I heard something about google claiming the contents of your emails as their own intelectual property. Is this true, if so I would see that as a major down side. I must admit it sounds far fetched.

claiming the contents of your emails as their own intelectual property

I think this legend springs from the fact that Gmail does parse your email text so they can display their targeted Google Ads... Frankly I find this feature to be hysterical at times (depending on the contents of your emails)...

I'm wondering how they can afford it. But that's not my problem to worry about

Google makes a fortune off of advertising, and the sale of their search technology to companies and schools. The Keyhole GIS service they purchased last year is also bringing in money. Google is pretty much THE search engine right now. I know very few people who use anything but it, so it makes sense for everyone to want to advertise through it.

Google:
All your data are belong to us.

Hey, Google is great. But remember that Google is in the information parsing buisiness. They are digging out a really big cave, and inviting everyone to fill it with gold. Selling AdWords is nothing. Having a pulse beat on a huge segment of the consumer society is where the real money is at. 2GB is not a feature, it is just marketing. Few people store that much data in their accounts so they don't need to worry about that. But it is a simple, one line bullet statement that says why they are "better" than everyone understands.

It doesn't matter if you use it or not, though. Everyone else will. Google has already won.

I admit I pay $20/yr for my yahoo account, but that comes with 2gb of storage (that I will never use).  I like pop with webmail, and that is why I use Yahoo.

Gmail has POP. Also we're at about 3 gigs now with storage.

They are digging out a really big cave, and inviting everyone to fill it with gold

As long as they continue to churn out free eatures for what is fast becoming a distributed network GUI then I could give a shit if they want to fill their cave with my misspelled "gold" email... It certainly is only gold for them and not at all for me. Perhaps they really do have the Midas touch then?

I like pop with webmail

Me too, thats why I use gmail The main thing I love about gmail is the blinding speed though.

2GB is not a feature, it is just marketing

Actually it is a feature when you use it as a network drive accessible from anywhere on the Web. Find the hack yourself though:)

 

Actually it is a feature when you use it as a network drive accessible from anywhere on the Web. Find the hack yourself though:)

Well, I am not going to get rid of Yahoo, but I may look at Gmail for that reason.

Its called GMail Drive. Google it. It works right in Windows Explorer.

Its called GMail Drive

Aww I wanted Tal to work for it:) It does in fact rock.

how come it says that there is less storage now than what it shows in the first post's image? it says that there was 2106.654143 MB of storage. But now the site says that there is less. 2105.900693 MB.

is less storage now than what it shows in the first post's image

Storage = #users/Drive capacity therefore if there are periods of time when no drives are added but users are signing up then Storage_then > Storage_now.

Google is pretty much THE search engine right now. I know very few people who use anything but it, so it makes sense for everyone to want to advertise through it.

I don't use Google much directly. I'm not sure why but I have an odd loyalty to Yahoo! Of course Yahoo! is partly powered by Google (they don't seem to advertise that fact anymore...odd that)so I guess you can't really escape its evil clutches.

how come it says that there is less storage now than what it shows in the first post's image?

I could be wrong, but it is also worth noting that once the April 1st announcement started the increase in capacity was somewhat time-zone dependent (so that folks hit 2 gigs around the end of the day). It is entirely possible that the number is less because you are an hour or two behind the poster (hence the 'clock' is a little behind as well.

Just a thought.