To Gmail or not to Gmail?

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I am ambivalent.
The other free email services are doing the same thing, they just aren't telling you. and in the case of Micosoft, my guess is that they are so big they don't care and wouldn't notice unless you did something stupidly obvious.
I hadn't realized Google was a commercial enterprise until I got my gmail account (I tend not to be interested in news in any form). I am still loyal but looking for alternatives. I am keeping both the gmail and hotmail accounts. I also have three ISPs with associated forms of email. I like the verizon and the mail.map best - somehow these are less overstimulating. The gmail is also very low key, but since I just got it I won't judge it yet.

I got my third gmail account this morning. It is as I suspected. If you google gmail on a computer which has not been used to get a gamil account, you get invited.
I now have 149 invites to share...

BTW, I also found out that gmail does not have group or distribution capability yet. This makes no sense to me. You'd think this would limit their ability to compete with hotmail and yahoo.

I have some impairment about using yahoo that i can't figure out. i can never remember my usernames and so have to keep creating new accounts. i don't get this. something about the site stops me.

All search engines kind of suck.

That means that Google had done half the espionage work for the government. All the NSA has to do is set up a SQL server to document mail with certain keywords for their project Echelon and have a copy sent to an FBI SQL server foir their project Carnivore.

This is an informative thread. Looks like I won't respond to Gmail accounts anymore.

Are you joking? I mean that seriously, because some people do not respond to gmail accounts, although I think that's extreme. It's no different than any other major e-mail provider. As they always used to say, treat your e-mail like a postcard, if you're looking for more security, the only way is to encrypt it. Last I checked, the government needs a warrant to look at your e-mail, unless it's >180 days old, in which case they need a subpoena. Either way, I don't think it's any more difficult for them to get information from any other e-mail provider. If you want to be really secure, run your own e-mail server and delete the logs/messages.

I've been reading more on this, and while it is slightly disconcerting, their policies don't seem any worse than other providers to me. EPIC released a statement on it, and while I usually agree with them, I'm not so sure on this one. To me, the biggest qualm I have is the long data retention, the fact that they will transfer that data to a new company if they're bought out, and their loose claims about when they have to disclose data.

The interesting part is that this thread has had a lot of reads, and I have had only one request for an account.
Perhaps we are all hitting up other people's computers for those additional accounts?
I wonder if I have crossed a line...
Nah, I have always had a hobby of defeating systems.

If you don't want the ads you can just enable pop3 on your account and you never see them that way.

I agree that gmail isn't any different from other email providers in terms of privacy but people are more aware of the privacy concerns with it. I have had a gmail account for quite some time now and I am very happy with it.

anyone want to give me an invite?

I don't think Gmail is all that hot. I'm in a website provided email.

I would pay for a non ad non scanned gmail account.Have a gmail account i use for beta testing emails. And free email is not free but ad paid for. I do have a paid for yahoo account that has no ads but i do wish they would add ssl all the time not only for login. And I only use yahoo webmail and groups that's it no searching or news. Use a mix of places works better and lowers the risk if any one of them goes out of business.

I'm paranoid about a lot of things. Someone follows me too many turns in traffic, someone is standing too close to me in the store, this person has been looking at me for far too long.

But email really what's the big deal if uncle sam knows I spent $30 on Transformers, or thanked someone for complimenting my website.

I use gmail because the spam filtering is excellent. I used to change emails on a yearly basis because I'd eventually be chased off my account by spammers. I never get spam on my gmail account and I've had it since they launched.

Wow!

Some of you just bumped an old thread, and that is ironic.

This is such because I want to know how you can set up a Gmail account.