ExtremeTech: "Gmail: Stop The Whining"

[Suhit Gupta]

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1570399,00.asp?kc=ETRSS02129TX1K0000532

"Search engine superpower Google recently announced its intentions to offer free a Web mail service, called Gmail, to its users. Well, as we all know, no good deed goes unpunished and Gmail is no exception. As soon as the Internet giant announced the specifics of its offering, privacy advocates and others began lambasting the company, complaining that Google's policies would violate user's privacy rights. While legitimate feedback on such a service can be useful, some "advocates" have gone off the deep end and engaged in outright and crass demonization of Google."



So we haven't posted on Gmail for a while but I think it is time to stir that discussion up again . Gmail, Google's free 1GB of email storage service has given rise to a lot of controversy among those worried about privacy. Many people seemed horrified by the idea of their emails being scanned and were vehemently against it. From reading the comments on previous posts about Gmail here on DMT, most people didn't seem to care about Google scanning emails and doing their targeted advertising thing. But this article from extremetech.com looks at the service from the pro- standpoint (a very pro standpoint).

[Suhit Gupta]

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1570399,00.asp?kc=ETRSS02129TX1K0000532

"Search engine superpower Google recently announced its intentions to offer free a Web mail service, called Gmail, to its users. Well, as we all know, no good deed goes unpunished and Gmail is no exception. As soon as the Internet giant announced the specifics of its offering, privacy advocates and others began lambasting the company, complaining that Google's policies would violate user's privacy rights. While legitimate feedback on such a service can be useful, some "advocates" have gone off the deep end and engaged in outright and crass demonization of Google."



So we haven't posted on Gmail for a while but I think it is time to stir that discussion up again . Gmail, Google's free 1GB of email storage service has given rise to a lot of controversy among those worried about privacy. Many people seemed horrified by the idea of their emails being scanned and were vehemently against it. From reading the comments on previous posts about Gmail here on DMT, most people didn't seem to care about Google scanning emails and doing their targeted advertising thing. But this article from extremetech.com looks at the service from the pro- standpoint (a very pro standpoint).

[schergr]

It's about time someone else said this. I wrote a piece over on Weblogs Inc. entitled The Great GMail Debate of 2004. Basically it goes a little something like this. EVERYONE JUST SHUT UP ALREADY AND LEARN ABOUT TECHNOLOGY BEFORE YOU COMPLAIN ABOUT GOOGLE. <empahsis> mine

Actually, it starts out like this

"...The much maligned Google GMail service, while not even released to the general public has come under intense scrutiny. What appears to be lost in this whole debate is recognition of the fact that every single e-mail that we send and receive (there are always caveats here so bear with me) must traverse a series of points and pass through many different scans along its journey...."

Stop by and get the full scoop.

or just stop by my personal blog The Epicenter and tell me what a fool you think I am

[Gary Sheynkman]

It is so sad that when people get a free service they also demand that the provider takes a hit with ever customer....

[Tim Williamson]

Yeah that article makes some great points, if you're worried about privacy, DON'T USE gMail, don't use ANY free email service for that matter. Use PGP or some type of encryption.

And there goes the wonderful Democrats again, "concerned" about the little guy who's always being a victim to EVIL BIG BUSINESS. The big difference is that REAL victims don't choose to be victims...using gMail is a choice, you're not a victim if you use gMail, you're a willing user.

Anyone know if gMail will offer POP3 service? Would they just insert ads at the bottom of the email or something?

[Jason Dunn]

ExtremeTech has it nailed - this is a bunch of FUD and if people don't want to use the service, they don't have to. It's an unfortunate North American mentality where people hear about something and they think they have a RIGHT to it, then BITCH AND MOAN when it doesn't work exactly the way they think it should. :roll:

[Crocuta]

Yeah, I just don't get all the fuss. The only thing Google should have to do is be honest up front about what information is used and how it's used. That is, it shouldn't be able to be buried half way down a 30-page user agreement, but should be clearly noted at the time of registration so that people understand the tradeoff they're making. After that, if someone wants to agree to share their information in return for free email, that's their business. I must admit, I wouldn't like Google to scan all of my emails. So gosh, I guess I just won't sign up. Hey, that was easy!

[Jason Dunn]

Originally Posted by Crocuta

Yeah, I just don't get all the fuss. The only thing Google should have to do is be honest up front about what information is used and how it's used.

But that's the goofy part - the service isn't even public yet! It's on a limited, 1000 person beta, so most of the world has no basis to even complain yet... :roll:

[Gary Sheynkman]

Darn...I signed up for it too :lol:

Here is the thing though: hotmail is choke full of ads that largely suck (I dont want to date middle aged women nor do I plan on smoking either) If google can use key words like "digital" or "sony" to make ads that are atleast relevant to what the user recieves why haggle for it? Most corporate users dont use free email so why care about invasion of privacy (that is not actually there) oy :roll:

[coffeeFreak]

My concern with Gmail is not with privacy, but with reliability. Last I heard, Google uses commodity machines as their data center, massively clustered and redundant, they are able to afford machines going down (some for weeks before being replaced) all of these to reduce cost of operation. The unstability (and achieving service reliability through redundancy) works for indexing service, since index data are duplicated across multiple machines/database, and most machines are just doing index searching (not storing). I worry more about e-mails, if the *cheap* machine that my e-mail sit on went bye-bye, will I lose my e-mail? I haven't heard of any info regarding their different storage model, have anyone heard of anything?

[Steve]

If your e mail is important, I recomend getting a pay service which is well known for reliability. Free services aren't a great way to go if you deal with e mail that's important to you or others.

I don't get why people complain about gmail either. The only complaint I have is that it would be annoying trying to fill up one gig I love filling up space. With relevant stuff, anyhow.

I have a lot of respect for companies making leaps forward in improving services. If all they do is scan my e mail, so be it. I'd let them read it a million time sif they wanted to... If I'm using a free service, I expect nothing. People who act like google services owes them something or seem to think they are entitled to something are probably the same type of people who use programs like kazaa for poor reasons. Or maybe they really don't understand the basics of our western economies.

edit: Come to think of it, I really think 90% of the internet think everything on the 'net is supposed to be free. And so... It may as well be high quality. And hey, if they have to take the time to login and type their password and click the button and everyhting... I guess they deserve some sort of a pat on the back.