5 ms·

Hitting send on the next 15 years of Gmail

34 points by panarky 8y ago

airstrike 8y ago
I remember being absolutely amazed at how clean, fast and huge Gmail was. This post brings back great memories. I got an invite as I was an avid blogger user and signed up as early as 4/20/2004. Missed out on claiming firstname@gmail.com since my first name is only 5 letters long...
- scoutt 8y ago
  I was invited near that date and happened to grab lastname@gmail!
  - airstrike 8y ago
    Cool! Unfortunately my last name is also 5 letters long
- wlesieutre 8y ago
  You're probably lucky to not have firstname@gmail.com, it'd be inundated by idiots who don't know their own email address signing you up for things.
  - airstrike 8y ago
    You're probably right. I have firstlast@gmail.com and still receive countless e-mails meant to other recipients I once received itinerary details of the Brazilian VP's trip to South Korea...
  - trequartista 8y ago
    Absolutely. I have firstname.lastname@gmail.com. My first and last names are by no means common, but still I get emails, bank statements, job offers(!) and account recovery emails meant for others.
  - josteink 8y ago
    > You're probably lucky to not have firstname@gmail.com, it'd be inundated by idiots who don't know their own email Early on, first@gmail.com and yes absolutely. Even military fucking emails.
    - scoutt 8y ago
      > Even military fucking emails. This will be downvoted, but your comment made me smile for a second, thinking on what kind of strange pr0n about military is flooding your inbox.
  - s0rce 8y ago
    Ugh, same here, i have common first initial and common last name at Gmail. Almost daily emails to the wrong person.
  - ocdtrekkie 8y ago
    I have a six letter email address and have gotten mistyped emails tons of times. Once got an email welcoming me to the NRA, even. Had to let the NRA know that I was not, in fact, interested in being a member of the NRA.
  - Cthulhu_ 8y ago
    While my old email address isn't very common (old internet nickname + numbers), it still ended up on some list and it seems like someone (or some people) in a Spanish speaking country are using it to register accounts for Deezer, Netflix, etc; I don't understand why they can start a trial and use it right away without confirming their ownership of the e-mail address. Joke's on them, I've changed the password to those accounts. (note that my email address has NOT been compromised, it's got a unique password + 2FA).
  - MrMember 8y ago
    I have firstinitiallastname@gmail.com (I don't have a particularly common name) and I get a surprising amount of email not meant for me. People signing up for Facebook, Instagram, online orders, you name it.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
Justin_K 8y ago
Finally, official support for scheduled send!
gburdell3 8y ago
Still lightly salted they killed off Inbox, but at least they rolled most of its useful features back into Gmail.
- jonawesomegreen 8y ago
  I REALLY liked Inbox and I've been having a hard time going back to normal gmail. It's frustrating.
  - rickyc091 8y ago
    I'm using it until they completely kill it off. Wondering what happens to all my reminders and saved links?
- iEchoic 8y ago
  Gmail hasn’t felt like a replacement to Inbox to me. Inbox had an amazing way to only push me notifications about emails I actually care about, and the Trips tab was amazing for quickly grabbing flight and hotel information parsed from emails. Gmail’s notifications feel spammy and the Trips tab is gone.
  - gburdell3 8y ago
    I only used the default filters in Inbox (Primary, Promotions, and Social) and those seem to have made their way back over to Gmail for me. I was able to turn off notifications for the Promotions and Social folders and it (mostly) works the same now as Inbox did. The trip overviews are sorely missed though.
- aliljet 8y ago
  Inbox. Sigh, it really feels like inbox users were sold a bill of goods by the CEO of Google (https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/10/an-inbox-that-works-for-you.html https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/10/an-inbox-that-works-for...) and for five years with no directive otherwise, most of us committed to a product that certainly wasn't free (my data is for sale because I used this tool). Today, I open their app which my data paid for and I'm greeted with a giant middle finger. Something seems wrong. Some random PM didn't promise me this product. The CEO did. This relationship with a giant service provider (Google) feels more like the relationship I loathe with the average monopolizing telecom. I've been taken advantage of and my commitment in the end to this, as I learn, unclear experiment has generated enormous benefits for Google and today results in a frustrating realisation that I wasted my time trying for years to make it work. One day, I really do hope there's a way I can take my email address and leave Google. Number portability deserves an analog in the email world.
WA 8y ago
> You could also store 1GB of data for free—nearly 100 times what was available at the time. "You could also store 1GB of data in exchange for letting us read your emails and build an Ad profile based on everything you do in Gmail – nearly 100 times what was available at the time, because no one else dared to do something similar and had no means to profit from this data." Privacy-aware folks, it's time to move on if you haven't done already.
- vcavallo 8y ago
  done! proton mail is turning out to be a great though not perfect alternative.
  - mft_ 8y ago
    What are the downsides of Proton Mail? I'm on Gmail currently, but interested...
    - berbec 8y ago
      For me, storage space limitations and requirement to use the Proton App or WebMail to access my mail keep me from switching. I have 15GB in gmail and proton only offers 5GB for a single user plan. You can't use a regular email client with Proton without some proxy software. [1] https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/third-party-email-client-integration-outlook-thunderbird-apple-mail-ect/ https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/third-party-em...
    - CedarMadness 8y ago
      I've been a paid user for about 4 years now, here are my main gripes: It doesn't have a calendar, so you can't send or accept meeting invites if that's something you need to do. They keep saying they're going to open source the app when the next version comes out, but development seems super slow on that front, no major app updates in a couple of years. They have a bridge app that lets you use outlook, thunderbird, etc. and it works great, but the Linux version has been in beta for about 2 years, and you have to email someone to get on the beta list.
malvosenior 8y ago
I really hope I'm not using Gmail in 15 years. Gmail as a product has gotten progressively worse over the years. Google as a company has gotten progressively worse over the years. They make the worst product decisions of all the large tech companies (seriously, how many chat platforms will they create and kill in those 15 years). I use Fastmail for somethings but sadly it's not quite as good as Gmail (and not as bad in many ways). Anyone care to wager what an idealized email platform will look like in 15 years?
- 52-6F-62 8y ago
  > Anyone care to wage what an idealized email platform will look like in 15 years? Now this is a good question. I've wondered (half-assedly) myself recently. I've been on the gmail hook since 2005 (I remember getting approved for the Beta and how in awe I was of having a whole GB of online storage). I've grown so accustomed to the use of gmail that I have a hard time distinguishing what it is that really holds me there. One item is ubiquity. Everyone knows it now so there's no ambiguity about the address as long as one knows the name I use. That's not a huge detail, but one minor feature I find I don't have to think about. Outside of that I think the main deterrent to changing is the migration process. It sucks. I'm hesitant to move from one external provider to another as my faith in the longevity of other services has waned over the years. That said I'm also hesitant to run my own node because of the maintenance and security concerns. I'm not abreast to any innovations in the space, however. I'd also love to hear from others who might have a lot more experience and knowledge in the area.
  - ocdtrekkie 8y ago
    One of the things I do miss about Gmail is how a lot of restaurant receipt systems and the like have an "@gmail.com" button, but I have to type my full email address out every time, it's definitely a longer process to read over the phone too. I recommend even if you are not ready to migrate away from Gmail though, to hedge your bets and make the migration process easier eventually. Get an email address at your own domain name, and forward it straight to your Gmail. Over time, adjust all your accounts and contacts to send to your new, forwarded address. Then if it any time, you need to move providers, all you have to do is change where your address is forwarded to (and of course, use IMAP to drag all your old emails from Gmail to the new service). I spent about a year and a half using Gmail, but migrating things over to my own email address. Make it a lot easier when the time came.
azhenley 8y ago
I remember just how different Gmail felt compared to everything else back then. When is something going to come along and revolutionize email again?
- airstrike 8y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wave
Yuioup 8y ago
Is Gmail still made with Angular?
- Cthulhu_ 8y ago
  Was it ever? It predates Angular by at least 5 years (iirc Angular was first conceived in 2009 and used for google's help pages)
mark_l_watson 8y ago
I probably won’t see the improvements in G Suite for a (long?) while but that is OK. I use G Suite for Cloud Search that gives me one Search form for all my stuff on Drive, Gmail, docs, etc. Still, I wish they would be faster rolling new stuff out to paying customers.
ken 8y ago
Full automatic replies remind me of the demos of the robot calling on the phone to book an appointment. It's slightly creepy, and I wish there were an indicator that it was written by machine. Even with plain autocorrect, these days, it's scary how often I read something and later discover it's not at all what the author intended. I can't think of any software feature, offhand, with "Smart" in the name that I didn't end up hating and wanting to disable. Why do companies keep pushing these?
- airstrike 8y ago
  > I can't think of any software feature, offhand, with "Smart" in the name that I didn't end up hating and wanting to disable. Why do companies keep pushing these? Because other people don't hate them as much, and you're free not to use the suggestions. Have you checked the Gmail settings to see if there really isn't a way to turn it off? Also, this may not seem like a big deal on the desktop client, but wait until you're carrying groceries on both hands and trying to send a quick but urgent e-mail... it really does address that occasional frustrating moment
- panarky 8y ago
  I've found the smart reply feature to be moderately useful. Some people wire their homes to turn on lights and TVs when they get home. I don't find that creepy because I know that it's just an electro-mechanical process. Same thing with ML-driven features like smart replies. It's amazing, but it's just math and logic, so I don't find it creepy. More of this, please.
matthewfelgate 8y ago
Bring back Inbox.
everdev 8y ago
Many people have multiple Gmail addresses (personal, work, etc.), but as far as I know there's no way way too unify them. In Chrome you need two tabs open and in the mobile app there's no way to default to 'All Inboxes'. It's a huge pain point.
- ihuman 8y ago
  I'm surprised they never copied the iOS Mail app's "All Inboxes" feature.
- JRKLabs 8y ago
  The official Gmail app, DOES have an "All Inboxes" feature now. It's a life saver!
  - everdev 8y ago
    The mobile app does, but you can't default to it, so you have to do two taps: "Menu" -> "All Inboxes" every time you open the app if that's the view you prefer.
yodon 8y ago
I know we're all supposed to love gmail but I find Outlook (including the free web based versions on hotmail.com and outlook.com accounts) to be a far better fit to the way I want to handle messages than gmail.
pieter_mj 8y ago
I like Gmail's interface in the "Gmail's 15th Birthday"-video much better than the current one!
craftinator 8y ago
"First off, we’re making Gmail more assistive" Please, just fucking stop. I know how to write my own emails; everyone does. Every single assistive feature introduced to Gmail has been a regression.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

34 points by panarky 8y ago

I remember being absolutely amazed at how clean, fast and huge Gmail was. This post brings back great memories. I got an invite as I was an avid blogger user and signed up as early as 4/20/2004. Missed out on claiming firstname@gmail.com since my first name is only 5 letters long...

scoutt 8y ago
I was invited near that date and happened to grab lastname@gmail!
- airstrike 8y ago
  Cool! Unfortunately my last name is also 5 letters long
wlesieutre 8y ago
You're probably lucky to not have firstname@gmail.com, it'd be inundated by idiots who don't know their own email address signing you up for things.
- airstrike 8y ago
  You're probably right. I have firstlast@gmail.com and still receive countless e-mails meant to other recipients I once received itinerary details of the Brazilian VP's trip to South Korea...
- trequartista 8y ago
  Absolutely. I have firstname.lastname@gmail.com. My first and last names are by no means common, but still I get emails, bank statements, job offers(!) and account recovery emails meant for others.
- josteink 8y ago
  > You're probably lucky to not have firstname@gmail.com, it'd be inundated by idiots who don't know their own email Early on, first@gmail.com and yes absolutely. Even military fucking emails.
  - scoutt 8y ago
    > Even military fucking emails. This will be downvoted, but your comment made me smile for a second, thinking on what kind of strange pr0n about military is flooding your inbox.
- s0rce 8y ago
  Ugh, same here, i have common first initial and common last name at Gmail. Almost daily emails to the wrong person.
- ocdtrekkie 8y ago
  I have a six letter email address and have gotten mistyped emails tons of times. Once got an email welcoming me to the NRA, even. Had to let the NRA know that I was not, in fact, interested in being a member of the NRA.
- Cthulhu_ 8y ago
  While my old email address isn't very common (old internet nickname + numbers), it still ended up on some list and it seems like someone (or some people) in a Spanish speaking country are using it to register accounts for Deezer, Netflix, etc; I don't understand why they can start a trial and use it right away without confirming their ownership of the e-mail address. Joke's on them, I've changed the password to those accounts. (note that my email address has NOT been compromised, it's got a unique password + 2FA).
- MrMember 8y ago
  I have firstinitiallastname@gmail.com (I don't have a particularly common name) and I get a surprising amount of email not meant for me. People signing up for Facebook, Instagram, online orders, you name it.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

Justin_K 8y ago

Finally, official support for scheduled send!

gburdell3 8y ago

Still lightly salted they killed off Inbox, but at least they rolled most of its useful features back into Gmail.

jonawesomegreen 8y ago
I REALLY liked Inbox and I've been having a hard time going back to normal gmail. It's frustrating.
- rickyc091 8y ago
  I'm using it until they completely kill it off. Wondering what happens to all my reminders and saved links?
iEchoic 8y ago
Gmail hasn’t felt like a replacement to Inbox to me. Inbox had an amazing way to only push me notifications about emails I actually care about, and the Trips tab was amazing for quickly grabbing flight and hotel information parsed from emails. Gmail’s notifications feel spammy and the Trips tab is gone.
- gburdell3 8y ago
  I only used the default filters in Inbox (Primary, Promotions, and Social) and those seem to have made their way back over to Gmail for me. I was able to turn off notifications for the Promotions and Social folders and it (mostly) works the same now as Inbox did. The trip overviews are sorely missed though.
aliljet 8y ago
Inbox. Sigh, it really feels like inbox users were sold a bill of goods by the CEO of Google (https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/10/an-inbox-that-works-for-you.html https://gmail.googleblog.com/2014/10/an-inbox-that-works-for...) and for five years with no directive otherwise, most of us committed to a product that certainly wasn't free (my data is for sale because I used this tool). Today, I open their app which my data paid for and I'm greeted with a giant middle finger. Something seems wrong. Some random PM didn't promise me this product. The CEO did. This relationship with a giant service provider (Google) feels more like the relationship I loathe with the average monopolizing telecom. I've been taken advantage of and my commitment in the end to this, as I learn, unclear experiment has generated enormous benefits for Google and today results in a frustrating realisation that I wasted my time trying for years to make it work. One day, I really do hope there's a way I can take my email address and leave Google. Number portability deserves an analog in the email world.

WA 8y ago

> You could also store 1GB of data for free—nearly 100 times what was available at the time. "You could also store 1GB of data in exchange for letting us read your emails and build an Ad profile based on everything you do in Gmail – nearly 100 times what was available at the time, because no one else dared to do something similar and had no means to profit from this data." Privacy-aware folks, it's time to move on if you haven't done already.

vcavallo 8y ago
done! proton mail is turning out to be a great though not perfect alternative.
- mft_ 8y ago
  What are the downsides of Proton Mail? I'm on Gmail currently, but interested...
  - berbec 8y ago
    For me, storage space limitations and requirement to use the Proton App or WebMail to access my mail keep me from switching. I have 15GB in gmail and proton only offers 5GB for a single user plan. You can't use a regular email client with Proton without some proxy software. [1] https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/third-party-email-client-integration-outlook-thunderbird-apple-mail-ect/ https://protonmail.com/support/knowledge-base/third-party-em...
  - CedarMadness 8y ago
    I've been a paid user for about 4 years now, here are my main gripes: It doesn't have a calendar, so you can't send or accept meeting invites if that's something you need to do. They keep saying they're going to open source the app when the next version comes out, but development seems super slow on that front, no major app updates in a couple of years. They have a bridge app that lets you use outlook, thunderbird, etc. and it works great, but the Linux version has been in beta for about 2 years, and you have to email someone to get on the beta list.

malvosenior 8y ago

I really hope I'm not using Gmail in 15 years. Gmail as a product has gotten progressively worse over the years. Google as a company has gotten progressively worse over the years. They make the worst product decisions of all the large tech companies (seriously, how many chat platforms will they create and kill in those 15 years). I use Fastmail for somethings but sadly it's not quite as good as Gmail (and not as bad in many ways). Anyone care to wager what an idealized email platform will look like in 15 years?

52-6F-62 8y ago
> Anyone care to wage what an idealized email platform will look like in 15 years? Now this is a good question. I've wondered (half-assedly) myself recently. I've been on the gmail hook since 2005 (I remember getting approved for the Beta and how in awe I was of having a whole GB of online storage). I've grown so accustomed to the use of gmail that I have a hard time distinguishing what it is that really holds me there. One item is ubiquity. Everyone knows it now so there's no ambiguity about the address as long as one knows the name I use. That's not a huge detail, but one minor feature I find I don't have to think about. Outside of that I think the main deterrent to changing is the migration process. It sucks. I'm hesitant to move from one external provider to another as my faith in the longevity of other services has waned over the years. That said I'm also hesitant to run my own node because of the maintenance and security concerns. I'm not abreast to any innovations in the space, however. I'd also love to hear from others who might have a lot more experience and knowledge in the area.
- ocdtrekkie 8y ago
  One of the things I do miss about Gmail is how a lot of restaurant receipt systems and the like have an "@gmail.com" button, but I have to type my full email address out every time, it's definitely a longer process to read over the phone too. I recommend even if you are not ready to migrate away from Gmail though, to hedge your bets and make the migration process easier eventually. Get an email address at your own domain name, and forward it straight to your Gmail. Over time, adjust all your accounts and contacts to send to your new, forwarded address. Then if it any time, you need to move providers, all you have to do is change where your address is forwarded to (and of course, use IMAP to drag all your old emails from Gmail to the new service). I spent about a year and a half using Gmail, but migrating things over to my own email address. Make it a lot easier when the time came.

azhenley 8y ago

I remember just how different Gmail felt compared to everything else back then. When is something going to come along and revolutionize email again?

airstrike 8y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wave https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wave

Yuioup 8y ago

Is Gmail still made with Angular?

Cthulhu_ 8y ago
Was it ever? It predates Angular by at least 5 years (iirc Angular was first conceived in 2009 and used for google's help pages)

mark_l_watson 8y ago

I probably won’t see the improvements in G Suite for a (long?) while but that is OK. I use G Suite for Cloud Search that gives me one Search form for all my stuff on Drive, Gmail, docs, etc. Still, I wish they would be faster rolling new stuff out to paying customers.

ken 8y ago

Full automatic replies remind me of the demos of the robot calling on the phone to book an appointment. It's slightly creepy, and I wish there were an indicator that it was written by machine. Even with plain autocorrect, these days, it's scary how often I read something and later discover it's not at all what the author intended. I can't think of any software feature, offhand, with "Smart" in the name that I didn't end up hating and wanting to disable. Why do companies keep pushing these?

airstrike 8y ago
> I can't think of any software feature, offhand, with "Smart" in the name that I didn't end up hating and wanting to disable. Why do companies keep pushing these? Because other people don't hate them as much, and you're free not to use the suggestions. Have you checked the Gmail settings to see if there really isn't a way to turn it off? Also, this may not seem like a big deal on the desktop client, but wait until you're carrying groceries on both hands and trying to send a quick but urgent e-mail... it really does address that occasional frustrating moment
panarky 8y ago
I've found the smart reply feature to be moderately useful. Some people wire their homes to turn on lights and TVs when they get home. I don't find that creepy because I know that it's just an electro-mechanical process. Same thing with ML-driven features like smart replies. It's amazing, but it's just math and logic, so I don't find it creepy. More of this, please.

matthewfelgate 8y ago

Bring back Inbox.

everdev 8y ago

Many people have multiple Gmail addresses (personal, work, etc.), but as far as I know there's no way way too unify them. In Chrome you need two tabs open and in the mobile app there's no way to default to 'All Inboxes'. It's a huge pain point.

ihuman 8y ago
I'm surprised they never copied the iOS Mail app's "All Inboxes" feature.
JRKLabs 8y ago
The official Gmail app, DOES have an "All Inboxes" feature now. It's a life saver!
- everdev 8y ago
  The mobile app does, but you can't default to it, so you have to do two taps: "Menu" -> "All Inboxes" every time you open the app if that's the view you prefer.

yodon 8y ago

I know we're all supposed to love gmail but I find Outlook (including the free web based versions on hotmail.com and outlook.com accounts) to be a far better fit to the way I want to handle messages than gmail.

pieter_mj 8y ago

I like Gmail's interface in the "Gmail's 15th Birthday"-video much better than the current one!

craftinator 8y ago

"First off, we’re making Gmail more assistive" Please, just fucking stop. I know how to write my own emails; everyone does. Every single assistive feature introduced to Gmail has been a regression.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]