Hotmail Joins the Fray!

[Alex Pelan]

An email my friend forwarded to me yesterday:


IMPORTANT INFORMATION REGARDING YOUR ACCOUNT
************************************************** ********************

Dear MSN® Hotmail® Member:

As a valued MSN Hotmail Member, we want you to know that there are
some exciting changes coming soon to your account that will help you
do more, receive more and store more than ever before. And it's FREE.

That's not all.

We're rolling out email antivirus protection as well as enhanced
storage to help meet your growing needs. This will make MSN Hotmail,
a world class email service that both scans and cleans ingoing and
outgoing email for viruses and worms before they enter your inbox.

In addition to delivering world-class antivirus protection, you can
also look forward to an upgrade in your storage capacity. In fact,
you'll receive 125 times your current email storage with the
introduction of a 250 MB inbox as well as the ability to send
attachments up to 10 MB.

We'd like to thank you for being a valued MSN Hotmail Member and look
forward to telling you about more exciting changes to your Hotmail
account in the coming months.

We will send an update on when and how these exciting changes will be
made to your account within two weeks. Please check your email for
this important update.

Thank you, and enjoy the good news.

MSN Hotmail Member Services

So, first Yahoo steps their storage up to 100mb, now microsoft has to outdo them and go up to 250! Sounds like they are getting more and more afraid of Gmail.

Comments would be appreciated. Will this change your opinion on switching to Yahoo/Gmail?

Personally, I would say that I like the Gmail interface a lot more than hotmail anyways, even though I probably don't need 250 mb even. Not to mention I have noticed that Gmail is much faster.

[Jay H 237]

This is getting to be interesting. I wonder when these free email battles will stop! Even though I just got Gmail two weeks ago I still have my Hotmail account I've had for almost four years. I haven't checked it in a few days so I haven't seen that announcement yet. I'm going to hang on to it and see what other changes they do besides the new storage limit. Who knows, they might even speed it up and change the look of it.
The bottom line is with the introduction of Gmail and Yahoo bumping up thier limit Microsoft had to do something to keep running with the pack. We all know how Microsoft hates not being on top of everything!

[Dorienne]

It doesn't really matter to me, as long as it's fast and is free. I don't like the fact that sometimes you have to pay for email. Drives me nuts. I've been with Yahoo! for like, 2 years or so and I really love it. I like how they turned it up a notch a bit ago, but I don't really need all the space they gave me. I delete almost everything I get in my email, so it doesn't matter. *shrug*
--d0ri

[Mike Ciance]

i still like AOL mail the best. but maybe it is because cost is not an issue, since my family gets AOL free .

[sanddrag]

10MB Attatchments! OMG - that is way too large for e-mail! What are they trying to crash the Internet?!?!?

[shyra1353]

I have hotmail too .. and I havent seen that notice yet ...

And even though I have gmail ... for some reason, the hotmail account I have had for the past 3 years is still more active ...

What i dont like about gmail though is how you have to type in the contacts names ... with hotmail you can see your contact on the same page as where you are writing your message and you can just click on the contact to add them ..
its a pain when you send out forwards .. maybe its to discourage forwards ??

[Astronouth7303]

If you add a contact, when you type in the name, a little box pops up with the name.

See?

[Ashley Weed]

My hotmail account hasn't seem to have been enlarged yet. I have really enjoyed Gmail so far (besides the price I paid for it on ebay ). I have a huge problem with my ISP e-mail and getting spam in there, so I hope to get gmail to filter that out eventually.

[Yan Wang]

This is old news. It's been at the logon screen for hotmail to the left (in a little column) for weeks... the update won't happen till the early fall apparently.

[evulish]

Screw 100mb/250mb/1gb of space. I want free IMAP.

[Ryan M.]

Originally Posted by evulish

Screw 100mb/250mb/1gb of space. I want free IMAP.

?eh? Why?

To be able to access using a regular email program?

[shyra1353]

Originally Posted by Astronouth7303

If you add a contact, when you type in the name, a little box pops up with the name.

See?

right .. but if you are sending out a forward .. you then have to think of everyone you want to send it to .. and then think again as to what you have them saved as in your address book (nickname or real name ??) .. and you have to type the first letter .. and then click .. and then do it again .. and again .. and while it is fine for normal emails .. it is amazingly annoying for forwards ...

edit: i just got this email today .. im glad .. its about time ..

[Brandon Martus]

Originally Posted by shyra1353

right .. but if you are sending out a forward .. you then have to think of everyone you want to send it to .. and then think again as to what you have them saved as in your address book (nickname or real name ??) .. and you have to type the first letter .. and then click .. and then do it again .. and again .. and while it is fine for normal emails .. it is amazingly annoying for forwards ...

Google must be indirectly trying to curb the number of chain letter FWD's people send out. Yee-haw.

[Blacknight]

I use a little known myway and they are going to upgrade me also, but they have been saying that since the spring.