An Open Letter to Gmail: Happy Halloween! We love your costume!
Posted Oct 31st 2008 12:56PM by Webmail Team
Happy Halloween Gmail! We knew you would have the best costume at the party, and who can blame you? We think it's great that you're using this holiday to pay homage to the one who started it all, who got 35 million people online at once, gave them all email, great content and messaging capabilities, and even created a forum that encouraged them to speak in emoticons.
That costume is fabulous...clearly, the devil is in the details... and what's that you've got there? An "experimental" instant-messaging feature built right into your mail service so people can use it to send text messages to their contacts' phones? We love it – that was such a hit when we first introduced it so many years ago. We tried to make it easy: telling users to simply open the AIM panel in their email type "+1 and the 10-digit cell phone number" into the To: Screen Name box. It's kind of fun, too – good choice!
And those sidebar options – talk about getting it right... Adding gadgets to email that allow people to manage their calendars, access their favorite content and best Websites? Nice work. The idea of adding a side panel like that was one of our best. Giving people the ability to get to their favorite places on the Web, manage their schedules and IM right from their email home page tripled the convenience of our service. We're sure you'll get lots of compliments.
Finally, is that an "attachment warning" popping up on your back? Nice touch. We know nothing is more embarrassing than having to send an email twice because you forgot the attachment. Our users love this little reminder, and they have been praising it since we first implemented it back in 2007.
They say imitation is the best form of flattery, so Gmail, we thank you and we are indeed very flattered. Putting together a costume that is so dead-on could not have been easy, and you've got it down pat. Trying to convince all the other kids at the party that the only thing to use is Gmail and putting out a press release every time you add a new button to the service is just so 1998. We're telling you – this outfit brings back memories!
Here's a tip though... the Web's getting more personal, and people are really savvy at customizing their own services. When you don this same costume next year, make sure you check out www.tunome.com first and add some third party services (see our new Yahoo! plug-in) – you can't be all Gmail all the time any more – it won't be such a big hit next year!
Happy Halloween!
Add your comments
Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.
When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link to confirm your comment, and a password. To leave another comment, just use that password.
To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make it a live link for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted — no need to use <p> or <br> tags.
AOL Mail Team on Twitter
AOL Mail Team on Facebook
Most Recent Comments
About the Blog
This blog is published and maintained by the Mail team at AOL.
Please share your comments with us. You can bookmark this blog at: http://mailblog.aol.com or use AOL Keyword: Mail Blog
P.S.: Constructive criticisms are encouraged, but any comments with profanity, non-advancing communications, defamatory, objectionable, offensive, venting content will be removed. Please keep the topics product-related. Thanks for keeping this area "family-safe."
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 5)
41. what, did someone get drunk and write this up? what a total douche-tastic thing to write.
Posted at 1:09AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by jjudge
42. You've got mail, but I've got Gmail! =^_^=
Posted at 1:52AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Torley
43. This is sad AOL, the time you spent to write this up should be the time you should see what you could be doing to better up yourselves. This is sad...
Posted at 1:11AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by redzeroshift
44. Take your pills, gramps. You're going to have a stroke! You're no longer relevant. Who uses AOL mail in 2008, anyway?
Posted at 2:04AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Adel Ortega
45. AOL also pioneered the concept of being "the most publicly hated company ever to be involved with the Internet".
Strangely, Google has yet to rip that one off.
Posted at 2:35AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Graham
46. Me too!
Ahhh... usenet. *sigh*
Posted at 2:41AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by cytizen
47. AOL still has email?
Posted at 12:20PM on Nov 3rd 2008 by ez
48. When is Gmail going to implement that great feature that automatically deletes emails after you read them? That's my favorite AOL mail perk!
Posted at 3:33AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Eli
49. AOL you forgot to mention your biggest achievements: time travel (because that's the only way you could have come up with these features first)
Posted at 3:27AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by san
50. I'm sure I'm not the only person out there who rolls their eyes when they see an @aol e-mail address... so out of touch.
Posted at 5:45AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by katie
51. Ugh. Are you still here? You were a horrible company and you got what you friggin deserved.
Posted at 8:28PM on Nov 16th 2008 by Firsty McLastname
52. To all people commenting on this blogpost - thanks, havent had so much fun reading comments on a hungover Sunday for ages! And this gmail feature would be handy for people submitting blogposts at AOL:
http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2008/10/new-in-labs-stop-sending-mail-you-later.html
Posted at 10:19AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by D to the AN
53. Hey folks,
This entry truly speaks to the lack of professionalism, pride and accessibility to the industry. I have a response to this blog entry on my blog, listing seven key improvements you can make on this blog.
http://www.joemanna.com/blog/open-letter-to-aol-you-still-dont-get-it/
I look forward to your thoughts.
Thanks,
Joe Manna
http://www.joemanna.com/blog/
Posted at 11:16AM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Joe Manna
54. FAIL
Posted at 12:23PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Rafael
55. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL#Controversies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gmail#Criticisms
AOL disgusts me.
I have had well over $2000.00 in unauthorized charges in the past from them. You know how much I've had from Google/GMail?
Zero.
I've had several (Somewhere around 50+) pretty daunting security/technical issues with AOL in the past.
Know how many I have had from Google/Gmail?
Zero.
I've spent an average of one to one and a half hours on the phone attempting to get in contact with someone at AOL who not only spoke English, but could help me with ANY problem.
Know how long I have spent on hold with Google/GMail?
Wait...
...I've never had to contact Google/GMail with a problem.
AOL: Grow up and stop worrying about the people that have obviously taken your spot as "Teh Awsumness" and worry more about making your product more reliable.
Try hiring CS Reps who are not complete douchebags.
Stop with all the account retention BS.
And for fuck's sake.
Stop hiring people that can't even communicate with others.
Posted at 12:42PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Baker
56. I'm not a huge fan of AOL from times past but you have to admit that the company seems to be doing a lot of things right. Pity that it was 8 years too late... But I applaud AOL for calling out Google. The company is putting out tons of derivative products and calling them out as innovative: the functionality referred to has been on AOL and Yahoo for years. iGoogle is a ripoff of Netvibes and My Yahoo, not to mention all the other so called personalized pages there. The media is giving google a pass and has been for all these years. Derivative product, bloated bureacracy and a holier-than-thou attitude that is reminiscent of the religious right.
Posted at 2:00PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by ernani415
57. [This is the second time having submitted this, luckily I had the sense to copy what I had written into a notepad file before submitting because I knew there was a high chance of something going wrong if AOL was involved, which is funny because I called that out in my originally written body that you can see below]:
Lol wow AOL, don't flatter yourself, your service may have been a user friendly way to get online nearly 10 years ago, but since then your program has become a bloated, resource hungry piece of crap. It has been many years since I actually used the AOL desktop program; I really hope your keyword: FTP interface isn't still using graphics from 1997, as it was sometime in 2003. Just let me say this before I even start talking about your online mail app: Your desktop program clearly lacked any fundamental design philosophies other than "ADD MORE FEATURES", and unfortunately that left your program being so cluttered and unorganized, that even the programmers forgot about certain areas of it.
Now, on to your mail web app. I stopped using your desktop program many years ago, unfortunately I did continue to use your email through the web interface for a few years following. During that time I can recall much frusturation with your service, ranging from frequently disapearing emails that took hours to write, a horrible interface, and the fact that you used the bottom of my emails to advertise to my contacts. I used to select all and copy every email I sent through AOL mail in case it didn't go through, luckily I would have it 'backed up' and could paste the body into a new email.
The only reason that I continued to use AOL mail, despite many extreme annoyances, was because it was my first email address and it was my only method of communication to contacts. Unfortunately, being the only option around doesn't mean you have a good service. I read around the web that gmail was good, and after finally having enough of AOL mail, I made the switch. Now, I have to compliment you on one aspect of AOL mail, and that is the ability to pull mail out of an @aol.com mailbox via IMAP. This made my transition to Gmail very smooth because all of my old AOL mail would get pulled directly into my new Gmail account (and get filtered with MUCH better spam filters). Probably the best part is that I could send mail through my Gmail but keep my @aol.com account as the sender. So I didn't have to lose any of my old contacts, or ever again check your terrible web app for old mail.
Gmail is leagues beyond AOL mail, please stop trying to flatter yourself.
Signed,
A very pleased Gmail user
P.S. I actually laugh (in a joking kind of way) at people who tell me that they have an @aol.com email address. Generally the first words out of my mouth after that chortle are "why would you use AOL mail? ewww."
P.P.S. I'm going to ctrl+a then ctrl+v what I have written here because I know from experience that when using anything AOL related, you have a high probability of losing your work.
Posted at 2:28PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Benz145
58. Wait, AOL is still in business? I thought they went out with dial-up?
Posted at 2:51PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Chad
59. Ahahaha! That was hilarious AOL, you kill!! Oh wait, you were being serious? You seriously think you are competition to GMail?
Maybe if you could stop treating people like shit and didn't force people to pay for your crap we would take you seriously. Unfortunately you have proven time and time again that you are not worthy of our service... Google on the other hand is completely free and is constantly coming out with new ideas and improvements on their already o-so-wonderful GMail.
Cry more. We LIKE it.
Posted at 4:45PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by Emily
60. ha! Pathetic.
the difference betwixt the two "costumes":
>People LOVE gmail's costume
>People HATE yours.
...figure it out
Posted at 3:46PM on Nov 2nd 2008 by parkerj