This is the first ever Techsplosive Showdown. Techsplosive will take a look at two competing services and decide on which one clearly comes out on top. So here it is – Gmail v. Yahoo! Mail.
The Radicati Group reported in the year 2007 that an estimated 1.2 billion people use email. This number is expected to grow to 1.6 billion by 2011. Of these 1.2 billion email users it is estimated that 254.6 million of them use Yahoo mail, or a Yahoo owned mail system to accomplish their email needs. Only 91.6 million users have adopted Gmail as their email service provider. The mere fact that Yahoo enjoys almost three times the membership that Gmail possesses does not make it the better service. Yahoo is able to have 3 times the membership because they began their email services a few years prior to the launch of Gmail.
Google’s email service launched with much anticipation in the summer of 2004. Prior to the launch of Gmail, the most common email services were AOL, MSN (and its properties such as HotMail), and Yahoo. Users of these electronic mailing platforms were growing increasingly bored with the features and complexity of the user interfaces. In response to the consumers need, Google launched Gmail. Gmail has proven itself superior to all email programs including Yahoo mail during the past four short years of its existence.
The main thing that sets Gmail above Yahoo mail is its superior user friendly approach to email. Google developed a system in which email became a simple and efficient process. Google saw that Yahoo mail users had to click to a whole new screen to add attachments to emails and in response allowed users to add attachments with just one click on the same screen as the email itself. Google noticed that Yahoo mail users were wasting time typing in email addresses each time a user needed to send an email. As a result Gmail “remembers” previously used email addresses so that the address must only be keyed in for the initial email. To round out Gmail’s user friendly approach, it is also quite important to point out the fact that when emails are either deleted or moved to a new folder in Yahoo mail the screen must be given time to refresh. However, Google utilized a coding language called Ajax which allows Gmail users to delete mail, archive mail, and otherwise move it to any other folder without wasting a few seconds each time waiting for the screen to refresh.
In addition to Gmail’s user friendly feature set, Google’s mail services contains extra features which are completely non-existent within the Yahoo mail platform. In recent updates, Gmail has almost turned itself into a social networking platform with the addition of personal status updates, an instant chat feature, online friend indicators, background customization, and the ability to watch videos directly from Gmail chat. One of the most recent additions to the superior feature set of Gmail is the offline email access feature. Google realized that accessing email was only possible with internet access. The offline Gmail feature allows users to open an internet browser, go to Gmail.com, and access their full email archive without the necessity of internet access. Many corporations and universities have noticed the superiority of the Gmail service, and through Gmail’s syndication program have incorporated the service for company and school wide usage.
For the simple email user looking for a basic email platform, Yahoo mail will suffice. However, for the email user who desires easy usability, practical and premium features all for free, it is evident that only Gmail will meet their standards.
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