Facebook e-mail: The battle with Google heats up
Today could see a new battle between Google and Facebook.
Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg
At 10:00 Pacific time, Facebook is expected to launch an e-mail service that will challenge Google's Gmail and further tie its own 500-million-plus users to Facebook products.
Tech news blog Techcrunch reported that the service is known as Project Titan, "unofficially referred to internally as its 'Gmail killer'". Of course, Google is not the only company that would be affected by the rumoured product. Other e-mail providers include AOL, Yahoo with 303 million users and kingpin Microsoft with 384 million users.
At the weekend, AOL announced a timely preview of Project Phoenix, an update to its e-mail service. The press release did not specify how many people use AOL mail but did say that it "remains an important part of AOL's business; in fact it represents 45 percent of the page views on the AOL network today".
If the rumours of "@facebook.com" addresses are accurate, imagine the clamour for tom@facebook.com, dick@facebook.com and even maggie@facebook.com - addresses which carry a certain cachet because they will seem so "in" with Facebook. "Hey, look at me: I don't even need my last name!"
But I digress from the rivalry between Facebook and Google.
The thing to remember is that Facebook's users are a very engaged bunch; with so much of their information locked in Facebook's walled garden, they are the envy of Google which is unable to trawl through all that data and point adverts at them.
On Facebook, people share status updates and photos, write on one another's walls, buy and send virtual goods, play games, ask questions, and check into places and cash in on deals. Add a decent e-mail service to the mix and you need almost never leave.
In return, Facebook will get to know more about you and your interactions with friends and colleagues: where you shop, where you are going on holiday and what you are up to this coming weekend and in the future. It will know more about your work, likes, dislikes and contacts. And of course all this e-mail will be personally identifiable and open to monetisation through advertising.
Worrying stuff for Google.
A report by the research firm Gartner says that "greater availability of social-networking-services, coupled with changing demographics and work styles, will lead 20% of employees to use social networks as their business communications' hub by 2014."
"The rigid distinction between e-mail and social networks will erode," says Gartner senior research vice president Monica Basso.
"E-mail will take on many social attributes, such as contact brokering, while social networks will develop richer e-mail capabilities."
The Facebook e-mail rumours followed a very public spat about address books. Google recently blocked Facebook from importing Gmail contacts because Facebook was keeping its own contacts private. Google says it believes in the open sharing of such data.
Last week Google awarded its staff an across-the-board 10% pay increase in an attempt to stem the flow of talent to Facebook, seen by many as having a more innovative culture because of its smaller size.
Facebook has around 2,000 staff; Google has 23,000. Recent high-profile departures included Lars Rasmussen who created Wave - which was nixed because it wasn't getting enough user traction - and was also the co-founder of Google Maps.
Chrome architect Matthew Papakipos, Android senior product manager Erick Tseng, and top ad executive David Fischer also decamped to Facebook earlier this year.
Other notable departures include Bret Taylor, the former CEO of Friendfeed and now Facebook's chief technology officer and platform manager Carl Sjogreen who led the team that gave the world Google Calendar.
At the Redfin corporate blog, Glenn Kelman recently noted that of the 2,174 Facebook employees with a profile on networking service Linkedin, 378 previously worked at Google.
Musical chairs aside, all attention here in Silicon Valley is focused on Mark Zuckerberg, who is coming to a swanky San Francisco hotel to make an announcement - which will come hours before an appearance by Google's CEO Eric Schmidt at the Web 2.0 Summit in a nearby hotel.
Mr Zuckerberg will be appearing at Web 2.0 on Tuesday.
It is worth remembering that it is all about the data. While Google has quite a bit to lose and Facebook has much to gain, what's in it for the humble user?
~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~13~RS~)
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It is worth remembering that it is all about the data. While Google has quite a bit to lose and Facebook has much to gain, what's in it for the humble user?
The answer I suspect will be an unbelieveble amount of spam from Facebook 'partners', most of which will be generated using peoples 'likes', group memberships etc.
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When Maggie asks, "what's in it for the humble user?" I have to wonder if she's being rhetorical.
My feeling is we don't get much out (an email address) for what we lose - an incalculable amount of privacy; and frankly, if this blog had a modicum of quality, that is what it would be analysing.
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I've had a hotmail account for ten years. Two or three years ago I decided to get a GMail account (mainly just to stop someone else registering the address), which I only started using properly when I got an iPhone wanted to read my email in the iPhone email app (which was just too bothersome to set up with hotmail). Since then, I've gradually moved a lot of my website accounts to my GMail address, but I've never fuly made the move completely from Hotmail, partly because it's handy to have an account for shopping websites etc, who are more likely to spam me and give my details to third parties.
Obviously we'll have to see how the facebook email evolves, but I currently see no need to suddenly abandon GMail just to have a facebook email address. I'll probably register my usual address with them, but that'll be it, as I have no desire to go trawling through websites, changing my email contact address again. Besides, my GMail account is also connected to the other Google services I use.
I still have people emailing me at my hotmail address instead of my GMail one - why would I want to create more confusion by changing my email account a second time? Certainly not to appear "in" with facebook - I'm not 13, so I don't care about that.
Facebook will have to watch what it's doing, because the bigger it gets, the nearer the time comes for the "facebook backlash", which is inevitable. Companies need to start realising when big is big enough.
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I use Gmail as my email service and have been since it first started. I do not trust anyone else with my email. I certainly do not trust Facebook as most of their games apps seem to be spam related, they do not seem to vet the applications at all. Every app seems to want the same info (contacts, addresses etc). I will not be switching, however I will register an email with them and then setup forwarding... to Gmail.
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Facebook/Google battle is heating up.
The mid-terms are over. The ads on TV seriously disrupt my TV viewing - not that there's much to watch on TV anyway. So I might as well get interested in this cyberspace war.
Google's Head of Mobile Product Development, Hugo Barra: "We're not working on a social network platform that's just going to be another social network platform..."
Okay, having made that statement, which tells us nothing, he goes further to say that social is not the only ingredient for success for any app going forward, search and advertising being probably the best two examples...
If he downplayed the word "advertising", I'm all for search capability.
Still, I don't believe that Google could compete with Facebook - socially. Google has thus far proven rather "socially" inept.
In case you think I'm being one-sided TechCrunch reports that Facebook will be launching its own Web-based email, which it calls (in the spirit of sociability): "Gmail killer."
I'm not keen on the email and social marriage.
The Digital Society
- gives Facebook a failing grade for security
- while it gives Gmail an "A."
Google is not (yet) close to losing its control over the Web, and personally, I am glad for this. I'm not anxious to join any "player" that cannot prove to me that it has tight, unbreakable security.
Why?
Because wherther we humble little users think about this or not, the real winner in all this tomfoolery is BIG BROTHER. Google and Facebook are at the hub of every privacy debate. Consequently, regulators in the Obama administration and the EU are working to change the rules for how these giants use and distribute their information.
What does this tell us?
How do they want to change it?
Will we be informed re changes?
What will be the derivative uses?
Here's another, perhaps more vital question:
If BIG BROTHER can get most users on one system (maybe two), with relatively loose security, is that system not easier to monitor? Suppose the Government wanted to round up every person who has ever, let's say, made reference to rebellion against the US Government?
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The extent to which I would expect Facebook to "pick up" data from any source available means that not only would I not even consider getting a Facebook-linked email address, I'd almost certainly never even reply to any email that I got from one.
I simply don't want everything I say parsed away into their database, when their company motto appears to be "Don't be good."
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I started using Gmail because friends of me had it, and because I am a technology geek, I experiment with stuff and easily find out cool features like receiving mail from other POP3 accounts. That is another main reason that I am using Gmail for. It allows me to receive my personal mail from several accounts and my school mail. While also having the feature of Google Calendar which syncronizes with iCal and my address book which does the same.
I use GTalk a lot and my MSN ID is also my google mail, all of this will result to one thing: everything gets send to my Gmail with 7GB of storage, a good spam filter, labels and filters.
On the other hand, I am just using facebook because all of my friends here use it and it is an easy way to stay in touch with them. And after all, I can't import Facebook chat in Adium because of the Great Firewall we have here. Now, I probably won't use Facebook mail because I don't see the point of it. It's more confusion to my friends probably than to myself.
And I totally agree with Google stopping to allow Facebook users to import their contacts because Facebook only does it one way, import, not export.
To get back to the question in the last sentence, Facebook is growing, it is probably going to dominate more in certain areas than others. To reduce confusion, people always like to stick to just one thing. But for me, a student in grade 11, Google still provides more use to me with Mail, Calendar, Docs, Chat and Search.
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I think it will be very interesting to see how Google reacts to this.
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Given the problems that FB currently have with their platform (both in terms of performance and stability) and they openly admit that they don't do full and proper testing of code before they push it out to the live servers (like they did on Friday afternoon) I can't see that an email system provided by them is going to be either reliable, OR secure.
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Whether Facebook mail will be a success will depend on how it is implemented. I work in computer security and many major organisations ban the use of mail accounts like hotmail, yahoo and gmail in the workplace - because they are avenues for what we call data leakage (sending company secrets to the outside world). But corporates generally allow access to Facebook - because users demand the ability to keep up with their social life at work - and the risk to the corporation of allowing access is manageable.
Therefore the big question for me is: Will I be able to easily block access to Facebook mail in the workplace without also blocking access to the whole of Facebook? If push comes to shove, I may have to block access to the whole of Facebook from the workplace. If other corporates follow suit, Facebook could find it has shot itself in the foot with this move.
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Would I risk putting my email through the security nightmare known as Facebook?
No chance.
Also, how exactly does Facebook intend to enhance my email experience?! Could they:
Match Gmail's Spam filter: No.
Make searching through my mail easier: No.
Offer me 6GB of email space for free: No.
Guarentee to not sell my informantion: No.
Give me any sort of piece of mind: No.
Facebook is a joke. It is the plaything of those who have no idea about the dangers of the internet. Go with this cowboy act at your own peril.
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I'm interested to see how this looks because after hearing the rumours of what Facebook mail will do I'm less likely to use it.
The assumption is that the mail will tie in with your Facebook contact lists. I've been activly trying to wall off Facebook for ages now, I'm down to about 80 friends (from about 300) and keep strict boundries between Facebook and my work life.
I'd be very cautious about any product that opens all that up again.
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I do like how people seem happy to give google all their data, but not Facebook. Despite the fact google use it to make money as much as facebook do.
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I'm minded of a very pertinent tagline from a rather poor film released a couple of years back:
"Whoever wins, we lose"
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@WelshBluebird1 - I don't like giving ANY company (Internet or otherwise) all my data - I don't care who's behind it.
I dislike Facebook, detest Twitter and hold Google at arm's length.
But I'm old enough to remember when privacy meant just that and being in business meant that you actually generated revenue before people invested (other people's hard earned money) in you.
No matter how much Facebook/Twitter appear to be worth or are claimed to be worth, they both have phenomenal operating costs which have to be found from somewhere: and that means us.
Th only reason I use Google at all is that of all the others, its search engine remains the most accurate (except in the rare cases I need a specialist such as Wolfram); but I'm savvy enough to also know that it's keeping everything I look for and where I'm located.
The more helpful Google tries to be - the more I know wants; and the more discrete I am.
But as I said, I'm old enough to have learnt to examine gift horses very carefully when they come from huge corporations; American ones in particular.
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I'm unlikely to ever use Facebook mail. Facebook is blocked on my job's network, as it should be, and an email service is completely useless to me if I can't access it in the place I spend most of my time. Earlier this year, after all the Facebook security issues, I deleted my Facebook account. I haven't missed it at all since then.
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Dear Maggie,
When you next have a chance to ask Mark Zuckerberg a question, please don't ask something so nebulous as "how will this channge how people interact?". There are SO many more important questions you could have asked!
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@nenslo
Questions such as: "When do you expect to become world president" or "Why do you continue to play fast and lose with people's personal data"?
I'd like to ask Maggie a question to: when is this blog actually going to break a story rather than recycle gossip (which is shortly proven completely incorrect) or press releases from a tiny minority of publicity hungry American companies?
I realise this might sting, but I'm not the only commentator here who is jaundiced with the amount of publicity this blog gives over to meaningless tittle-tattle and the companies behind it.
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BBC/Maggie/whoever,
why don't you just rename this blog:- The Facebook Blog
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Remembering how Mr. Zuckerberg accessed private facebook accounts with an "admin" password to have a look at them i think i will never ever use their e-mail service. At least with google i know no one will be checking my email. Though i know they provide certain information to advertisers.
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I realise this might sting, but I'm not the only commentator here who is jaundiced with the amount of publicity this blog gives over to meaningless tittle-tattle and the companies behind it.
@mardraco, @RedLinuxHacker
you could always go elsewhere, there are plenty of other tech blogs. By reading and posting here (even if you are doing so to comment negatively) you provide the blog and blogger support. As someone else mentioned, the business models of businesses rely on traffic (for ad impressions), and it doesn't matter if it is negative or positive. Of course, positive traffic is preferred, because it has better growth potential. The only way to truly show a lack of support for the blog is to leave, unless of course you enjoy leaving sniping comments.
As for the subject, I think it is legitimately interesting, even if I use and will continue to use gmail.
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Didn’t we go through all this a few years ago?
When Gmail was launched it was asked ‘would Gmail put Hotmail out of business?’ Of course it didn’t.
I now have email accounts with Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo and one or two others; I’ll probably try the Facebook offering too, just to see if it lives up to the hype – my guess is it won’t.
Given Facebook already has a messaging service and chat facility it’s difficult to see the ability to email people not on Facebook as being that much of a ‘killer app’.
My guess is that for a majority of Facebook users most of the people they’d want to send messages to are also now on Facebook – so the existing message services are already perfectly adequate.
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