I've been a Gmail fan long before I actually migrated to it. More than a year ago I wrote up a few tricks on how Gmail Can Boost Your Non-Gmail Productivity - this post still gets a lot of hits, although the my Gmail-usage evolved renders most advice there obsolete.
When I started using Gmail with my own domain, I continued downloading it to Outlook for a while. I no longer needed my paid email service, but frankly, the benefit was not saving $0.99 a month, but the much better spam-filter and to dual access (pop and native Gmail online). Then I realized I was missing out on some of the best productivity enhancements Gmail offers by not using it's native interface, at the same time grew sick of the ever-growing number of Windows, Outlook, Office problems, so I finally cut the umbilical cord, and moved (almost) entirely online. I'm Outlook-free, using Gmail (at least for now) as my email service and Zoho for everything else. My How to Import All Your Archive Email Into Gmail became a classic, 50 thousand or so people read it here, not counting the numerous re-posts.
So I am in Love with Gmail... but that love may not last forever. It takes two to ....
Not long after I made the transition, Gmail started to have performance problems. Occasional outages, just for a few minutes, sometimes seconds. When it works, it's no longer lighting fast. Recently I'm starting to wonder what happened to its legendary strength: the spam filter. Look at my Inbox this morning:
Yes, this is the Inbox, not the Spam filter. There is actually one (!) legitimate mail there, the rest is crap. I looked inside, they are not even using the image-trick to bypass spam filtering: all are the most traditional text emails, most of them the "classic Nigerian type" - Gmail's filter must be sleeping (perhaps enjoying one of the many Google perks?)
Gmail, my dear, I still love you ... I think... but you know, my love is not eternal. I'd like to be loved back - sooner, rather than later.
Update: A (somewhat) related post at Web Worker Daily: 3 Ways to getting email without Spam. I tried and promoted method#1, "plus addressing"; the only problem is that far too many places won't accept the [email protected] format as a valid email address. Besides, smart spammers have likely already automated the removal of the +tag portion.
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