MS to sell Outlook access to Hotmail

While I agree this is a good idea for a service, I think the price is a bit high. $60 a year to get email, contact, and calendar functionality via Outlook to your Hotmail account? I think it is a service that some folks would like, but I think the price point is wrong.

Not to mention the security issues. And the licensing. I mean, how many people are really going to go buy the full blown version of Office/Outlook, just to pay $50 a year, so they can have functionality that is freely available elsewhere? I know I don't own Outlook myself...it's always been provided by an employer...at least the most current version. Will this work with Outlook Express *shudder*

No, I think while this is a good idea, they aren't going to be nearly as successful with it at $59 a year...unless they sell it with a huge helping of FUD.

Link

After shelling out the 99 bucks for Office 2003 educational edition, (which includes outlook and access) I find it pretty peeving. Currently outlook is my primary email client, but this has me thinking more on getting a different one...perhaps it's time to return to the old school and pickup eudora.

I think the reason M$ is selling off outlook is because of all the security problems it's had in the past with it - it's quite the unpopular email client because of this, and because there's so many other ways of getting one's email. Even my own isp has a website where I can check it, but it's inconvenient to me to have to type the URL every time I want to see what's come in, and more inconvenient to me to set it as my homepage (that's reserved for AO, thank you!)

It's odd that they'd throw Access into the mix however. It's widely used albeit a bit tough to understand while learning it. Everyone needs a database though, and access fills the bill quite nicely here in the |ce household. Once again, however, if this turns out to be true, access goes byebye.

Thanks for the clue-in.

[edit] Hmmm.... maybe ThunderBird since FireFox kicks so much ass...[/edit]

Blackice, two words: "G" "mail"

and they have a nice little notifier tool that sits in your systray and announces new email, just like Thunderbird and Outlook do. Oh, and it's all SSL encrypted. Oh, and it's a gig of storage. Oh, and it's free.

If you need an invite, lemme know.

As I said in the pm I shot just before reading your reply here, If I need one, I'll yell - the accounts I described in pm work quite nicely, and ThunderBird rocks just as hard as Firefox does - I'm seriously impressed yet again by Mozilla - I think I'll send 'em some money.

Tch, typical M$. Yes, I use Gmail. I also use Thunderbird (even with Outlook Express on the PC).

Like most other M$ products, Outlook loads slowly and takes more out of the system than it should (unlike Thunderbird which loads instantly) also Gmail updates instantly, faster than the Hotmail page can load the 30 ads (not to mention SSL encryption for POP3 and TLS encryption for SMTP).


So let's compare!

Hotmail:
- (Idk the space, definately not anywhere near 1 GB)
- Multiple ads on site (large annoying ones)
- Loads slowly, and I've noticed with Hotmail and Yahoo it sends/recieves mail slowly
- Costs to upgrade ANYTHING (extra space, POP3/SMTP, random crap I'd never use anyways)
- Sends its own spam


Gmail:
- 1 GB FREE space for mail/attachments
- FREE POP3/SMTP server access
- Great interface (mail archiving, conversation archive system, starring system)
- Rare ads (Maximum of 3-4 text ads in a tiny ass box on the right side of the screen, all Google sponsored ads.. I rarely see them though)
- Very quick servers (no filler crap around your emails, doesn't have to load 40,000 pics or ads..)
- Oh yeah! (read Zen's post again).. the Gmail Notifier (small e-mail tool that sits in the Windows system tray and notifies you when you recieve new mail, double click the icon to open the browser to your Gmail inbox.)


Anyways, maybe I'm biased but Gmail seems to be the best mail service I've ever had (sadly probably better than my webhost, I know I use it alot more).

If anyone needs an invite I have 3, but I know ALOT of people willing to give away 20+ each so it'd be no problem finding one.

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$60 a year to get email, contact, and calendar functionality via Outlook to your Hotmail account?

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60 a year? With all the free email services that are out there now, as stated why pay? I wouldnt pay for something I can get for free. Anyways Why not just configure Hotmail in Outlook e-mail client? To do this open Microsoft Outlook Click on Tools, go down to e-mail accounts, (assuming your running 2000/xp version) A dialog box will appear asking 2 things: "Add an new email account" or "view or change exisiting mail account" place the dot in the first option which is "Add an new email account", hit next.

Next it will ask you to select the type of server IMAP POP3, SMTP, HTTP, etc... place the dot in HTTP since thats what hotmail uses. Incomming mail HTTP server for hotmail is http://services.msn.com/svcs/hotmail/httpmail.asp

Hit next, now you see a form field page asking for basic information fill it out, make sure to place a check in my http server requires authentication when done hit next, then click finish. This will configure outlook for hotmail. To test your email account to make sure its configured correctly send an email to yourself. If your able to get it then its working perfectly, if you don't and it comes up with an error code "0x800ccc?? Delete it and rebuild it. Whole process takes 2 to 3minutes. Hope this helps Computernerd22

Computernerd22, I think the point of selling the service is they are selling the whole 'PIM' package. Lame, yes. But the they will sell, I assume, is you are paying to have an Outlook w/ Exchange-esque looking and functioning client. Contacts, calendars (Notes and the Journal? Task reminders?) and email.

Yes, I agree, don't pay that much...unless you REALLY want to have it, then best of luck to you. (well, not YOU, I can tell...but the buyer. :D)

Hehe, that's an interesting read. I can already see the problems that'll run rampant and that's just the security side. I can't imagine what they're really thinking of gathering if it's going to cost to get the program as well as a yearly cost. Most households use the outdated and outclassed OE because it's "free" and wouldn't go for the alternative, that being Outlook.

I'll stick with Thunderbird. A program that loads instantly, sends/receives immediately, doesn't clutter things up, doesn't trash my resources, does everything it says it does and nothing it doesn't. MS has a long ways to go in regards to that. And TB is just one of the many that are free and the others that are paid for but have a ton of stuff going for them. Eudora, Pegasus, The Bat!, and others...

Hey Hey,

I typed out a big long post to this thread yesterday and then decided against posting it... Today I'm going to type out a new one...

To me you all are just looking for a reason to bash MS.... You don't have to take advantage of this service... It's an additional feature they're making available to you if you wish to utilize it... Those of you that go on and on saying I'll use Thunderbird, I'll use Eudora, I'll use The Bat!.. you make me think you have no experience with Outlook.. I have it installed everywhere and use it constantly...

From a security aspect, it's at the point wher it functions quite well... It doesn't load images by default, it blocks certain attachments and gives warnings about others.... It does a lot more than some other browsers, making it more useful than many other Email clients... It also supports Exchange connectivity (Obviously) but still it's nice... You can also add hotmail and msn to Outlook already... as well as other webbased mail providers (if they allow it). However this is all still just email related, and that's how you're seeing it... as only a mail client..

Outlook is much more than that.. It's a full out PIM (Personal Information Manger for those of you that are wondering).. I can sync it with my PDA (Palm or Windows-based)... I can store contacts with more detail than any other Address book out there... I can set calendar appointments (I am actually beta testing a systray app that I wrote that you can click on.. set an appointment/calendar event and even mail other parties involved)... and on that note there are several APIs available for modifying and creating Addons for Outlook. I receive all my RSS feeds into Outlook and browse through them using the same outlook search functionality that I get with my mail. I can record and send Video email directly through outlook without needed a third party program... (other than the addon)... These things make it simple for the end user and helpful for us advanced users. I know several classmates that make extensive use of the Tasks feature.... and I have used it myself on occasion.... The same goes for the Journal... It gives you the functionality of several programs.... by running a single applications... Letting you cross over your outlook calendar with hotmail is a very nice feature.. one that I would definately pay 60/year for... It gives you a remote way of checking your calendar... which is very handy...

I'm guessing that those of you that have commented don't use Exchange at work... and if you do you don't make a lot of use of it beyond sending email... Outlook WebAccess is amazing.. and provides you with a lot of extended ability... this Hotmail promotion will give the common user the same functionality with their hotmail account... You can push GMail but trust be told it doesn't have the user base of hotmail, nor does it have the popularity... People like and trust hotmail... No one has every questioned their privacy with it, at least not to the extent that people are currently questioning GMail..

Anyways you can't look at it as an email service.. it's much more and if you'd ever experienced something like that you'd realize that it's useful for a lot of people...

Also as a side note.. Many people keep going on and on about GMails 1GB mailbox.. but if you're downloading your email to a client.. it doesn't matter how big the mailbox is because everything will always reside on your Harddrive (unless you set your mail client to leave it on the server also).. This is why GMail added SMTP/POP3 support.... It results is less mail on their server...


Anyways stop bashing good business ventures just because your juvenile minds can't comprehend the usefulness of a business oriented application.

Peace,
HT

Quote:

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Originally posted here by HTRegz
Hey Hey,

I typed out a big long post to this thread yesterday and then decided against posting it... Today I'm going to type out a new one...

To me you all are just looking for a reason to bash MS.... You don't have to take advantage of this service... It's an additional feature they're making available to you if you wish to utilize it... Those of you that go on and on saying I'll use Thunderbird, I'll use Eudora, I'll use The Bat!.. you make me think you have no experience with Outlook.. I have it installed everywhere and use it constantly...

From a security aspect, it's at the point wher it functions quite well... It doesn't load images by default, it blocks certain attachments and gives warnings about others.... It does a lot more than some other browsers, making it more useful than many other Email clients... It also supports Exchange connectivity (Obviously) but still it's nice... You can also add hotmail and msn to Outlook already... as well as other webbased mail providers (if they allow it). However this is all still just email related, and that's how you're seeing it... as only a mail client..

Outlook is much more than that.. It's a full out PIM (Personal Information Manger for those of you that are wondering).. I can sync it with my PDA (Palm or Windows-based)... I can store contacts with more detail than any other Address book out there... I can set calendar appointments (I am actually beta testing a systray app that I wrote that you can click on.. set an appointment/calendar event and even mail other parties involved)... and on that note there are several APIs available for modifying and creating Addons for Outlook. I receive all my RSS feeds into Outlook and browse through them using the same outlook search functionality that I get with my mail. I can record and send Video email directly through outlook without needed a third party program... (other than the addon)... These things make it simple for the end user and helpful for us advanced users. I know several classmates that make extensive use of the Tasks feature.... and I have used it myself on occasion.... The same goes for the Journal... It gives you the functionality of several programs.... by running a single applications... Letting you cross over your outlook calendar with hotmail is a very nice feature.. one that I would definately pay 60/year for... It gives you a remote way of checking your calendar... which is very handy...

I'm guessing that those of you that have commented don't use Exchange at work... and if you do you don't make a lot of use of it beyond sending email... Outlook WebAccess is amazing.. and provides you with a lot of extended ability... this Hotmail promotion will give the common user the same functionality with their hotmail account... You can push GMail but trust be told it doesn't have the user base of hotmail, nor does it have the popularity... People like and trust hotmail... No one has every questioned their privacy with it, at least not to the extent that people are currently questioning GMail..

Anyways you can't look at it as an email service.. it's much more and if you'd ever experienced something like that you'd realize that it's useful for a lot of people...

Also as a side note.. Many people keep going on and on about GMails 1GB mailbox.. but if you're downloading your email to a client.. it doesn't matter how big the mailbox is because everything will always reside on your Harddrive (unless you set your mail client to leave it on the server also).. This is why GMail added SMTP/POP3 support.... It results is less mail on their server...


Anyways stop bashing good business ventures just because your juvenile minds can't comprehend the usefulness of a business oriented application.

Peace,
HT

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Nah, I bash MS for a lot of other reasons. This isn't MS bashing for me so much as it is me noticing yet another attempt to garner more market share. Nothing wrong with that, as it's a business practice.

When I got into MS when Win 95 became "the big thing", even though I liked Windows 3.11 w/ an actual shell, I got to see OE and IE. I got to spend the next few years watching other competitors fail and lose ground to bad code purposefully implemented by MS so that people would say "Wow, Netscape just bombed again, I'm going back to IE.". I got to deal with the problems that tying your browser, which was not uninstallable to any degree without breaking everything under the sun, directly into the engine that drives your OS, get POUNDED with critical flaw after critical flaw.

And now, here we are with Longhorn approaching and MS has problems all over the place. To me, this has nothing to do with Exchange at work or using Outlook at home, etc. Outlook is part of Office. Nothing wrong with using office, but how many people here use Editpad Pro? Or Moffsoft Calculator? Or using a REAL database, as MS Access is NOT a real database, like PostgreSQL? Or Star Office's spreadsheeting? It's my choice to use what I want, not because of lack of knowledge in using something MS has, but I get better stability and functionality from third-party programs. Sure, Outlook is great, and at work, we use it. Some use a lot of what you talked about. I still use TB and FF because it's my choice.

The service they're pushing out could be good for others. Me, I'd rather write my own in php/postgresql and tie it in with my main account and end up with my own webmail utility, but then again, that's just me wanting to learn more.

As for the 'juvenile' comment, that's entirely up to you. Seems someone here got bent about people not necessarily agreeing with something else that MS is doing. Maybe if MS had better 'business applications and practices', they wouldn't be suffering these judgements.

The thing is, either you will use it or not. I happen to be a cheap bastard and use free stuff like Open Office. I have no idea how useful Outlook is because I have never used it. Some say it is like Envolution, but well.

Maybe I am reading this wrong? I thought Microsoft owned Hotmail............so they are not selling anything to anyone, except Joe Public?

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he service will cost US$59.95 a year but is being offered through April 19 for $44.95. For that price, consumers get the downloadable Outlook 2003 for Subscription Services, 2 GB of Hotmail or MSN Mail storage and the ability to manage multiple e-mail accounts and view schedules, contacts and to-do lists.

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As I recall, MS took away Hotmail support for OE and Outlook from free Hotmail accounts, but retained it for subscription accounts. An obvious ploy to force people to either look at their adverts via the Hotmail client, or pay for the service.

I notice that they are now offering 2Gb of storage ;)

In the old days AFAIK, Outlook was not sold as a separate module, unlike Word, Access, Excel and Powerpoint, so they seem to be trying to make up for it?

And I am sure that "access" means "access to" not "Acccess the database", they are pretty unrelated products (Outlook & Access) are they not?

just my thoughts :)

I've been on hotmail since way before MS bought it. You could access your account via SMTP for free. And even a year or so after MS took over you could still use ANY mail client that supported SMTP. Now they want to offer a connection with a full version of Outlook. If people want to pay it, that's cool. It is true, you don't need a fancy account somewhere to use Outlook as a PIM, it's all stored on the local PC or Exchange store. And this is not a full fledge Exchange hosting option but it's close. I have to side on HT with this.

On the surface this is an excellent product for small businesses who want group email solutions without buying one. There is no way you could get that same functionality for free. Well if you are a techie you can get close, sure but if you have a small office with NO Information Technology then this is definitely a good deal compared to paying the same for some Linux based technical solutions or hosting company. As for me, I wouldn’t pay it, but hey I have the budget for Exchange and on a personal level I want free, on my own websites. So I deal with less functional products like horde. There are other companies that offer the same functionality as hotmail will, and for less money. But a lot of people already have a hotmail account, so that could be attractive

In addition to cost benefit, one might look at security as an argument. But most businesses I have seen use free or less expensive products and run email from obscure companies anyway. They are usually slow to respond to help desk issues, which I would gauge at also as being slow to respond to any security related issues. So I wouldn’t consider them to be any more secure. And most free email systems are based on PHP. We've had the PHP security discussion a few times. ;)

//EDIT Nihil, if you have ever used Outlook with Exchange, that is what they are selling. Group based storage, in that you can share: calendars, mail, notes, to-do lists, and contacts. Then associate all of those with each other based on several factors along with documents. All this using your browser. Others offer similar functions but you will pay for those as well and they are not anywhere near as funtional. It is alot more than access to your mail account.