up by the emails i want to the read and the rest by toolbars, buttons, gadgets and adverts. can barely ever load the site on my netbook. i want to ditch it.

maybe this will placate:
http://lifehacker.com/5817272/gmail-rolls-out-its-new-minimal-look

that looks exactly like what i want - thanks

Gmail's subtly chaged things recently and I'm vaguely annoyed. A thread used to have a link for "expand all" and now it is a not-very-obvious button of a square with a down arrow in it :/

not got + yet, but i care not.
loving the new minimal look.

Goddamnit. My gmail just got hacked this afternoon, got that big red warning at the top about my account being accessed from the Netherlands. Changed my password as soon as I saw that, how freaked should I be?

it probably wouldn't hurt to change all your important passwords

Will definitely do that.

i have, likely foolishly, not done this, but you may subsequently want to try two-step verification.

lately gmail has been putting more than a few of my non-spam messages in the spam folder and trash. i don't want to have to check three folders every time i log in!

xp thanks! just set up two-step authentication; that is cool.

Okay, so I changed my password and set up the two-step authentication, but I have a question. On my work computer, our IT guy has it set up so our IE (yes yes, I know) clears out all saved data every couple of days. Since it says I'll have to do the two-step verification on every unverified computer, will I have to redo it every time IE clears out (so to speak)?

i thought it was pretty cool when i got on gmail early on and got a very simple address, but now it is awful. people apparently sign up for all kinds of shit (mailing lists, fantasy football sites, online shopping receipts etc) with a 'fake' email (or maybe they're somehow getting their own email wrong?) that happens to be mine. lately i've been logging into their accounts and deleting them as retribution for using my email (and so i don't get more spam). it is mystifying, especially for sites that require you to verify your email address.

haha i thought it was pretty cool too -- you gave me my gmail invite iirc

haha

Jordan I've started to get the same thing in the last 6 months or so. I can't work out if its a bunch of people dumb enough to think my email address is theirs, or some weirdass new spam sneak mechanism?

But yeah Ive gotten login (w/plain text pwds) for dating sites, and the other day full info on someones financial services shit, which I just replied to all with "this isnt your account, change your password!".

same shit happens to me. there's not much to do about it except jordan's aggressive stance of deleting accounts, which i've also taken to. it makes me feel kinda bad sometimes :(

yeah, i usually respond to misdirected emails (lately i've gotten a lot of resumes from indian people for some reason?). but this account shit is weird, and if it's spam then it's next level for sure.

xp

One dating site login I had gave me a pwd and userID. I logged into it (eharmony I think) and it worked. I guessed that the eharmony userid was the actual gmail address they meant (rather than "trayce"). lo and behold it let me log into her gmail >_<

It was full of Farmville updates and nothing else, so I just let it be.

The lesson there is: never use the same password on all yr accounts.

oh most definitely, some *ahem* people I know used that to great effect back in the day

also, do not auto-message your password to a certain nickname on irc.

So any thougts on the new gmail? I switched and subsequently lost my nice minimalist theme :(

I just switched to Gmail after Hotmail, or should I say Hotfail, blocked my decade-old account (presumably for spam/hacking reasons) and won't let me back in unless I give them my mobile number for them to display for all the world to see. Fuck you I won't do what you tell me, &c.

Seems to be working OK thus far but who knows.

There's an ultra-cosy option or something.

Marcello I think you can skip that mobile "extra security" option: its there, but its in very teeny small text on the bottom right of the page/message.

Not on mine there isn't.

I annoyingly only see that teeny small text in the bottom right when I log out. It pops up for some milliseconds and I can never get there in time to click it.

that sounds like browser shenanigans :(

Either that or Larry Page and Sergey Brin are going "LOL he missed it again trololo" every time I try :-(

Probably a FF issue though, you're right.

Still no way to organize email by address alphabetically. >:(

hurrah I managed to get my Hotmail account back without having to do all the mobile number business! "There's only one way to beat them - get round the back," as someone once said.

hmm, change for change's sake, it seems.

It's OK, not worth changing back.

As long as those "Do you with to view only the webpage content that was delivered securely?" stupidquestion panels go away.
(just checked, nope they still ask!)

this new version is not compatible with my browser at work so I can't email from my home account during the day which kind of sucks

The Gmail blog says that the big change was "responsive design" which will make the page conform to the size of its window. I approve of that, and I'm really glad they made the more diffuse spacing of objects optional bc I don't find the dense spacing crowded, I find it useful.

Does internet work?

Yes.

Let's fix it.

looks way too spaced out for me, irritating. guess I'll get used to it like I get used to every other dumb internet thing.

Even after switching to Compact display density? I hated the look until I figured out you could change that. My only qualm is that starred items don't stand out as much as they used to, but otherwise, it pretty much looks the same as it used to now.

xp: Click the lowermost of the two cogwheels in the top-right; there are two less airy settings to choose from.
I'm one of the few who thought Google Reader was improved by the redesign, but with gmail I'm sticking with the old look as long as I can. Mostly I dislike that some of the old text-links have been replaced with icons. I'm sure I'll get used to the icons in time, but ugh, not until I have to...

unread emails don't stand out as much as they used to. my gf leaves lots of unread stuff in her inbox, so this is driving her crazy.

I use the Tree theme (shows pictures of what the weather is doing, which is great! e.g., snow piling up on your icons, terrifying electrical storms) and the contrast btwn read and unread might be slightly lower, but it's still pretty clear.

However the new look works (or doesn't work -- I personally find it decreases legibility), there'll be an add-on within weeks to display it the old way.

contrast between read and unread is what matters to me and this looks way worse for that.

I see zero difference in the contrast between read and unread for the new look versus the old look.

(I am using the "Light" theme.)

Preview Dense

Yeh, I just switched back and forth between old and new and the contrast of read/unread was the same in Tree theme.

this new version is not compatible with my browser at work so I can't email from my home account during the day which kind of sucks

this is true of a lot of Google stuff, if your work uses a dud web browser like IE7 and does not let you install stuff on your PC. I mentioned this to a friend who works for Google, and he more or less laughed at me for working somewhere that uses IE7.

Eh, just in case my friend who works for Google reads this, that maybe is a bit of an exageration of his position, but he did seem to feel that people stuck with dud browsers are not a category of persons Google needs to worry about. Which is a shame - I fear that Google may be limiting their appeal to first world people with flash new computers capable of running all the latest web browsers and browser add-ons.

I mentioned this to a friend who works for Google, and he more or less laughed at me for working somewhere that uses IE7.

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=0

laughing at someone for using the most popular browser in the market is kind of stupid

Also, the appeal of Google in the first place was that it was so pared down and that it could be used on even the junkiest of 1994 computers. Dicks.

it's totally fine if Google wants to focus on tech nerds but they are effectively jettisoning over 50% of the market by doing so, which is just stupid no matter how you look at it

laughing at someone for using the most popular browser in the market is kind of stupid

Well, you might consider upgrading to 9 at least...

I have to deal with a website at work that requires me to use IE 6(!!). I use Opera for all other things, however, so that I don't have to use IE 6 all the time. I don't like Firefox or Chrome.

lol I wasn't even paying attention to the version number; working in tech has made me well aware of anti-IE snobbery (in fact, I participated in it for years)

I think my dev environment still has IE6 as the browser, lol.

Yeah our work still uses IE7 (tho we all use FF instead really)

I work for the largest employer in the state and we use IE8 on locked down computers.

i have used portable firefox in the past on government-locked-down computers. which was probably a bad idea

I mentioned this to a friend who works for Google, and he more or less laughed at me for working somewhere that uses IE7.

ugh tech nerds

My work employs over 4000 ppl and we're on IE8

tangential to this, is it just my Firefox upgrade or did Google recently become https?

Google or gmail? Gmail's https. Google doesnt seem to be for me tho. I did notice something weird at home this morning tho: I couldnt force it to stay on google.com.au (and thus be able to filter to "pages from Australia). It was reverting back to google.com each time. At work though it isnt doing this. I run NoScript at home, maybe that did something funny.

yah I have noscript too, but in the last few days the regular Google page (which I use as my homepage) has been coming up https, making it very inconvenient to navigate to other pages by c&p-ing in the address bar.

I don't like the lack of demarcation between the left sidebar and the emails when you open a mail - it's just all white background. There's probably a scheme that doesn't do this but icbf to look at all of them.

oh here we go, it's cause of my Blogger acct, this is fuckin creepy:

(Long Island, N.Y.) On October 18, 2011 Google Inc. announced on their blog that they would begin encrypting search engine results behind an SSL (Secure Socket Layer) connection for any users signed into their Google accounts while using Google.com. The official Google blog noted: “As part of our commitment to provide a more secure online experience, today we announced that SSL Search on https://www.google.com will become the default experience for signed in users on google.com.” As this change encrypts search queries from Google’s results pages, which the company claims is intended to provide improved user privacy, many familiar with the search industry question the change as the protection doesn’t extend out to pay-per-click advertisements, just algorithmic search results. Adding to the speculation is the fact that Google already offers an encrypted version of search provided a user has an interest in protecting them.

The change took place the same day as the announcement hit Google’s blog whereas anyone logged into their Google account would automatically be redirected from http://www.google.com to https://www.google.com (take notice the https://). The URLs look quite similar, but beyond the surface much more takes place. To understand what happens and how this changes effects long standing principles with the Internet, marketers and search engine optimizers, one needs to understand what exactly happens when someone performs a search.

hm its not doing that for me and im signed in (cos i have gmail running)

I feel really bad for encouraging anti-my Google friend scoffing.

this is true of a lot of Google stuff, if your work uses a dud web browser like IE7 and does not let you install stuff on your PC. I mentioned this to a friend who works for Google, and he more or less laughed at me for working somewhere that uses IE7.

yes that's my situation at work exactly, IE7 on desktops and no installation allowed. No prospect of an upgrade in sight either.

i just had to restart chrome to update and because NO flash on any site was working, with or without adblock on, and now i can't use gchat. i have a chat window open but it took away the place where i would type a message! also the update just sucks generally and chrome sucks!

i too am one of those overpaid, lazy, useless state employees who has a slow dell desktop from 1999 at work. i don't think our operating systems would support an IE upgrade, and if they would IT probably doesn't know about it. i can no longer read my gmail at work, but somehow the chat function works. it just says "Loading..." for hours if i try to read an email and the "sign out" link has just disappeared! it's too bad because i like to email myself pdfs from lexisnexis and i need to use my personal email for it because our employee email is outlook-based and outlook makes me want to kill myself. i can't even send a large attachment to my own work email because i won't get it and if i do it will take 10 minutes to open

If you have chrome, could you install opera instead? Or set gmail to basic HTML mode?

Oh I misread, guess chrome is home computer? Ah well... Opera's still way awesome

i can't read emails in standard view any more, just basic view, which doesn't auto update.

updating my browser is useless for me cuz i use camino. firefox is too heavy and my laptop is too old for chrome.

why do these fucking platforms never make improvements that make my life BETTER? it's always worse. something new i have to install or something i have to change or something that doesn't work. ALL THE TIME. who are these people and why are they doing this to me?

i. just. want. things. to. work. like. they've. worked. before.

Companies have to stop making software for antiquated equipment at some point.

my laptop is 5 years old! that is not antiquated!

or am i meant to buy a new one every year like those freaks who queue up outside apple stores?

http://www.old-computers.com/history/images/LearSiegler_ADM3A_System_1.jpg

5 years is like a lifetime for technology. I have a 4 year old iMac that is still going strong though.

Age of your laptop might not be the sole problem. My Vaio laptop is 4 years old and it's showing some signs of age (aside from some virus-related damage that I can't fix and is not worth spending money to fix) but it can certainly run Chrome and Firefox, etc. Maybe the laptop was semi-disposable to begin with and not meant to last 5 years.

xp

5 years is like a lifetime for technology.

so ordinary consumers are just meant to shell out every time technology advances? fuck those companies for real

This can't really be news to you....

chrome doesn't run on mac 10.4. why, i have no idea. surely it is not that hard to make it so that it does.

i guess they added an extra click if you want to 'reply all' in new view? good job.

xp i just can't believe how many people just accept it and take it for granted

I'm willing to admit that maybe I'm being fooled into being a planned obsolescence apologist, but it seems like computer technology advances so swiftly that it's inevitable that 5 years = a lifetime for most computers. And software aside, a 5 year old computer is usually going to be pretty well worn out and glitchy.

i too am one of those overpaid, lazy, useless state employees who has a slow dell desktop from 1999 at work.

wow, I thought I was badly off. your office should charge people money to see you and your computer.

my home computer is probably heading for five years old now, and it works fine.

With laptops, particularly, there are limitations in the materials they can use for hardware components. They are just physically going to wear out after awhile. Add to that the additional wear that laptops get by virtue of portability and you've got a consumer product that probably won't last more that five years.

Still, how can you just stand by and accept the fact that manufacturers don't build their products from aircraft black box materials? WAKE UP SHEEPLES

…

these free online services are so enraging

so it's my fault that they've changed it so it's unusable? when it was FINE BEFORE, i can't stress that enough?

my laptop has no bugs and operates perfectly well.

hey otherLex, have you googled? Is this your problem?

There is a bug in Camino's ad blocking which causes it to hide Gmail messages in the new Gmail look; it will be fixed in the upcoming Camino 2.1. In the mean time, you can work around it by turning off Camino's ad blocking preference.

nothing is your fault. it is unfortunate that things have changed unhelpfully; i'm just saying that you get what you pay for.

Add to that the additional wear that laptops get by virtue of portability and you've got a consumer product that probably won't last more that five years.

in theory I agree with you, but my five year old Apple laptop continues to chug away happily, and Mrs Vicar's even older Dell laptop still works too.

these free online services are so enraging

there is a part of me that wonders whether we would all be better off if we actually did pay for online services, as at least then we would have a contract with the providers and could hold them to things and so on.

More generally, and not meant rhetorically - why do you reckon companies like Gmail and Facebook feel that it is a good idea to piss off their users with unwanted new looks etc.?

hey otherLex, have you googled? Is this your problem?

There is a bug in Camino's ad blocking which causes it to hide Gmail messages in the new Gmail look; it will be fixed in the upcoming Camino 2.1. In the mean time, you can work around it by turning off Camino's ad blocking preference.

haha this actually worked! thanks!

nothing is your fault. it is unfortunate that things have changed unhelpfully; i'm just saying that you get what you pay for.

ah ok. so there is to be no criticism of facebook, twitter, gmail at all, ever.

you call it criticism, i call it a tantrum

Yay! LexPower!!

xp My last two Apple laptops I had five and four years and I gave them both away to ppl who got another year or two out of them. Also we have that four year old Mac desktop that might as well be brand new for all we use it for.

So my point was not to say that all laptops disintegrate into dust at five years. Just that there are reasons beyond the relentless forward progress of technology and planned obsolescence that a computer might no longer function well after a period of time. Good for us both that our personal experience has been different.

and i call you a cunt

xps

fucking hell i hate technology nerds who expect everyone else to be like them

i think it's perfectly reasonable to complain when a service that hitherto worked FINE - completely fine - is suddenly rendered unusable by some bullshit obsession with constantly tweaking it that these platforms seem to have

Glad to see that "xps" there.

yes i nearly didn't see your post in between! a hasty addition

so for the past 8 or 9 years, i've kept the desktop pc that i use to produce music disconnected from the internet, totally isolated. the one i started using in '03 was as fast and stable in 2010 as it was when i bought it. finally had to upgrade for more processing power, doing the same thing with the new one.

why do you reckon companies like Gmail and Facebook feel that it is a good idea to piss off their users with unwanted new looks etc.?

all those employees have to do something with their time.

lol i don't think i've ever been called that before! cheers

lex, I understand what you're saying and you have a valid point, but this was a flaw in your chosen installed software that is overzealously engaging the ad blocker. This has absolutely nothing to do with gmail, and they may have even done regression testing to ensure older versions worked.

I just had a bloke seeing to my 4-year-old Dell desktop.
He installed Windows 7 to make it go faster (it was barely going at all).
It's faster but a load of problems have appeared, from my POV. I'm not sure whether they will disperse, or not.

Example of problem: downloading iTunes and trying to import 14,000 tracks back into it.

I hate Windows 7.*

*This is a total curmudgeonly "this isn't the PC OS I'm used to wahhh" opinion.

I'm not in a position to judge Windows 7 itself. I tend to have problems with all computers. I get the impression of some instability in this newly rigged computer, though.

The songs did, eventually, get into iTunes. But I seem to have lost the quite numerous Playlists into which they were organized. I think those may even still have been there, a bit earlier, or maybe not. If anyone has a thought on getting a playlist back from oblivion, let me know.

Example of problem: downloading iTunes and trying to import 14,000 tracks back into it.

errrrr.... so, after this professional upgraded your PC, iTunes was no longer on it?

mmmm.

Sounds like a professional call to me.

indeed, iTunes was no longer on it. It needed to be downloaded all over again and this was quite problematic, but seems to be in place now. Sans playlists.

the computer keeps shutting things down, saying 'internet explorer needs to close' when I had not even tried to open it - that kind of thing.

I wouldn't mind but I paid 4 x as much as I expected for all this.

I've only used Windows 7 a couple of times, but I really didn't like it. It feels like they were trying to entice Mac users with a bizzaro-world iOS dock. Ugh. I don't like the dock in Mac, and I certainly do not like the knock-off version in Windows 7.

I agree, it did remind me of a Mac more than any other non-Mac I've used -- as though I am one to judge such things.

I wouldn't mind the design features, etc, if was all working properly, fine. But the whole thing seems a bit half-cocked and stuttering, at best, in my own case, as one OS has been replaced with another.

Oddly, my inbox unread messages count went down by 1 for about 3 minutes, then it went back up to normal.

(...w/o receiving any new msgs obvs)

I've got to side with Lex here. In the last few months both gmail and google have been 'upgraded' to become total shit: much slower, harder to navigate and less easy on the eye than before.

Was it here where I was complaining about Windows 7? Well I have a new laptop and now I have to use it, and it's actually pretty OK for the most part. I was able to undo the dock-style task bar, which was super annoying. I like the way the explorer works now. In case anyone was wondering about my opinions on Windows 7.

The new Gmail Compose thing is awful, as is Gmail reply.

I would like to think that The Backlash might stop them making it compulsory.

But I am sure it will not.

Why have they done this?

i've been using the new gmail compose thing for ages, it's fine

Yeah, I prefer it.

I don't understand the obsession with making pop-up windows pop up within pop-up windows

xzibit.gif

I do not see how one could prefer it

but OK

but I do not see why not let those who prefer it, use it

and those who do not, use the old one

which is fine

yeah, not feeling the compose pop-up at all. why should reading any email get its own page but writing one doesn't?

it's a free online email account literally WHO CARES ABOUT A VERY SLIGHT REDESIGN

I like the new compose thing but I wish it was in the centre of the screen rather than at the bottom right.

int., living room, evening

ILX poster Dwight Yorke stares glassily at his computer screen, scrolling listlessly. he clicks through to GMAIL: the backlash? & types,

it's a free online email account literally WHO CARES ABOUT A VERY SLIGHT REDESIGN

just popping off a message

Is gmail's spam-filter suddenly not very reliable or is it just me?

it is just you that is not very reliable

I get maybe 30 pieces of spam email a day, but like 2 or 3 slip through. Pisses me off.

mine was pretty squeaky clean until about 4 days ago, now I'm getting ~6 junks a day.

I'm happy w/ Gmail's spam filter. I very, very rarely get spam in Gmail, and when I do, it is almost understandable that it slips through b/c it's well-disguised. Also it very rarely filters out legit mail.

That's on my current account - but on my first-ever Gmail account, at some point it was like the spam filter got turned off, and it would get dozens of spams per day. Weird.

I get way more misdirected mail than I get spam

for example, I don't think the wound care clarification email for nurses at a retirement home in Michigan was meant for me

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/google-overhauls-gmail-to-take-on-email-overload/?hp

The revamped Gmail automatically sorts incoming messages into categories, which appear as three tabs — primary, social and promotions — that users can toggle between in their in-box. The primary tab contains the e-mails that the service thinks are most important. Social contains message updates from various social networks, like LinkedIn, Tumblr and Yelp. Promotions contains newsletters, party invites and concert announcements. Users can also select to add additional tabs to help manage electronic bills, banking statements and messages from forum boards.

Have you guys seen the recent media appearances of the two guys? The Google Island story? That old article the computer historian wrote about them? One can't do anything about the last decade of emails but personal websites are cheap if you just want an email account and a place to put your pics, CV, paintings, etc.

just got this image today

http://www.matteoduo.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Welcome-new-gmail.jpg

um, no thanks

ok i just figured out how to hide the tabs

I'm loving the tabs. I would have done this myself ages ago if I could have.

yeah, i don't mind them, inasmuch as they sequester a lot of my junk mail

I was wondering if they were going to do that - I was doing some tidying recently and found out that they are in the list of things you can search by - you can get the list by typing 'category:' in the search bar and watching the autocomplete.

It looks like starred items in any tab are shown in the Primary tab? I kept moving one starred email from Primary to Social but it would always show up again in Primary.

I dislike the tabs. I already had a system setup using rules and labels, so all the tabs did was disrupt that.

i disabled the tabs after 5 seconds of seeing them. at least they made it easy this time to get rid of one of their new 'improvements'

Stating the obvious at this point: Google's lawyers: If you use Gmail you have no expectation of privacy

The news was highlighted in a new press release from John M. Simpson of Consumer Watchdog drawing attention to a recent brief from Google's lawyers. You can read the brief for yourself here on Consumer Watchdog's site. Google's lawyers filed the brief in an effort to dismiss a class-action complaint accusing the company of violating federal and state wiretap laws this past July.

In the filing Google's official lawyers clearly state:

Just as a sender of a letter to a business colleague cannot be surprised that the recipient's assistant opens the letter, people who use web-based email today cannot be surprised if their emails are processed by the recipient's [email provider] in the course of delivery. Indeed, 'a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties. (Motion to dismiss, Page 19)

women are safe, phew

despise new compose. fucking despise it.

decompose

it's fine

it's horrible. i hate change.

it's just, it's just a message composition window

Does this "no expectation of privacy" thing also go for paid corporate accounts or just free, individual ones?

Everyone.

Google didn't say that http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/14/4621474/yes-gmail-users-have-an-expectation-of-privacy

All they said was that non-Gmail users should know that Google has to process their messages to deliver them.

Off-topic but sorry to misinterpret you wrt hyperloop

Ultimately the question is, do you trust Google?

ha well

probably no more or less than my isp

http://media.idownloadblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Larry-Page-illustration-Nicola-Felasquez-Felaco.jpg

http://zeno.name/startupschool07/photos/large/Paul_Buchheit--Gmail--2007-03-24-17-49-04.jpg

today i sent an email to a group of 320 people, which didn't seem to work, until two hours later i got it at my other address and started receiving the expected out-of-office messages and such. huh?

sounds like it takes awhile to send 320 email addresses

turns out that for many reasons gmail is a bit useless when trying to deal with mailouts of that magnitude. STAY AWAY.

get a google group

So I trial installed this Sanebox thing which is supposed to make your email easier to manage by putting important emails in the inbox and less important ones in a separate folder. But (a) I can't see how this is different from the Priority Inbox functionality that is already in Gmail and (b) it doesn't make a lot of sense to me anyway because now I have to look in two places rather than one. Anyone else try this?

so mad that they got rid of the pop-up audio player

now apparently i can't do anything else in gmail while playing an attached mp3 -- good change. or, at work, i can't play it at all and need to make a bunch of clicks to use some player in google drive.

Shit, you're right. Fuck google.

there was a popup audio player?!

Yes. If you had an mp3 attachment you could just play it right off. It meant that, for example, I could email myself rough mixes of stuff I was working on at the end of the night, and then during the day search my inbox for "from:me demo" and very conveniently listen to anything I was working on and think about what to do next without having to download it to my work computer and fuck about it with it there. It was great. Very annoying that it's gone.

^yeah i do this constantly. i've made so many songs and albums just conveniently bouncing attachments back and forth with someone.

you can go to the bar at the bottom now and select 'music player for google drive' (after installing it), it's just a couple extra clicks, extra tabs, and doesn't feel as streamlined.

http://www.wired.com/business/2013/12/gmail-spying-explained/?cid=co15695154

ffs why would anyone do this

these tech bros need removing

Being able to tell whether someone has read a message is very useful. It's one of the things that has always bugged me the most about email.

I feel the same way about written letters

does anyone use a more privacy-oriented alternative to gmail? Seriously thinking about switching.

It's easy to turn this off btw.

Please explain.

settings - general - ask before displaying external content

thanks

Being able to tell whether someone has read a message is very useful. It's one of the things that has always bugged me the most about email.

outlook used to (maybe still does?) let you request a receipt once your emails had been read. i was doing this at work until a friend questioned me about it, making me feel like a paranoid loon.

does anyone use a more privacy-oriented alternative to gmail? Seriously thinking about switching.

― signed, J.P. Morgan CEO (Hurting 2), Thursday, December 12, 2013 7:56 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

http://www.pynchoninpublic.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/WASTE_Bin-1024x768.jpg

Surprised it took them this long to implement read receipts, tbh

does anyone use a more privacy-oriented alternative to gmail? Seriously thinking about switching.

― signed, J.P. Morgan CEO (Hurting 2), Thursday, December 12, 2013 7:56 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

a friend of mine who's v concerned with privacy moved to https://bitmessage.ch/.

hmm, that looks a little more wonky and under the radar than probably suits my needs. Any services a compromise between that and the powerful, user-friendly gmail?

what do you mean by "privacy-oriented"?

I guess at a minimum I would like something that doesn't mine my data and whose lawyers don't argue in court that I have no reasonable expectation of privacy using their service.

I mean you know, not "me" as in "hurting 2" but the broader public. I don't think I've been personally addressed in court by google's lawyers.

i'm guessing there aren't many above-the-rader webmail services that fit that description.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ph85KQ8ocp4/TjdtnwMDauI/AAAAAAAAAE0/fzjVIc92q94/s640/Mailbox-Black.jpg

i would pay a small fee if that mattered

why don't you just use a standard POP3 email account from your ISP

yeah go figure free email not everything you want, huh

Set up yr own domain name, get web and mailhosting from a decent webhost that supplies a CP interface. Make own email.

(tho I dont know how this whole NSA biz goes when it comes to datamining of hosting cos like Dreamhost and the like tbh)

Set up yr own domain name, get web and mailhosting from a decent webhost that supplies a CP interface. Make own email.

― the Bronski Review (Trayce), Wednesday, December 18, 2013 11:30 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i ditched gmail (and webmail) a while back for a "under the radar" service similar to the one linked by merseyeux upthread. i download mail to thunderbird and the service is invisible to me and not wonky at all.

Google just made it really easy for strangers to email you

You no longer need someone's email address to send them an email. At least, that will soon be the case if you want to email another Google+ user. A new Gmail "feature" will let you simply type in anyone's name into Gmail's "to" field and send them an email. Google announced the new Google+ integration on its Gmail blog today, but company representatives have clarified to The Verge that — by default — anyone on its social network will be able to send messages to your Gmail inbox.

Once the service goes live over the next few days, a new setting will appear in Gmail called "Email via Google+." If you don't want everyone on Google+ to be able to send you an email, you'll have to opt out by selecting "no one" or choosing another option to limit the feature to people in certain circles. It's important to note that even if you do let people send you emails through their Google+ connection, your actual email address won't be revealed unless you choose to respond to the email. Google also says that emails from Google+ users outside of your circles will not hit your "primary" inbox — they'll be placed in the new "social" tab it introduced earlier this year. The change continues the company's push to integrate Google+ with the rest of its popular online services, but it's concerning as it turns a private space — your inbox — into a social one.

barf

I hardly ever get emails so I would welcome some from strangers.

if they're outside your circles then how is an email from them 'social' except in the sense that society is made up of all kinds of people we don't know from adam

just left google plus entirely, thx for the tip

I got rid of G+ forever ago, and I already get a jillion missent mails for other people anyway thanks to my early adopter short address :(

is it possible to "leave" g+ and still have a gmail account?

I got rid of G+ forever ago, and I already get a jillion missent mails for other people anyway thanks to my early adopter short address :(

― the Bronski Review (Trayce), Thursday, January 9, 2014 8:00 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This.

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/reverse_identity_theft.png

People buy cars, sign up for dating services, pay their utilities, sign up for banking, book airline tickets and don't even know their own email address. So they put mine.

Hahah same! And mines not even first initial, its just trayce! And I get signed up to dating sites - with clear passwords sent IN THE EMAIL - potluck jewish gatherings, prayer sessions, fuckin I dont know, some silly lady in the US seems to think my address is hers, but I've gone over this on the "missent emails" thread on whichever board thats on.

People buy cars, sign up for dating services, pay their utilities, sign up for banking, book airline tickets and don't even know their own email address. So they put mine.

― Jeff, Friday, January 10, 2014 5:12 AM (35 minutes ago) Bookmark

i even have more than one lifelock account linked to my address, thinking about starting a class action suit

I have two old firstinitiallastn✧✧✧@gm✧✧✧.c✧✧ friends, both over 60, both born-again Christians, both conservative Republicans. The lady in South Carolina stopped for a while after I called the hospital to tell them that that they shouldn't send me her husband's medical records, but is now back in full effect; but I kinda like to actively screw with the dude in Texas, like sending "meat is murder!" back as a response to his hunting buddies.

haha same here - got my last name only @ gmail and get tons of emails sent to some earth mother type boomer.
What is the etiquette for this? In the beginning I actually replied to people to tell them they had the wrong email. Now I stopped but still feel super guilty when I see emails like "i'll wait for you at 6pm in front of that place"

At this point I'm hard pressed to tell if its genuine mistakes or spam/phishing tricks, so on that point I tend to caution/ignore, unless it is obvious.

get so much email for Pasta Blurred

I get emails about graphic design from Australians. It's worked out because they've sent me all sorts of great resources for brushes and vector art!

I have an unusual surname and a firstinitial+surname gmail address so I don't get much, but emailing the other me to say "hey did you mean to link a calendar to my address and add 6000 appointments?" got no reply. Marking one of them as "will not attend", however, got him to stop instantly.

(too bad in a way, I'd have been curious to talk to him and find out whether he was distantly related. On the other hand he clearly liked banking-related events a bit too much to be someone I want to spend time talking to.)

Meanwhile if there is someone out there who has my email address but with an extra C in it then they are getting a shit-ton of mail for me - sorry, whoever you are - because nobody can ever spell my surname. So it was a dumb move to have an email address with my surname in and expect to be able to spell it out on the phone or write it on forms and actually receive the resulting email.

I had firstnamelastname@yahoo as my main address for a while and kept getting photos of trips from a nice middle-aged jewish lady. I kept emailing her to tell her I wasn't the firstname lastname she was looking for, but I never got a response and they kept coming.

mine is "firstname1" and i get soooo many wrong emails, both misdirected and people signing up for shit (lately lots of kids signing up for online gaming websites, and i get the 'parental control' email). i should really just change emails but it's a matter of stubborn pride, i can't quit now.

is it possible to "leave" g+ and still have a gmail account?

Deleting my Google+ profile

will this affect my youtube tho

have ~11,000 unread emails dating back to 2004, this is the year that i…do something about it

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iDGt5_Bi2Sc/Soa0jc7L7ZI/AAAAAAAADPk/74Yco1K_gXM/s320/a2.gif

xxp it shouldn't. i have gmail and youtube but no google+.

This link suggests it will affect your youtube. I think you have to be signed in for the link to work:

https://plus.google.com/downgrade/

eek you're right. it seems deleting google+ disables your youtube channel:
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2657970

but it can then be enabled again:
https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/2972692

(i have no idea if that actually works)

I detached my google account from youtube and the username went back to what it was pre-Google. Videos of my kid eating a banana are still there.

wow, that seems like a good case for deleting g+ just right there. thanks for the tips y'all.

btw if you don't mind bare-bones functionality using the html version of gmail bypasses much of the annoying aspects/new features etc.

I hate google+. but I don't get the big deal here. In order for someone to email you through google+, first they have to add you to their circle, which means they already know who you are, in the general sense. And then they're not even really emailing you, they're sending you a message; they don't even get to see your email address. And *then* they can only do it once. And *then* I think it goes to your social file, which no one uses, because lol google+. So that basically means strangers can, if they really want to, email you once to a de facto spam folder. BFD.

uh, i just got an ad in my email - not just spam, but sponsored by gmail. it says "This ad is based on emails from your mailbox and information from your Google account. Ads Settings puts you in control of the ads you see." Clicking on Ads Settings brings me this piece of information:

How we matched these ads

Your email and Google account
This ad is based on emails from your mailbox and information from your Google account.

it also gives me an option to block messages from that specific advertiser - but not to block all messages like that from ever appearing again, which is what i actually want.

is this new? do i just need to install an extension or something to block this kind of shit?

shit that's horrible

immediately check my gmail to check 4 ads, none phew ad-free...for now

Yeah I got one of those, luckily I clicked a little box and it went away so managed to not care

got one of those 'u can attach money to any email now' popups

first thought: 'oh shit you mean there's some money on my hard drive?? —oh.'

http://i.imgur.com/W1EbOrU.png

What the heck??

what if i enjoy looking at mine a negative amount, can i use this to make my friends' lives worse

it's april first elsewhere in the world

Damn!! Got fooled :((

i sense sarcasm possibly

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2605400/five-million-gmail-addresses-and-passwords-dumped-online.html

http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/22/google-unveils-inbox-a-new-take-on-email-and-possibly-a-replacement-for-gmail/

I was in gmail beta and I don't get an invite for this? whatever Google don't expect an invite to the Christmas party this year then

For instance, instead of showing you a message from your airline about your flight, it shows you real-time information about that flight gathered from the web. When you click on the highlight, you can always see the underlying message, but if the software does its job well, you won’t have to click on the message.

Stop trying to be intuitive, computer. Please.

idk i've really been digging google now's talents tbh, if they can bring that to my inbox i'd be pretty happy

req'd an invite

"can google wave replace email"

About 12,700,000 results (0.40 seconds)

only About 357 results

if you put quotes around it. but still 0.40 seconds!

stratification stuff - like the tabbing into social, personal, &c, & this, too - always makes me worry that something could be lost, like finding things in your junk mail, but then maybe this could be an example of computers being smarter than us, truly intuitive, capable of the perfectly mathematical organisation we haven't the server space to perform, that they detect the waning enthusiasm of our epistolary prose in e-mails it took us days to respond to, they assess the decreasing frequency of our exchanges with addresses suffixed with the domain names of our old employers, & that there is a digital intercession, filing somebody essentially unimportant out of sight, & what's more leaving us with an alibi, an inbox malfunction, filtering out high school friends, filing the details for flights we'd be better off missing where we won't see them. inbox as a kind of guru, a better you, severing contact with your brother-in-law, repeatedly reminding you of how well dan is doing, how beaming his children are, how bright the caribbean is, cutting you off from what's toxic, increasing the brightness of the display when your ex writes, erratically capitalising the perfunctory check-in e-mails you send to your dead-end copywriting job until they breach basic standards & leave you set adrift, necessarily spurned & catalysed into meaningful action. i requested an invite, i requested an intervention, i need to be organised, i need to be oriented, hope for inbox is all i have, some kind of systemisation to order the mess of loose ends i call an inbox right now.

from what I've seen this is quite a good, clean way of dealing with email. certainly much better than the current cluttered interface.

yeah the gmail app right now sucks (you seriously want me tapping every one of these i need to delete??), and as much as i was a mailbox partisan on my iphone now that i'm on android mailbox is perpetually hanging on login, so i need something better.

got my inbox beta yesterday and it's definitely not for me since i don't consider my inbox a todo list

another thing that is driving me nuts is that my app badge has a 5 on it indicating unread messages or something? but nothing inside the app seems to correspond to the number. i was swiping things done etc and nothing would change the badge number

gmail android is pig

ok by me what's wrong with it

u can set swipe to delete fyi

mailbox always seemed like some snake oil to me tbh, like oh i can ~attain mailbox zero~ by deferring everything til later wow u don't say

still dled it for the xtra dropbox gigs natch

gmail android she dont connect no more so good

she maybe dont send my mail for maybe some hours

she is pig

the mailbox-y features plus the pin feature are making this for me

"snooze" an item was always much more specific for me than a general "defer," it was always "when will i be somewhere i can deal with this," so i'm digging its integration here

the pin is a nice way to indicate "i've dealt with this once and will circle back to it once i'm done working my way down the list," i think.

but yeah god gmail android is awful

i haven't got an invite yet (tbh my gmail is just a backup spamtrap really) but feel like the stuff inbox is supposed to do would be way more useful replacing my work outlook client than my personal email account

ever since i got my android, i keep hating google more and more. their products are garbage. google+ is the biggest offender, especially on smartphones.

google the search engine used to be one of the greatest things on earth, but their dirty tactics and bad practices is pretty pathetic.

having said that, i'm willing to try inbox.

and sktsh otm, from what i've read so far about inbox.

p much everything else i use google products for works like a dream tbh

Yeah. Hate outlook so much.

the pin is a nice way to indicate "i've dealt with this once and will circle back to it once i'm done working my way down the list," i think.

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Friday, October 24, 2014 10:17 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oh you will circle back will you how very productive

i mean if i don't circle back things pile up and my life runs off the rails, so yeah i circle back

sounds like you are very proactive about getting things done

i often circle back

to the future

sounds like you are very proactive about getting things done

― everybody loves lana del raymond (s.clover), Saturday, October 25, 2014 9:13 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i try to be, it Works until it Doesn't

Google exists to mediate the unmediated. That's what it does.

That's what the company's search tool does: It mediates our relationship with the Internet.

That's why Google killed Google Reader, for example. Subscribing to an RSS feed and having an RSS reader deliver 100% of what the user signed up for in an orderly, linear and predictable and reliable fashion is a pointless business for Google.

It's also why I believe Google will kill Gmail as soon as it comes up with a mediated alternative everyone loves. Of course, Google may offer an antiquated "Gmail view" as a semi-obscure alternative to the default "Inbox"-like mediated experience.

But the bottom line is that dumb-pipe email is unmediated, and therefore it's a business that Google wants to get out of as soon as it can.

Say goodbye to the unmediated world of RSS, email and manual Web surfing. It was nice while it lasted. But there's just no money in it.

http://www.computerworld.com/article/2838775/why-google-wants-to-replace-gmail.html

Goddamn depressing

the thesis of that article is stupid it is a stupid article

gmail is good at selling us ads that is why it makes money

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Trying out Inbox. Snoozing, pinning, and marking complete are awesome but I don't see it being my primary way of using email in its current state.

i mean i use stars/favs for pinning and marking complete and snoozing i'm not sure of, so...

the thesis of that article is stupid it is a stupid article

― everybody loves lana del raymond (s.clover), Tuesday, October 28, 2014 4:16 PM (4 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah... the thing about replacing rss or google books; nothing depends on people using them. replacing gmail... i mean, the world runs on gmail

Anyone have an Inbox invite? sidewaysoul at gmail

Dooope, thank you.

~knowledge~ depends on google books

The new Google Contacts is really nice.

Couldn't be any worse than Google glasses

Logged in at work this morning and found that the browser I am forced to use at work (IE10) no longer supports Gmail, Drive or Calendar. wtf. Whatever happened to the idea of Google as some kind of open page, make-the-internet-more-user-friendly kind of thing. gah.

u gotta upgrade so yr browser can load all the links to google+ services that you'll never click on

Had to dump Safari for the same reasons.

I use google+ dammit.

heavy sigh

maybe check this out? https://support.google.com/mail/answer/181472?hl=en

Google is shifting everything to open standards and eliminating support for older proprietary workarounds like NPAPI (the N is for Netscape, remember them?) that inflated the codebase and impaired speed and security. Meanwhile, MS has long resisted standards and always glommed its own proprietary function calls unto its browsers.

Long overdue, IMO.

yeah, this is good

Wow, if you use the iOS Gmail app, don't update unless you'd like to lose the ability to copy/paste anything in the reply/forwarded field. They inexplicably took out a ton of other features, like being able to easily swipe-left on emails and having some options, entering a full signature, and a bunch of smaller downgrades.

the university where i work is a google campus, so all the business applications we use are google. gmail/google calendar does feel better than outlook though i have to say

So Google Inbox is on its way out. Shame, I really liked it. Back to Gmail, then.

was def easier to clear large amounts of junk mail at once

why does my gmail now look like a game for children

idk chrome has gone bollocksy on my phone today though

I’ve fired chrome from my phone and my main laptop

I also got an AOL.com account the other day for the lulz

on my mini i use Opera w/duckduckgo and Privacy Badger

I still want to ditch my Gmail account.. but good lord the websites I use it for! I probably have logins on 300+ websites using my Gmail address. I honestly don't know a way around that unless I pop open 1Password and start going through the list one by one, manually logging into sites, going to my profile info pages, and changing my email address?? and of course keeping Gmail around the entire time and probably for some time after just in case I've missed one.

Tombot what browser are you using now?

Firefox and Safari

As usual I want to recommend Fastmail to anyone who’ll listen. Email worth paying for! Use your own domain easily! Not Google!

Hotmail is p good

new firefox is better than chrome now in addition to not being chrome

yeah I generally use Firefox w/Noscript as per TOmbot's advice in an earlier thread

i switched over to pale moon when the new firefox broke several extensions i found important, but it might soon be time to switch back

Firefox is very slow on my laptop and it makes the fan rev up like crazy. I hate it. But since I get emails at 3 different addresses all day long, I have to keep Chrome, Safari and Firefox running simultaneously.

sounds like you woulda been a definite candidate for a standalone email client back when that was actually how everyone read their email anyway

you can be signed into 3 gmails at once, don't need 3 browsers open

hotmail, hot and mail

hate the new gmail look, especially since i never use hangouts and so have the right hand side of the screen filled by something useless. anyone know if there's a way to remove it?

the idea that people would use browser email is totally bizarre to me. why??

Cant install a client at work so browser it is

lonesome hobo, cast from computer to computer with no harbor but my browser login with which to complete the tasks assigned by my employer

same as j.
i don't use it that often, but every time i do it annoys me tbh

y'all are crazy, Gmail is the best

Yeah - work recently moved over from Lotus Notes and GMail is sooo good.

Though people are looking to turn off conversations because there is literally no learning some people.

hate the new gmail look, especially since i never use hangouts and so have the right hand side of the screen filled by something useless. anyone know if there's a way to remove it?

I don't have anything on the right of my screen except a tiny column with some buttons - calendar, keep, and tasks.

and even that has a button at the bottom to collapse it.

yeah i have that panel too. i also realised i'm an idiot and i just needed to deactivate the chat in my settings

I have to click on everything twice and it's slower.

And seeing that Gmail envelope animation every 35 seconds like it's the Batman logo doesn't help.

same

Remember dial up

∞ you've been particularly helpful lately

thank's

U put out luv to the world and u get it back is how i c it

mooks <3

the idea that people would use browser email is totally bizarre to me. why??

― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Friday, 28 September 2018 4:59 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Always flummoxed by this. I feel I should be using something better than Apple mail; what’s good?

eudora

compuserve

Apple Mail is pretty decent tbh

Mutt if you’re nasty

🐶

airmail's ok. that's what i use, along with spamsieve.

i'd probably use Apple Mail except there's a bug that renders all my IMAP email in black text with a black background. i even got a new hard drive, fresh install of high Sierra, did NOT restore any data, put all my info in from scratch and the bug was still there. only thing I've found online about it is something similar from like 2014 if you were running a beta or something..

bloatmail

https://medium.com/@boriscoder/peeking-under-the-hood-of-redesigned-gmail-dd84b532e0f5

i used to run a decade-out-of-date machine that was pretty taxed by browser usage, merely even loading the hangouts widget was an obvious bottleneck

but now on my fast new computer it still sometimes shows the 'something's wrong' error in that widget's frame intermittently

yup, it's considerably slower and glitchier since the update on 2 of my older pc's.

The way the official, promoted ads in my 'Promotions' tabs jump around about 2-5 seconds after I open the tab, ensuring I click on an ad instead of the actual email I want to open, is driving me bonkers. Even knowing it's coming and waiting a few extra seconds only works about half the time, they seem to have learned just how to time them.

Extra annoying that these two promoted ads are no longer consistently at the top of the page, easy to ignore.

gmail is trash

I used to like it. As I complained in another thread the search function is terrible, and Google’s core business is a search engine!

Use Fastmail (affiliate link) (https://fastmail.com <- not an affiliate link)

fastmail security supposed to be a bit shit? (full disclosure: i use fastmail for personal non spam email because i like it and don’t care)

have never heard that nor do I know what you might be referring to

have had no issues re gmail or search.
in fact, i have no 'promotions' tab !?

have never heard that nor do I know what you might be referring to

have had no issues re gmail or search.
in fact, i have no 'promotions' tab !?

Oh I mean in practice most email you send will be TLS encrypted between servers and if you use any email provider you’re kind of trusting your provider to not read your email no matter what, nothing special about Fastmail there. Also I’m sure their infra is deployed worldwide now the internet isn’t good enough in Australia to run a service from there I’m pretty sure

My impression of Australia is the whole country is sharing one asymmetric DSL connection that goes to Singapore and they each pay $89 a month for it

xxpost - I don't know if it was something with my settings, but several years ago my Gmail started appearing pre-screened into three tabs at the top - Primary, Promotions and Social. For the most part it does a pretty good job of sorting my incoming mail into the appropriate tabs, although I have had to do a little "training" for newsletters and such. I'm sure there's some setting for this, but I'm actually okay with it and I didn't do anything intentional to set up these tabs, they just showed up. The Promotions tab is the only one that had the embedded ads.

that sounds like a nightmare to me. if gmail had any advertising at all i would be gone immediately.

Yeah I've had the tab setup on the browser gmail for a few years, it happened automatically. Yes it has embedded ads but it also segregates useless promotional emails with a pretty high degree of accuracy (I also train it sometimes). Makes gmail an better experience overall, most days I don't even open the Promotions tab. In the app version, I use the Primary view, where Promotions is not a tab but they show up grouped together at the top of my email, which is slightly more annoying than the browser version

I have several Gmail accounts and only one of them has that "promotions" tab and only one or two emails ever get sent there. Usually they're notifications from Zoom or something stupid like that.

I think they offered me the promotions 'upgrade' a couple of years ago, I declined and they haven't asked me since.

The Promotions tab is great. Filters out all the offer emails from companies you've purchased from in the past etc

Very easy to quickly scan through the list to see if there's anything of interest and then bulk delete them.

It's fine, I'm sure it could be better but it's just frickin email and I don't care enough to change, though I'm sure there are better alternatives

it's super easy to customize / remove the tabs in gmail!

The Promotions tab is great. Filters out all the offer emails from companies you've purchased from in the past etc

Very easy to quickly scan through the list to see if there's anything of interest and then bulk delete them.

exactly! Recently I had to go through a bunch of emails on an old work computer where I was using MS Outlook (ah the days of configuring POP3 settings ...) and realized that having to sort through a bunch of promotional email from like Office Depot and gig announcements for concerts in places I will never go ... that used to be a major part of "my email lyfe" and now ... promotions tab + forums tab -- not any more.

Also! Also! being able to have multiple gmail account inboxes show in the app ... I think that was my technology excitement of the month when I figured that out tbh

Tried to set up an account for my mom, they want me to scan a QR code with my phone. Lol, fuck off

I guess I will just get her a Protonmail account, sucks to suck losers!!!!

Yeah you arent supposed to get the QR code when you are on an actual phone. Ugh.

Well, not my part of the company.

I'm on a computer!

Anyway, now the Protonmail account has been flagged for spam and needs me to enter a phone number for two-factor verification. I truly hate what the internet has become

was just saying this yesterday as I tried to save my fitbit account by moving it to an old gmail account, which not only was a total ballache but now i can't even agree the account at all. Phone-onlyapps can seriously fuck off - they used to have a desktop browser dashboard which they removed some years ago, so if I want to use my app I now have to buy a new phone, which I refuse to do because it otherwise works fine.

fairly sure I'm going to be forced into getting one at some point, but I'll hold out.

I do have a tablet I could have used, but that's set up on a "clean" gmail account which is unlinked to anything real, because it's mainly used by the kids. The fact you have to have one to use a device simply for a browser, photos, YouTube etc is infuriating.

I manage a google workspace for a non-profit - lots of volunteers, part-timers, retired folks - and just navigating folks through the process of adding a second account to their existing account and legit want to chew my arm off.

oh yes I did that as well. We had new people needing login access to it every year or so (with outgoing people being removed). Could never work out who the phone numbers belonged to for those who had to receive 'confirmation codes' on their phone - just unbelievably hard to manage access to it.